You don't learn to walk until you believe you can which comes from a combination of modeling those around you and positive reinforcement from your parents or others supervising you.

At the same time, limits to beliefs constantly hold us down until we achieve Breakthroughs that help us to clearly see that what we thought was previously a limit is no longer a limit.

This is a fundamental truth of personal improvement and achieving success…and is so often the reason that people excel only when their back is to the wall and they are forced into different belief patterns to survive.

NOW – belief versus BELIEF!

What we don't realize though is there is a huge difference between believing something is possible and BELIEVING it is possible.

Here's what I mean.

When you talk to yourself in your head about overcoming your fear of public speaking you try to convince yourself that you can be wonderful, natural and highly effective up on that stage in front of the masses…yet this belief is marginal, technical…you don't really feel it in your gut that it is absolute.

But, when you see someone you know very well who is even more fearful than you get up and rock the house, suddenly your perception of the baseline changes…you now KNOW with certainty, emotional belief and absolute committment that it is 100% probably you will rock the house when you get up there.

That's the difference between BELIEF and belief.

There is no doubt, when we BELIEVE a goal or purpose is attainable, we WILL drive effectively toward that goal…overcoming all previous doubts, uncertainties and fears.

But that BELIEF must be emotional, enhanced by stimulation of all your senses (seen, heard, felt, smelled…) through visualization, elevating your emotional state, putting yourself in the place of having already succeeded and surrounding yourself with models that will help you KNOW what you want to achieve is not only possible, but a certainty.

Inside Attracting Greatness we share our own life story (along with several lessons) of how we went from broken down health, finances, relationships and profession to a very different and amazing place in just a few years…applying the principles like these and many others. If you are looking to change your life in a meaningful, long-lasting way and want to escape from your current life situation…check it out, lives just like yours have been changed.

It could be a musician that delivers the first few notes of a song so convincingly that you get goosebumps up and down your body or a top industry expert that seems so comfortable and certain about their views that you find yourself nodding in agreement within minutes of sitting down to listen to them.

Wouldn't it be great to have that impact on other people?

How do you gain that sort of persuasive influence over others, where you no longer have to fight, struggle and scream to be heard, but where your very presence is enough to make others fall under your spell?

The mistake many people make is looking at psychological tactics as the way to possess this influence, yet it is not tactics alone that will deliver what you want.

See, many of the tactics call for being likeable, using humor, practicing reciprocity, and modelling the behavior of those you wish to influence…but these will come off looking simply like techniques of manipulation if you are missing the one factor that almost nobody talks about…CERTAINTY.

When you are 110% certain about your convictions and you are around others who are 90% certain, you get instant influence – one of the reasons this is true is that certainty is one of the core human needs that we actively seek out.  The more we care about something, the more powerful the need for certainty.

Certainty Comes From…

The next question then becomes, where does certainty come from?

Can you fake certainty?

Can you appear to be certain about something when you really are unsure yourself?

No!

Certainty comes from one fundamental concept – BELIEF.

But what if you're not SURE if you believe ENOUGH to have the certainty you need?

Ah….now we are getting to the root of an incredible breakthrough…

Train yourself to believe!

Yes, through techniques outlined in Attracting Greatness that include visualization, meditation, specific types of affirmations, and specific methods to draw out your inner belief and strength you can tap into unwavering belief which will lead you to the certainty missing from your life today.

With unwavering conviction and belief comes certainty which leads to confidence and swagger (we like to use that word today!)  which gives us the basis for powerful influence.

Because everything is aligned…our needs, beliefs and convictions as well as a high level of certainty we set the foundation for incredible fulfillment and happiness in our life.

But remember, you can't FAKE certainty…it must come from within,

We only tap our potential to the degree that we BELIEVE it is possible

We only take action to the level that fulfills the potential we BELIEVE is possible

We will, by extension, only achieve results that match potential based on the BELIEFS

So, we can wish, desire and dream as much as possible, but if we do not BELIEVE, we will not achieve the results that we so badly want.

Remind you of the hamster running on the wheel?

Now, when someone suggests we examine our beliefs, that's not easy for most of us to do…we can't

Intellectually we may be smart and positive, but emotionally (which drives our beliefs to a greater degree) we are actually very negative and limiting.

"My Dad was an alcoholoc so I will likely be too"

"I don't know enough to…"

"I don't have the time too…"

"I didn't have the connections…"

"If only I had…"

"I failed once, so I will fail again"

If you REALLY want something, you WILL find a way…find the energy, the time, the way, the contacts

But if you look back at any major achievement in your life, a deep, passionate belief that it could be accomplished came BEFORE the achievement.

Am I right?

You had to have saw, felt and imagined what it was going to be like when you succeeded in achieving a desired outcome before that achievement actually occurred.

In many cases, this is done through years of imagining, visualizing, and thinking (if not seeing through someone else you model) about a desired outcome…it's just that you take it for granted because it because your NORMAL…the way you spend each day of your life.

So, it goes without saying that to achieve your desires you must focus on displacing those negative beliefs with unwavering, emotionally charged, crystal clear and unwavering belief that you WILL achieve…that's how to begin right now to succeed no matter what your starting point is.

Is there anything more frustrating that knowing you are heading 100 Mph into an oncoming train, but you can't find the break and can't get out of the way?

That's what it's like for us when we hit one of those points in life where we live out the same scene in a movie over and over again without being able to reset the scene.

But to realize your potential, escape pain, feed your human need to learn and experience new things and boost your self-confidence as well as your impact on those around you…you MUST find a way to break out of a rut through changing your life.

Here's a terrific 5-minute video from Tony Robbins taken from a Lifeclass he taught on the Oprah OWN network recently.

He highlights 3 main catalysts to invoke change…

1. Your strategies – knowing HOW to accomplish your dreams and goals

2. Knowing and being able to change your story – this hits the core of why you are stuck today and how to break out of being stuck, re-framing your life

3. Change your state…breaking out of your comfort zone as we all get too comfortable with states that no longer give us the edge we need to be truly happy and productive

Watch the video here, love to hear your comments…to me this is pretty powerful stuff when you know where you would rather be in your life, but can't seem to start the journey toward getting there:

Our talk was about business, but it holds true no matter what the desired outcome is…losing weight, attracting a meaningful relationship, having people like and respect you, feeling good about yourself, being motivated and energetic…it doesn't matter.

What it comes down to is properly managing the fear of DOING or NOT DOING in terms of making progress toward your desird outcome.

What is the #1 thing that gets in the way of anything we seek to achieve? 

Fear isn't it?

We we are faced with a critical point of progress in our life , we become afraid that…

- It won't work and then what do we do?
- That we will look bad or have a bad reputation
- That we will lose everything we have so far
- That we won't be able to sustain the outcome
- That we may be rejected

And the really big fear…

"That we personally will not be able to handle any of these outcomes and that something even worse than the current situation will be the outcome" 

That's it isn;t it?

When do many people experience breakthroughs in their life?

When they HAD to!

In other words, their back was against the way, they were at or near rock bottom, had little to lose and so at that point the fear of failing was tiny compared to the fear of not taking massive action. 

NOW…THE GOOD NEWS ABOUT FEAR

So, if we constantly sabotage our progress by fearing the consequences, doesn't it make sense that we flip this on its head and reverse the Fear context here? 

In other words, work on making the "lack" of action larger than the fear of taking action. 

For me, as is taught in Attracting Greatness, this changed dramatically when I started regularly practicing meditation.  Meditation allowed me to put the fear of "what happens if I do X" into clear perspective…I could then manage that fear and then deliverately associate conscious thought to fearing the "what if I do NOT do X…" 

Using this approach we can completely control how often and how impactful change can be in our life…despite years of avoidance, procrastination, fear, anxiety and low self-confidence…we can really initiate that change and make it consistent in our life.

Believe me, it's far better to use Fear than to be used BY Fear. 

You get caught up in the next big crisis at work.

Your kids interrupt you to help with their homework or to have you break up an argumnent.

Or perhaps you are just too tired at the end of a draining day and you'll get to it tomorrow.

The problem is, you have been telling yourself that for the last few weeks.

I'm not a psychologist, scientist or new-age expert, but I do believe in a few key concepts:

1. You will not achieve what you first do not conceive.  Everything I have been able to achieve in life has first been conceived in my mind…sometimes dileberately with great effort, sometimes through seeing it in someone else and subconsciously modeling their achievement. 

2. Allowing life to happen TO you is a recipe for unhappiness…you will be stuck in a reactive mode as others try and achieve their vision in life

3. Having a Vision for your life leads to so many other benefits such as motivation, happiness, higher self-confidence and better health

4. You must make "planning your future" a TOP priority in your life, above all else because it has such a profound impact on your life and the lives of those around you. 

5. You need to have a firmly planned outcome, but be open to flexibly living out that plan.  Look, just as NOT having a vision does not work, trying to control every aspect of your life living out a script is equally too rigid.  What is important is that you have a clear, deeply held, emotional and BIG vision for what you want in life that ramains unchanged.  Accompanything this vision is a Phase 1 plan that IS subject to modification…as new opportunities and events occur, you can change course as long as it supports reaching your ultimate desired outcome. 

Stop putting off plans to look at what your life COULD be.  Right now, put that at the TOP of your list, don't wait another day – get started now.

• Lack of Motivation
• Procrastination
• Low Energy
• Low self-esteem
• Poor self-confidence
• Addictions
• Unhealthy Lifestyle
• Problematic Relationships
• etc…

Naturally we become consumed with the issues we are going through at that time, they govern our thoughts, our self-talk, our conscious mind and impact our behavior.

How do you break out of the rut quickly so that you do not become constantly and chronically consumed with the challenges you face in life?

We all face these challenges, yet some people are able to move on quickly while others get buried.

Within Attracting Greatness there is a powerful roadmap for Getting Unstuck in life and improving your overall outlook, energy, physical and emotional health so that you place yourself in the best position to achieve your amazing potential. 

A critical part of the process is developing a "Vision" for various aspects of your life.

I suggest you have a "Vision" for where you want to be in the following areas:

• Relationships
• Career (in terms of what VALUE you contribute to society in return for income)
• Financial (how you keep, grow and invest your money for the good of society and maximum return)
• Health (physical and emotional)
• Social (what can you do to enhance the social environmnet around you)
• Creative/Personl (how you can grow each day in order to align closer to your true potential – and beyond!)

Do you have a Vision in each of these areas?

It really is worth the small amount of time and effort required to craft a clear Vision supported by your own inner belief system so that you can quickly rebound from challenges or setbacks in your life to focus once again on the Vision instead of the immediate situation. 

Use this technique to gain incredible focus, energy, motivation, resiliance and productivity in your life.

Before we go on, I want to mention that my personal battle with stress, outlined in detail inside Attracting Greatness, impacted me severely in the past…not only my emotions but my ability to function daily and my health were a total mess!

The good news is that I found a way out, and to this day still rely heavily on the discoveries I was lucky enough to find then.

I wanted to share with you the 3 most powerful techniques I have found to beat stress, take back control over my life and improve my health and wellness. 

Feel free to use these immediately in your own life and by all means, share any others that you have found work for you by leaving us a comment…

KNOW YOUR SIGNS OF STRESS

For many people, they figure out they are suffering from chronic stress too late…they find themselves wrapped up in addiction, ending a highly valued relationship, stuck in a rut in their life, depressed or even with a chronic or critical health situation such as heart disease or cancer.

The truth is that, left unchecked, stress has proven to wear away at nearly every healthy body function interrupting normal operation of your immune system, lympthatic system, digestive system and circulatory system not to mention the toll it takes on your emotions.

The challenge is though that it sneaks up on you and little by little takes over your life.

Another challenge is that stress impacts each person differently.  For some, it causes their muscles to tighten, their immune system to be compromized, for others it impacts their mind to such an extent that they become addicted or violent…very different effects from the same underlying cause.

What you want to begin doing IMMEDIATELY is learning to recognize the signs of stress on YOU right away so you can learn what triggers stress in your life, how your body reacts to that stress and can understand when you begin to recover from being chronically stressed. 

Here are some common stress reactions we have experienced or observed…

• Stomach titens up and digestion "locks up" resulting in heartburn, acid reflux, stomach cramping or "nervous stomach"
• High blood pressure
• Propensity to eat or drink the wrong things…when do you reach for junk foods, extra alcohol or tobacco?
• Anxiety…a feeling of overwhelm, sweaty palms, extreme nervousness, a dread of being somewhere or doing something
• Dizzy or "foggy" brain – this can often be due to a yeast or parasite overgrowth supported by bacterial imbalances encouraged by chronic stress
• Frequent propensity to catch colds, viruses or flu's – stress has one of the toughest impacts on a healthy immune system
• Behavioral changes such as temper, violant, mean, withdrawn, anti-social behavior
• Inability to relax when you do take a break, vacation or otherwise try to get away from stress…you find out you can't!

Which one of these do you recognize the most?

For me it was definitely digestive symptoms…when I let stress get the better of me, my digestion turns into a mess…but the impact for you can be completely different.

MEDITATION

Meditation is not as scary or hopeless as it may sound to you.

For years I had tremendous challenges with meditation…I put all kinds of pressure on myself and could never quite seem to experience the "letting go" associated with effective meditation.

If this is the case with you…try these tips that made meditation a breeze for me…

• Find your oasis. For meditation to work you simply need a repetitive stimulus that is or is closely aligned to your ultimate oasis.  For me, the sound of ocean waves is my oasis, so listening to a repetetive sound of ocean waves crashing on the beach is the perfect "mantra" that helps me effectively meditate.  For years I tried to listen to voices (guided meditation), but that only led to more stress for me.  For others, utter silence is enough, still others like the sound of their own breathing…for me it was water.  ANYTHING you find relaxing AND that repeats is ok as your trigger to meditate effectively
• Reserve 20-minutes twice each day for yourself.  Do no compromise or feel guilty.  This is YOUR time, and by improving yourself you are better able to help everyone around you so it needs to become as important as sleeping and breathing is to your life
• Don't push it…let meditation come.  The first several times you try meditation you may be overwhelmed with more thoughts than when you are NOT meditating…that's ok, acknowledge those thoughts but then push them aside and get back to focusing on your repetitive stimulus.  Have faith, eventually you will zone out and be meditating…but you can't force it.
• Give it at least 2-3 weeks (twice daily) to make it a habit…it will become easier as you repeat and suddenly you will realize that you can't live without it!

HAVE A PLAN – AND EXECUTE

One of the biggest challenges people have in their lives is that a) They don't have a plan, which means someone else is controlling your life and b) They don't execute – procrastination sets in and you beat yourself up for this. 

By definition, the #1 cause of stress is NOT being in control.

This has been demonstrated again and again with animals in captivity that end up mutiliating themselves because they do not control their environment. 

It's no wonder that someone who feels they have lost control of their career, financial condition, relationships and overall social situation is chronically stressed.

To beat stress you want to take back control, identify your purpose in life, set a plan in motion and even if it takes you years to accomplish your plan, you will have taken back control enough to beat stress.

Go ahead, use these stress management techniques in your life…not only will you be happier, your health will improve too.  With these 3 simple techniques you can completely change your life in a few short weeks.

No, it doesn't quite work that way…but YES it really can be a magic bullet.

In the 3rd Chapter of Attracting Greatness we tell the story of our major emotional and health challenges I went through in my mid-twenties…and how after a decade of suffering various digestive challenges including acid reflux, extreme heartburn, sleeplessness not to mention my overall immune system being a total mess.

Meditation was a key part of changing my life and emerging as a stronger, happier and healthier person.

To most, meditation does not come easily, 98% of people that try it give up to soon and never get the full benefit.

Yet, at the same time it's not out of reach for anyone.

With meditation, you will notice these benefits:

1. A new calmness along with a greater ability to handle stress
2. More peace in your life than ever before
3. The ability to put any bad/negative or challenging situation into perspective instead of letting fear or stress take over
4. More chemical balanced body including a more stable sugar level, less peaks and valley's and reduced cravings for unhealthy foods
5. A new enlightenment of people and things around us…I noticed that I just looked at the world differently.  Less cynicism, fear and negativity
6. Tend to attract more positive people to you
7. Health conditions, given time, will begin to heal themselves.  Our digestive problems completely went away within 6-weeks of twice daily, 20-minute meditation sessions
8. Build your reserves…after about 3-months of twice-daily meditation I found I could "slip" here and there without regressing…you are building strength back into your body
9. More energy and enthusiasm
10. Increased focus and renewed purpose in your life…and knowing that you now have the strength to make this happen, this can make you unstoppable!

The keys are…

• That you start and commit to at least 3-weeks of twice daily (at least 20-minutes each session) where you totally focus on the meditation…it will take time and you won't be successful for the entire 20-minutes, but even if you get 5-10 minutes in that span you will be doing wonderfully
• That you do NOT feel guilty about taking this time…this is YOUR time making you a better person which will benefit everyone around even more
• That you find your modality for helping you to draw into the meditative state.  For some, this can be guided (voice) meditation, for others silence is what does it and still others relaxing sounds like waves or repetitive music is what will do it.  The main thing is the sound should be pleasing and repetitive to work
• If you miss one session or day, don't let it slide, jump right back in and pick it up

Follow this meditation and relaxation advice and you WILL notice a difference within the next 3-4 weeks.   Share those changes with us…leave a comment.

Some of the main comments when we feel at this point in our lives are:

• I feel awkward and uncomfortable around people
• I have no friends (or at least no close friends)
• People don't listen to what I have to say
• I'm weird
• Shyness constantly gets in my way
• People seem to walk away from me or relate differently to me than others

Sound famiiar?

Without trying to diminish how devastating and frustrating having these feelings are in your life, let's put them into perspective and without it being too difficult, you can change your life.

1. I would say the majority of us secretly thinks these thoughts, feels this way and end up getting stuck in a rut at some point in their lives – this is not just you and not just a small portion of the population, it's just that you may think about it more or have shared it outwardly
2. The first major issue with this way of thinking is that we are putting ALL of the pressure on US when in fact the behavior of others is often due to other reasons.  In other words, you place yourself (in every social situation) as the center of Universe – all eyes are on you, waiting for you to mess up…sorry but that just is NOT the case.  Imagine trying to live under that pressure — no WONDER you are so self-critical, stressed-out and anxious
3. Even though you may have a more introverted personality (meaning you like time to think, more serious conversations, smaller groups, etc…) this is different than being SHY.  Shyness can be overcome…and usually comes completely from how you are perceiving yourself in certain situations.   You can use the techniques inside Attracting Greatness to overcome shyness and see massive changes in your life
4. There's nothing wrong with taking stock of your life and setting plans for how you can improve…this should not be a negative experience but rather a re-birth renewing your energy, excitement and confidence in life

So next time you get stuck in a rut, become confused and know that you want to change, embrace that challenge in your life and know that you can improve coming out with more fulfillment and happiness than ever before.