What’s holding you back right now?
Have you ever wondered why you don’t do what you know you 'should'?
I have long listened to many of the world’s top speakers talking about how our past conditioning affects us when we aren’t even aware of it!
When in companies training their sales teams, I’ve spoken many times about this and we regularly complete exercises to breakthrough this past conditioning so they can annihilate their 'shoulds'.
I am a big believer in the phrase, “leaders are readers!”. Reading books literally can change your life! In a moment you can make a new distinction and implement a new concept!
Now I know this, but I’ve always had an internal battle to get myself to sit down and read on a regular basis! I turned to Audrey,
“I can’t believe what I have just thought of...OMG...I never put that together!”
“What?” she looked at me confused.
“I have just realised why I have always struggled to get motivated to read the books I know I should read!”
Whilst I was reading an article aloud to Audrey, an unexpected image had popped in my mind! I had rewound myself back to the tender age of 12, sitting in an English lesson, with adrenaline surging through my veins as my heart pounded hard in my chest!
“Please don’t be me” I kept chanting, over and over again in my head!
“Paul Adamson, your turn, read!” he announced firmly to the class.
That was it - I knew what was coming, it's not that I couldn’t read, don’t get me wrong, I could read quite well. It was the fact that I couldn’t speak what I was reading!
At that time in my life I was crippled with a stammer that I totally hated, resented and was embarrassed about!
“Ssshhhhheeeee cr-cr-cr-cr-ossed the r-r-r-r-road...” I could hear the sniggering and the laughing start up, my head fell down and I felt so ashamed of myself!
Here’s the thing...
In that moment whilst reading to Audrey, I realised that at 12 years old I had linked up massive pain to reading and had buried it deep into my unconscious and I had no idea it was even there! It was a total breakthrough moment! I understood exactly why I would buy all the books, but, never quite get round to reading them!
Conveniently, I would always find something else to do or distract me! I now realise that I was just doing what us humans always do which is avoid pain and go for pleasure!
Unconsciously my mind was still thinking, “READING = MASSIVE PAIN”. So the pleasure was that I should avoid reading at all costs!
How crazy is that?! Because the very thing that I need to serve my clients at a higher level is read constantly so I can stay up to date and be ahead of the game!
I did a quick exercise to flip this around in my mind and the result, I’ve nailed 2 books and on my third over the past week and I am just loving reading!!!!
So how about you?
What past conditioning maybe holding you back right now that you might not be aware of? What is the area of your life that if you shifted could cause the whole game to change?
Maybe, its time to go inside and question some of your “shoulds”?
To your ultimate success,
One life...live it!
Paul :) x