My Year in the Master Key System -- Part Four

So, what have you been focusing on over the last few weeks?  I have to admit that I’ve been very caught up with the Holiday season and not very much with the mental practice I started a few months ago with the Master Key System.  But the beauty of this program of study is that the core ideas stick with you if you read them over often enough, so that they filter through even in the busiest moments.  And I notice that while very old habits tend to take over, they are slowly being shifted to incorporate the key ideas that Charles Haanel brings forward in his work.

Take, for example, the key elements of this week’s study.  I see three main ideas that pull together to give us the power and ability to draw what we want into our lives.  First, the concept of “give to get” – being of service to others and giving, in order to receive what we want.  But the model that I learned over the years of watching my mother and her mother slave in the kitchen, while everyone else sat around and ate, are not what Haanel is talking about.  Because he also stresses that we must take care of ourselves, that we “cannot be helpful unless we are strong”.  So my hours of work have been interspersed with hours of rest, play, sleep and time for me.  I’ve come to understand that it is,in fact, a cycle – take care of myself in order to have the energy to give, then give because it is the right thing to do, and then be ready to receive, which will reenergize me.  The Master Key System also says that “every transaction must benefit every person who is in any way connected with the transaction”, because we are each one of us part of the Universal whole.  So selfless, martyr-like giving is no longer part of my Holiday season tradition.

A second concept highlighted in Part Four is aligning our vision and actions with the Universe, in other words, “the higher, loftier, grander and more noble ideals which you can conceive,” the more we are able to achieve these ideas because they are aligned with the creative flow of the Universe.  Reminds me of a scene in a science-fiction movie I watched yesterday, Contact (Jodie Foster, 1997).  Foster is an astronomer who is the sole passenger on a spacecraft headed for the Vega system; after experiencing violent vibrations when strapped to her seat, she realizes that if she releases the straps, she floats effortlessly inside the craft.  She has picked up on one of Haanel’s important concepts: don’t fight the Universal flow just because you NEED to be right, open your mind to the fact that there may be an easier way to get things done.

And the final concept that pulls the Master Key System message together this week is the part that gives us the power to make what we want happen: mental and emotional strength.  This strength comes from regular practice, so that we learn how to focus better, how to seek out silence and repose to regenerate, how to channel our emotions to increase the power of our thoughts, and how to eliminate destructive thoughts. 

Practice, practice, practice.  At this time of year, we often set New Year’s resolutions to start exercising more.  Why not resolve to exercise our minds on a regular basis, just like going to the gym, to make 2012 a GREAT year?

Your Competitive Edge in 2012

You’ve updated your aging website, you blog regularly and your Facebook fan page has lots of followers.  You’ve read every success and management magazine, you have a copy of the most trendy business strategy books on your nightstand, and you spent several hours listening to webinars and attending conferences and networking events.

So, you’ve got the competitive edge, right?  Wrong, because your competitors have all done the exact same thing.  Marketing 2.0 and the global economy have evened out the playing field – the leading players in any industry essentially all look alike.  2012 doesn’t promise to bring anything new, unless you think that creating a Google+ account three days before your closest competitor does will truly make a difference.

What could you possibly do in 2012 that will make a difference?  What do you have that your competitors don’t, that you can use to create a competitive edge?  Well, to start with, you have you.  And you have your partners, employees and contractors. 

But, you’ve squeezed every ounce of productivity out of your exhausted workforce.  All your salespeople have attended the best sales training and your customer service department just underwent an overhaul due to too many customer complaints.  Your marketing department seems to have lost their creativity, your finance group is just trying to keep your corporate head above water in this endless recession, and HR is having a hard time finding enough qualified people to fill the few job openings you’ve dared to approve. 

Let me give you a few statistics that might make you think differently about things:

• Optimistic salespeople outsell their pessimistic counterparts by 56%;
• Happy employees take, on average, 15 less sick days per year than their unhappy colleagues;
• $360B is lost each year in the U.S. due to reduced productivity caused by poor relationships between employees and their supervisors;
• An employee’s belief in his or her ability is a stronger predictor of job performance than his or her actual level of skill or training;
• A study at KPMG reported that positive psychology training was responsible for improving life satisfaction, one of the most crucial predictors of productivity and performance in the workplace.

This will be your competitive edge in 2012 – the human edge.  Investing in developing a happy workforce (and this includes you) can provide you with a huge edge over your competitors.  While they are scratching their heads, trying to figure out how to continue doing more with less, you will become an employer of choice, reaping the many benefits of a happy, optimistic, creative, and innovative team of contributors to your bottom line. 

Want to know how?  Check in tomorrow for part two of this blog: how to incorporate the key concepts of positive psychology into your organization.

My Year in the Master Key System -- Part Three

There’s a reason why it takes time to absorb the Master Key System – we’re not always ready to fully understand a particular message the first time it is presented to us.  I’m reminded of the quote by Rainer Maria Rilke: “Do not now look for the answers.  They cannot now be given to you because you could not live them.”  (As an aside, I truly recommend that you read Rilke’s “Letters to a Young Poet” if you haven’t yet!)

Part Three of the Master Key System talks further about how the conscious and subconscious systems relate.  The subconscious mind receives direction from the conscious mind and simply does what it is told.  It links to the Universal Mind when it needs something, which is the mechanism by which we are able to create what we truly want.  The power of the subconscious comes from the energy it radiates – the more energy, the more effectively it reaches out to the Universal mind and the more rapidly we can create what we want.  So you want to radiate as much positive energy as possible – that means amplifying every request with strong positive emotion and passion.  It also means that we can’t let anything get in the way of this radiation.

This brings me to the main point of this blog – letting things get in the way.  This is probably the hardest part of the journey for me.  I believe what I read from an intellectual standpoint, but every time I re-read the material, I realize that I really don't get it yet.  I guess that up until now, I haven’t been able to “live the answers”.  Part Three tells us that fear is the biggest resistance against the positive requests made by our subconscious.  And fear is something I live every day, and I suspect that many of you reading this might dare to agree.  We want greatness, but fear living up to it.  We want success, but fear making a fool of ourselves.  We want to be a model for others, but fear other people’s reactions and treatment.  We want abundance, but fear the lack of abundance that we see around us.

In parallel to studying The Master Key System, I’m also reading other success classics, such as The Science of Getting Rich, by Wallace D. Wattles.  Wattles says: “To think according to appearance is easy; to think truth regardless of appearances is laborious, and requires the expenditure of more power than any other work man is called upon to perform.”  Wattles is saying that it is easy to think that things will always be what we see around us – we will always have what we have, we will always be what we are, we will always do what we do.  But the Master Key System says that we don't have to.  With focused study and concentration, we can create so much more and transform our lives and ourselves into exactly what we want!

A fun way to convince ourselves that we can actually do this is to try it out.  Think of one thing that you want to create, something immediate, not too complicated, but different enough from what you are living to convince you that you actually created it.  Sometimes I do this by finding a parking spot or getting someone to call me.  What small wins do you want to create this week to convince yourself that you can create anything you truly want? 

My Year in the Master Key System – Part Two

As I move further into my study of the Master Key System by Charles Haanel, I begin to understand how I could actually start controlling the process of creating in the outside world. 

Part Two of the Master Key System starts by explaining that we have a conscious and subconscious mind.  The conscious mind deals with and reacts to the outside world.  It sends messages to the subconscious mind, which quickly and effectively finds a way to provide what the conscious mind wants. 

What we often don’t realize is that we can choose what we react to and how we react.  Have you ever noticed that some days things come at you so quickly that you seem to respond as if you were a machine, processing each thing as it comes and reacting automatically.  This saves energy and allows our conscious mind to focus on the most important things.  I actually feel good on days like this, because I think I’m being efficient and dealing with everything effectively.  Except that my automatic reactions are not always conducive to giving me what I truly want.  I say yes when I should really be saying no to a project that I know won’t bring me any benefit.  I respond emotionally when I should realize that I am too tired to respond rationally to my spouse’s three teenagers.  I create a crisis when a few deep breaths might give me the chance to remember a solution I have already applied to a recurring problem. 

The conscious mind has the ability to discriminate, choose and reason.  This means that we can choose what we send to the subconscious mind, the instructions on which it will operate.  If we send “panic, this is a disaster!”, the subconscious very efficiently ensures that a disaster occurs so that it can panic according to our wishes.  If we send “find a solution to this before it becomes a disaster”, the subconscious will do just that: find a way for a solution to present itself to us so that we avert the disaster. 

Ok, so all I have to do is send positive messages to my subconscious and I’ll get everything I want, right?  Well, it’s not quite that simple.  First of all, we have to learn to discipline our conscious mind to send only positive messages.  In the Master Key System, Charles Haanel takes us through a series of exercises to start this discipline process.  In Part One, he tells us to practice being physically still.  And in Part Two, we start practicing being mentally still.  A form of meditation, we are asked to learn how to inhibit all thought and become quiet inside.  Quite a challenge!

But there is a second challenge to sending positive messages to the subconscious.  There is a filter between the conscious and subconscious minds.  This filter is made up of all the programming we have accumulated through years of being told what to do and all the internal messages we tell ourselves.  We can send positive messages about becoming financially secure, but if we have internal programming that says “rich people are snobs and I don’t want to be a snob”, our programming will sabotage the positive message before it reaches the subconscious. 

So I have two challenges: discipline my mind and dissolve all the negative programming that sits within the filter between my conscious and subconscious minds.  It’s certainly plenty of work for the next two weeks!

My Year in the Master Key System -- Part One

The Master Key System is quite different from a typical personal growth book, as each Part is a list of statements associated with Charles Haanel’s concepts.  At the end of each Part, he provides questions to study.  The idea is to read over each Part several times and use the questions to study the concepts so that they make sense to you.  Two basic concepts came out of my study of Part One.

I create everything in my outside world:  Most of the time, we do this unconsciously: we think about how we don’t want to work on a project anymore and we end up having a disagreement with our project partner, which puts the future of the project in jeopardy.  We focus on how annoying our teenager is and they go out of their way to bug us before leaving for school.  We worry about how we’re going to make ends meet this month and another bill shows up in the mail.  Notice how many of these things are negative.  My initial feeling is that I couldn’t possibly want to create all these negative things.  And yet, if we dig deep enough, we can find when and how we created it.  Example: I’m not on speaking terms with one of my sisters right now because of a huge fight we had last spring.  I couldn’t possibly have wanted to create that, right?  Except that I was reading through my journal the other day and noticed an entry about 4 weeks before I went to visit her, where I expressed my frustration regarding the organization of the trip.  And I wrote: “sometimes it would just be easier not to have a family!”.  That convinced me how careful we need to be about what we think, feel and especially express.

Consciousness and sustained focus allow me to control this process:  Great!  Now I have a solution that I use to create only good things, things that I want.  So, what do I want?  Most of us don’t have a clue.  Sure, we know on the surface what type of car we would drive if we had unlimited money to buy it, or what body we would prefer over our own.  But if you were given a sheet of paper and you had to write down EVERYTHING you want in life (relationships, health, job, leisure, experiences, etc), could you?  More importantly, could you choose one path?  Maybe you want to live in Costa Rica and sell seashell art.  No, actually you would prefer an apartment in Paris so that you could become a fashion consultant.  No, no, really you want to move to a small farm, raise your family and become self-sufficient.   Yikes, this is hard!  But the Master Key System insists that we need to be focused, not scattered.  We can’t focus on creating Paris one day and seashells the next.  So an important step is taking the time to decide what we want[1], and then applying the tools we are learning to focus on that. 

That’s it for Part One.  Hopefully my comments have triggered some thoughts in you – if so, please share them with me; I’d love to hear what you have to say about all of this! 

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[1] For those of you who don’t know, there are tools out there to help you.  I recommend that you search for “purpose” at your favourite bookstore or online.  You can also check out my soon-to-be-released 2-part e-course “Discover your Confidence” where I discuss discovering your purpose (see www.happiness-after-midlife.com) and my upcoming book “Drown or Surf: Riding Life’s Tidal Waves” which will also include a section on purpose and vision.

My Year in the Master Key System

As mentioned in my blog a few weeks ago, I have decided to embark upon a one-year journey into the world of Charles Haanel, author of The Master Key System.  Touted as THE book that inspired The Secret and many other books, study programs, videos and self-help workshops, The Master Key System is the compilation of a 24-week program that was initially delivered by Haanel as a correspondence course. 

So why am I doing this?  I’ve been a student of the personal growth, self-help, professional development movement for the last 11 years.  I’ve created my own programs, written my own books and taught my own workshops.  So, what more could I need to know?

Lawyers study the law their whole lives; accountants are required refresher courses each year to update their knowledge of recent tax changes; physicians and nurses are in constant learning mode, participating in knowledge and practice review sessions.  So why shouldn’t a success professional such as myself update my learning, especially from a source that seems so fundamental.  And who doesn’t know enough about success?

The Master Key System is based on the concept that you create in your mind everything that happens around you.  Now, before you roll your eyes and say “here’s another one of these gurus whose going to tell me to think positively”, let me tell you a story about a skeptic who actually helped me understand a key element in my learning.

On my way to a meeting downtown last week, I started focusing on getting a great parking spot.  It’s a game I play with myself to reinforce my belief that I actually can create good things in my everyday life.  And sure enough, when I arrived at my destination, here was someone pulling out of THE perfect parking spot.  When one of my colleagues arrived, I mentioned my experience with the parking spot.  He asked me “how much of what arrives in your life do you really think happened because you “created” it, and how much do you think is coincidence”.  I started answering, but as I spoke, I had an insight. 

It doesn’t matter, does it?  If good things are happening to me, what difference does it make if I’ve created it or if it was a coincidence?  Learning the mental discipline, the focus on what I want, the positive attitude, how to quit thinking about negative things in my life...all of that is good stuff.  And if it creates, as Haanel and others put forth, good things in my life, all the better. 

So I’m going to suspend disbelief for one whole year and jump into this program full-hearted.  I invite you to join me, by reading my blogs and even, if you dare, get yourself a copy of the book and study along with me.  I’d love to hear your comments, ideas and challenges with the material – it’ll make it more fun, learning alongside others.

So, good luck and here we go!

When it's time

Autumn is always an interesting season for me.  Once we've survived the start of a new school year, and before I spoil myself with my annual birthday celebration, I go into "think" mode.  What am I doing?  Why am I doing this and not that?  What is working, what isn't?  What else could I be doing?

And most importantly, what am I supposed to be doing?  I talk a lot about purpose and figuring out your "Why" (thank you Simon Sinek, I really enjoyed your book).  But what do I DO about it?

I took a course this summer on creating the life you truly want to live.  It was excellent, I highly recommend it for those of you in the Montreal area (see www.4weekstofreedom.com -- taught by John Kobel).  It taught us how to focus and concentrate on what we wanted, and to build a mental discipline to be able to create what we want.

And yet, there is always that extra step: do I dare want what I want?  Deep down, if we dig through all the layers of "shoulds" and "shouldn'ts" and "I'm good at" and "that doesn't make money" and all the other BS that we pile on our shoulders, we know what we want.  In my case, it always comes back to what I do for a "living", what my "job" is.  I know what I want.  If I peel back the layers, I know that I want to help people live great lives.  Cut out the drama and crises, use tools to make their lives and businesses successful (the way they define it).  Full time, no side contracts to provide some cash flow, no projects to distract me, just me and the world, making it better one person or business at a time.

But do I dare want this?  Do I dare go through the steps that I have learned to create this?  Learning to say yes to myself is not something new, and yet this feels like an ultimate, full-throttle YES.  It's scary.  But it's time.  I've delayed, stalled and let myself be distracted long enough.

So here I go.  First of all, in the next few weeks, you start seeing regular posts from me on The Master Key System.  I'm taking one full year to go through the program and every 2 weeks, I'll report back to you on my experience.  It'll be on my blog here and also on www.happiness-after-midlife.com, the website of a recent collaborator of mine.  I'm also finishing up a two-part e-course based on my first book, "Dammit, I am Right!", which will also be available on the Happiness After Midlfe website.  And finally, I'm committing to finishing my second book, "Drown or Surf: Riding Life's Tidal Waves", before the end of the year.

I have other projects that I want to get off the ground.  To get the public speaking side of my business going, I'll be giving a conference (in French) at the Salon Affaires et Travailleurs Autonomes at the end of October in Montreal.  I'm not exactly sure of the content yet, but it will be based on my second book, focusing on how small business owners can avoid constant crisis management and get into a positive cycle.

There's lots more to come, but I'll save that for when it's done (rather than promising things I haven't even created yet).

In the meantime, have you given yourself permission to dare want what you want?  If not, when will it be the right time to do just that?

Admitting life is tough

Yes, it has been forever since I've written.  I've had a tough spring.  Yes, I admit it!  Things have been difficult on a few fronts...financial, health, energy.  I guess I shouldn't complain, my house isn't flooded, I haven't had to live through a tsunami, no forest fire has destroyed my home, I have the love of a few very special people and business is looking up.  In fact, I am very lucky.  And yet, I still feel like I've been through my own special storm.

I was talking to a business colleague this morning and realized that we all do the same thing.  We go through tough times, and because we don't want to look like we're not successful, or because we feel guilty because there is always someone in a tougher spot than we are, we keep quiet about our challenges.  We live in quiet desperation, trying on our own to find ways to turn things around.  And we hide in our bubble, thinking we are the only ones living in this state.

The truth?  Many other people, just like us, are living through tough times.  Never mind all the ones we hear about on the news, it's obvious that those folks are in big trouble.  But there are also the ones that no-one talks about.  The small business owner who is struggling through this recession that everyone would like to believe is over (but those of us at the end of the economic ladder know that consumers are not spending and businesses are holding back on investing in their future).  The single parent whose child doesn't understand that there is just not enough money to live like they used to.  The employee who is being squeezed by their customer, their boss and their own perfectionism to work 80 hours a week and still respond to their Blackberry at 7:30pm on a Saturday evening.  So many more that I haven't mentioned...

So what?  Do we simply listen to the loud voice around us and within us and "suck it up"?  Figure it out, put a good face on, consider ourselves lucky?  Or do we listen to the quieter voice deep inside us that says "hey, maybe I could use a hand?".  Maybe it might be a relief to admit that I'm in trouble and seek the advice of someone who might have been through this before, or the comfort of someone going through something similar?

Certainly, we have to pick our audience -- no good telling all of your prospective customers that business has been awful.  But maybe we can find one or two good people, people who are trustworthy, who have a heart, who might just appreciate the fact that we are sharing (and who might be just as happy to share their challenges).  Maybe for once, we could drop the bravado, take off the mask and trust someone with our truth.  Or if you truly cannot trust anyone, it can be as simple as writing it in your journal or on a napkin at lunch and burning it afterwards.

Today, I recommend that you give yourself a chance to express the challenges that you are living with, give yourself a pat on the back for surviving up until now, and look for someone who can ease some of the tension.  Who knows, you just might find that creative answer you didn't even realize you were looking for!

Year-end Review

Yes, yes, I know, I was supposed to write this a few days ago.  Amazing how time flies when you take a break from your normal routine.  But now I'm back into the regular swing of things.  Earlier this week, I continued a tradition I've been holding for 10 years: completing my year-end review.

Many of us familiar with workplace bureaucracy know all about year-end reviews.  It's when you and your boss get together to discuss your accomplishments and whether or not you met the company's expectations.  In proactive companies, these expectations were set earlier in the year when your department's objectives were laid out by the powers that be (the companies that aren't as organised make up their objectives on the fly or backwards-engineer them after the fact).

I think I was a challenging employee.  Because I wasn't happy in simply meeting or exceeding the company's expectations or my department's objectives.  I needed to feel like I believed in those objectives and that I had truly contributed to something meaningful both to the company but mostly to me.  And through my coaching experience that started in 2001, I found a way to make my year-end review meaningful to me.  I created my own personal planning process.

At the beginning of the year, I update my life plan.  My plan contains all the elements of my work, home/social and personal life that I want to accomplish.  And at the end of each year, I identify all the things that I have in fact accomplished, whether they were on my plan or not.  I pull out my weekly calendar to trigger my memory and I write down all the things that I completed.  It can be significant, like writing and publishing a book, or smaller, like pulling together a birthday dinner for a friend.  I especially focus on the elements that are aligned with my life objectives: for example, if one of my objectives is to travel more, I make a point of writing down all the trips I took during the year.  If helping my spouse ensure that his kids get a great education, I mention that I helped his 11-year-old study for his junior-high-school entrance exams.

There are really two reasons for writing all of this down.  First of all, it helps me understand where I spend all my time.  Ever get that feeling that time passes and you truly don't know what you did with it?  A year-end review helps you get a better understanding of what you've been doing all that time.  It also helps you identify if your work, home/social and personal elements in your life are balanced in the way that you want them to be.    The second reason for doing a year-end review is to prepare for a new update to my life plan.  It allows me to see where I've arrived at, which becomes the new starting place for this year's journey.  It also gives me confidence; after seeing everything I was able to accomplish in 2010, I can create the energy and confidence necessary to take on all the amazing projects I want to complete in 2011.

So, if you haven't yet done your year-end review, don't wait for your boss.  Do your own.  And don't forget the most important part: once you have written everything down, celebrate!  Identify your top 5 accomplishments and tell someone about them.  Write about them in your journal if you want.  Make a point of NOTICING what you have done and pat yourself on the back.  Give yourself a raise (in whatever form you can).  And get ready for a new year!

(in my next post, I'll talk about how to build a yearly life plan)