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The Palace of Possibilities

Using EFT to achieve one's potential

In this Section 3....

• The Palace of Possibilities 6--Goals: What would you do if your success was guaranteed?
• The Palace of Possibilities 7--Goals: Making a masterpiece out of one's life.
• The Palace of Possibilities 8--Dreams take us in directions.

The Palace of Possibilities 6--Goals: What would you do if your success were guaranteed?

Hi Everyone,

Despite my recent emphasis on them, affirmations do not usually work well in isolation. For example, someone who rotely and boringly affirms, "I'm happy, I'm happy, I'm happy" is not likely to be inducted into the Happiness Hall of Fame even if all the tail enders are discovered and properly erased from the writing on his/her walls. Why? Because happiness, in this example, is not a driving goal. It's a "wouldn't-that-be-nice" sort of effort that lacks the passion of a motivational dream. True, the rote affirmation may lead one to be happier and much better off, but that improvement will come mostly from the EFT erasures rather than the "I'm happy" affirmation.

For an affirmation to be maximally effective, its subject matter must have the kind of "pulling power" that soaks up the psyche and becomes a compelling target at which to aim the affirmation arrow. It must also be a major WANT and not a SHOULD. Here is where people often stub their toes in the affirmations area. They often take on grandiose goals that are actually shoulds. Shoulds are someone else's goals that seem like our own. Our parents' desire for us to go to college is a should unless, of course, we genuinely want it for ourselves. Society's pressure to get married and conform in a variety of ways also represent potential shoulds. Whenever we affirm shoulds, they will eventually die out for lack of true interest. This is not a failure of the affirmation process. It is a failure of establishing proper goals.

Some people mistakenly aim their affirmations at goals that are way beyond their current beliefs. These are shoulds and will, of course, die out. Lofty sounding goals like becoming President of the U.S., ending world hunger or winning the Nobel Prize are worthy pursuits and some people find them to be within their belief systems. If so, go for it. But for others, especially those clients that are in the emotional Dungeon, an appropriate goal might be to feel worthy in a job interview or to confidently walk past alcohol. Athletes, on the other hand, might shoot for a better batting average or a higher free throw percentage. Students might want better mental acuity or enhanced social skills. Therapists might want to develop more charisma, compassion or intuitive skills.

Goals need to be wants. They also need to be achievable within our belief systems as well as being a stretch beyond our current "limits." If our goals are not within our achievable beliefs, we will eventually consider them fruitless and will stop doing them. Why affirm, for example, that you will someday spend the night on Mars when you don't even remotely believe it is possible? Further, if our goals do not stretch us to another level, then where is the excitement? Who cares about raising your annual income from $50,000 to $51,000? Not many. However, the prospect of moving up to a $60,000, $80,000 or $100,000 level will get the juices running pretty quickly. Once these levels are reached, it is much easier to see $150,000 or $250,000. And so it goes.

This is where we begin to recognize our true awesomeness and move into the more expansive rooms in the Palace of Possibilities. A few successes along these lines serve to raise our sights. After awhile, our previous "limits" become jokes. They become recognized as the fictions that they are (were). It's as though an intense vacuum is created in the bigger rooms of the Palace that sucks us right through the doors of our existing limits. Once we leave those old rooms behind, there is no returning. Who would bother earning $50,000 per year after having grown used to $250,000? Who would revert to being shy after having become outgoing? And so it goes.

Most of us don't have motivating goals because we lack passion in our life. We exist day to day. Sometimes we enjoy our lives. Sometimes we don't. Getting up in the morning and brushing our teeth is just something we do. But bounding out of bed with the enthusiasm of someone on a mission is something that few of us experience. A motivating goal--a mission--is the difference between the movers and the mopers. It is the bounce in our step and the stars in our eyes. It is an "inside job" that spells the difference between bliss and boredom no matter what our station in life. I'm reminded of this stanza by Doug Hooper...

Two men look out from behind prison bars.

One sees mud, the other stars.

Often our motivating goals are hidden behind the writing on our walls that have already convinced us of our cans, can'ts, shoulds, shouldn'ts and all the rest of our "limits." Perhaps we have writing on our walls that says...

• "Don't stand out in a crowd. No one likes a showoff."
  
• "Don't rock the boat."
  
• "If you do something for somebody, they'll just expect more."
  
• "Know your place."
  
• "Those who make a lot of money will lose their friends."
  
• "Don't get too excited about anything. It will just lead to disappointment."

Even so, we still have burning embers within us that can be fanned into flames. The trick is, how do you find them? One way is to do EFT on issues like, "Even though I seem stuck where I am.....," "Even though I have these blocks to a true mission....," etc. Daily repetitions of these and similar EFT rounds should crank up the "mission mill." No telling what you might find.

Another way to generate the true juice within is to seriously ask yourself some goal seeking questions. Here are some examples to dwell upon.

• "What dreams did you have as a child that you have given up on?"
  
• "Whom do you wish you could be like?
  
• "What would you like to do that you haven't been able to do yet?
  
• "What would you do/attempt/be if your success were guaranteed?"

These are all great questions. They are launching pads to unlimited living. If you just read them and go on, their true value will be lost to you. However, if you get out pad & paper and spend a few evenings with them, discuss them with your friends, ponder them while driving, etc., they will bring to mind many opportunities.

You need to give your imagination some rope, however. I remember asking the last question to Adrienne's mother many years ago. She was 78 at the time when I asked, "Mary, what would you do if your success was guaranteed?" She thought a minute and then said, "I would be a grocery checker in a first class grocery store." I let a pause go by and then said, "Mary, you didn't answer my question. You told me what you might be able to do, given your experience and background, if you stretched a little. I want to know what your dreams are. Let go of your presumed limits and tell me what you would REALLY do if your success was guaranteed." Mary straightened right up, a sparkle lit up her aging eyes and she said, "I would be a singer." Here was a dream. A true goal. It was something that would excite her if she were to pursue it. She finally did the question justice.

Do you want to be a singer? What would you REALLY like to do with your life which, if it weren't for your presumed "limits," you would pursue enthusiastically? I know. I know. It may not be practical (yet). But it is a start. We can begin affirming smaller steps that seem more do-able and build up to the dream. There's always a way. Later on in this series I will introduce the Antenna concept--our built in mechanism that faithfully finds the way to do whatever we want to do.

I hope you get the pulse of this. We are stepping into Opportunity Land here.

More next time.

Hugs, Gary

The Palace of Possibilities 7--Goals: Making a masterpiece out of one's life.

Hi Everyone,

I received many responses to my last post on goals. Most of them asked if "missions" were really necessary in order for an affirmation to be effectively supported by a goal. Good question. I re-read my last post and could see how this impression might have been given. It was not what I wanted to convey.

A mission can be called the ultimate goal but the zeal behind a mission is not necessary to bring about change within a person. A true WANT will do. My goal to lose 30 pounds was not a mission. Neither was my interest in multiplying my income. Both, however, were important to me and that importance is what made them useful adjuncts to my affirmations. An affirmation without a motivating WANT behind it is not likely to do much.

Some people have a hard time finding goals. They may have spent so much time in the emotional dungeon that formulating a motivating goal seems fruitless--a silly exercise. Further, they may have writing on their walls that says...

"Ambitious people are pushy and greedy."

"Stay where you belong."

"Why waste your time trying to accomplish the impossible?"

Whatever the reason, if someone having a hard time finding a goal can still be helped. Just using EFT without affirmations or goals is certainly capable of giving relief in a variety of areas. We have been doing this for years. As this relief happens, of course, they experience positive cognitive shifts. These, in turn, clear the way for the acceptance of goals and thus affirmations. People become freed up with EFT. They are lighter. Goals make more sense. They are even welcome.

This is where a therapy client becomes a Personal Performance client. It is where the therapist can shift gears and help a formerly destitute person make a masterpiece out of their life. Baby steps at first. Develop one goal at a time. Put affirmations behind each one. Adjust. Change. Take small victories at first and then move onto bigger ones. Erase portions of the writing on the walls and replace them with better affirmations. Build. Love. Laugh. Celebrate the new levels and keep going. Enter new rooms in the Palace of Possibilities. Do it together. Grow with your client. Establish your own goals and link them to affirmations. Affirm joy, abundance and freedom in your practice. In your life. Lead by example. Become a living model for your clients to emulate. Be careful, though, this could become a mission (smile).

Next time I will introduce "purposeful daydreaming." It is the third part of a trio designed to gleefully pull one toward the Palace Penthouse. The first two, of course, are affirmations and goals. I call this trio "The Gleesome Threesome."

Hugs, Gary

P.S. Below, for your perusal, are some of the recent messages I have received. They represent different ideas on this subject.

The Palace of Possibilities 8--Dreams take us in directions.

Hi Everyone,

As children, we made great use of our imaginations. There were no limits. We could fly. We could become Cinderella or Superman at a moment's notice. We could even imagine living in a Palace, maybe even a Palace of Possibilities (ahem!). What fun! Whatever we imagined became our own creations.

Sooner or later, however, someone came along and squashed our imaginations by writing on our walls things like...

• "Quit spending your time in fantasy land and get real."
• "Get your head out of the clouds!"
• "Quit dreaming. You'll never be able to live out those things."

Most of us bought this "advice" and don't daydream much any more. Too bad. Why? Because the purposeful use of daydreaming is one of the most powerful devices we have for moving freely through the Palace of Possibilities. When combined with affirmations, goals and EFT, daydreams become a magnet which draws us ever forward into the excitement of our tomorrows. We still have the use of our imaginations and can use them to create fabulous futures. We just need to dust them off.

Years ago I gave seminars entitled How to Drive Your Own Bus, the essence of which is the forerunner to what I am now calling The Palace of Possibilities. One of my day-long "Bus" seminars was captured on video tape. In order to give you a good sense for the power of dreaming, I include below a portion of the transcript from those tapes. I will integrate this tool with our other Palace concepts in a future installment. For now, let's look at the power of daydreaming as a stand-alone tool.

Please note the ideas that...

1. The brain does not distinguish between what is real and what is vividly imagined. This allows us to condition our minds with the purposeful use of daydreaming. We can actually create experiences (as though they were real) that were not there before.

2. Dreams do not necessarily come true but they DO take us in directions.

Hugs, Gary

FROM THE "HOW TO DRIVE YOUR OWN BUS" TRANSCRIPT

GARY: I still do affirmations and TV Techniques and the jingles. But the most powerful one for me personally is the one coming up. It's the one I didn't even realize I was using for years. I call it Daydreaming.

Let's start with an exercise. Please take everything out of your hands and sit back in your chair. Hold your hand out in front of you and imagine you are holding a lemon that has been cut in half. Hold the lemon so you can see the exposed juicy part.

Use your imagination as vividly as you can and feel the texture of the lemon with your fingertips. Notice the little indent marks on the outer peel as well as the oily feel. Can you feel that? Now bring it up to your nose and smell it. [Gary inhales] Can you smell it? Okay. Bring it back down.

Next, I'm going to have you bite into this lemon. You probably knew that was coming, didn't you? I'm just telling you now so you can be prepared. To do this correctly and get the true purpose behind this exercise, you must put your vivid imagination into it. That means you must really chomp into this lemon. Not a little nibble. I want you to really bite it. Ready? One, two, three, bite...ah-hh and chew it, okay? Do it like this, agh, agh.

Okay...take it out. How many of you noticed that you salivated? [Hands raised] Oh, most of you. That's because you really involved your imaginations. You vividly imagined it.

Before we go any further, you need to change something on page 20 of your manual. Do you see where it says "The lemon experience?" Right below that, it says, "The brain does distinguish......" That's a mistake. It should say, "The brain does NOT distinguish......" Please write the word "not" in there so it says, "The brain does NOT distinguish between what is real and what is vividly imagined."

Now let me ask you, was that lemon real? To your brain it was real, wasn't it? But it was not a real lemon. It was an imaginary one. Yet your brain did not know the difference, did it? It salivated even though there was no real lemon. It said, "Uh-oh, here comes some sour acid type stuff. We'd better send some saliva down to neutralize it." That's what your brain did. It does not know the difference between what is real and what is vividly imagined. Obviously, of course, your mind knows the difference. But the brain, acting as an organ, doesn't make the distinction. We are going to make great use out of that idea because the whole daydreaming process relies on that one concept.

Here's another example of how this phenomenon works. This study I'm going to tell you about has been performed many times but the particular one I'm zeroing in on here was done at Ohio State. It is discussed in some detail in Jack Canfield's tape set.

At Ohio State they had a number of students shoot free throws on the basketball court. Then they divided them into three groups of equal ability. Let's divide you [The audience] into three groups to get a better sense of this.

This section here will be group 1. You are not to practice shooting free throws at all for the next thirty days. Just leave a basketball alone and go about your own business and come back in thirty days.

This section over here will be group 2 and you are supposed to practice every single day. Go out to the gym and shoot so many free throws every single day.

This section over here will be group 3 and you are also supposed to practice every day....but only in your mind. You are not to touch a basketball for the entire thirty days. Just sit in a chair every day and imagine that ball going swish. Perfect shots every time, by the way. In your imagination you can do that. They go swish, swish, swish. So many every day.

After thirty days, all three groups came back to shoot free throws. The ones who did not practice at all made no improvement. No surprise there. The ones who practiced with the actual ball, improved 24%. The ones who practiced only in their minds improved 23%. It was almost the same. Why would that be? Who could tell me? Why, if this group never touches a basketball and practices only in their minds, can they make that kind of improvement?

MAN: Comfort zones.

GARY: Yes. Remember. The brain does not distinguish between what is real and what is vividly imagined. So when group 3 vividly imagined shooting free throws, they set up the necessary neural connections in their brains for improved free throw shooting. And that effort showed up on the basketball court.

The brain does not distinguish between what is real and what is vividly imagined. So what does that tell us about vivid imagination? If you want to create a "new you," you can get there by vividly imagining it. That's what daydreaming is all about. You vividly imagine yourself being the "new you."

Do you want to reach a new sales level? Imagine it first. Do you want the new weight? Imagine it first. Do you want to install the new health practice? Imagine it first. Do you want the new Rolls Royce? Imagine yourself sitting behind the wheel and driving it and putting gas in it and paying the bills on it as though they were nothing to you.

Imagine the "new you"....vividly....and your own brain will start taking you in that direction. After a while, you won't be satisfied with where you were. You will reach the new vision of yourself and will behave in a manner to bring it about.

EXAMPLE #1--THE PHANTOM HOME RUN

GARY: Here's an example from my own experience. When I was in second grade I loved to play baseball after school. I was okay as a baseball player. I was neither the best nor the worst out there. Once in a while I would get a base hit...maybe a little blooper into right field and I would be all smiles standing there on first base.

After baseball, I went home....which was about a mile walk. But I didn't walk it. I ran it. And with the vivid imagination of a young boy, I started imagining...daydreaming...about that little blooper base hit. And I would say to myself that it wasn't a little blooper base hit. I would imagine hitting the ball right square in the middle and watching it tower over the outfielders' heads. Going way out there. You could hardly see it.

I'm doing all this while running home and swinging an imaginary bat. Wham! Wham! Left handed too. Wham! All the way home I'm doing that. And I'm really into it. I'm vividly imagining it and I have my physiology into it. And I could actually feel myself hit the ball. I'd say...."Wow!"...like that. I get excited about it now just thinking about it.

By the time I got home and told my mother about it, it was no longer a bloop single. It was a home run that was so awesome that the ball was still rolling in some other county. And my mother, God bless her, didn't call me on it. She didn't say what so many people say...like, "Oh, you let your imagination get away from you. You didn't really hit it like that." Instead, She'd say, "Oh, that's wonderful. I'm glad you did that." She would encourage me along these lines. Thank God! I'm so happy she did that instead of stifling my imagination by putting me down.

And I would do that "hit-the-baseball-routine" day after day. Was I vividly imagining it?

AUDIENCE: Yes.

GARY: Does the brain know the difference between what I vividly imagine and the real experience?

AUDIENCE: No.

GARY: Sooner or later, if you swing the bat at enough baseballs, will you hit it on the nose?

AUDIENCE: Yes.

GARY: Yes. And I did. And I eventually got my first home run.

Now here's the critical point to this story. There are two ways I could have responded mentally to my home run. One of those ways would be to say, "Well, I got lucky. That's not like me. Sure I hit it. It was a good home run. But I'll never do that again. Or if I do, it'll be another lucky day." Do we do that sometimes? Do we move above ourselves...somehow get to another level...and then defeat ourselves by saying, "I was just lucky. That's not the real me."

See, the real affirmation there is, "That's not the real me. That's not really me that did that. I just stepped above myself one time and got lucky." But because I had hit so many home runs in my imagination, I prepared my own system for that inevitable day. I was mentally ready for it. It came as no surprise. To me...it had nothing to do with luck.

So when I actually hit my home run, what do you suppose I said to myself? I said, "Hey, it's about time." That's true. See, I had already built in here [Gary points to his head] who I was as a hitter. Having the reality catch up with my thoughts was simply a matter of time. But when the home run finally arrived it was not an unusual experience for me. It was routine. I had hit enough home runs in my head to make it seem commonplace.

Hitting home runs became "the real me." Building on that, I became a very good baseball player. And from there, I became a good football player and so on it goes.

Daydreaming is the centerpiece of this story. Without it, I doubt if I would have done much in sports. I may never have gone beyond the bloop single. This young boy was allowed to have his imagination run. And it took me in a direction.

I call this story "The phantom home run" because it illustrates clearly the power of daydreaming. Where is your phantom home run? Where have you vividly imagined something that eventually showed up in your world? What new level, what phantom home run, could you create that would take you in a new direction?

Years later, at around age 13 or 14, I remember wanting to play center field for the New York Yankees. I daydreamed about that a lot. I actually felt sorry for Mickey Mantle because I was going to take his job and someone had to break the news to him. And Mickey was a nice guy, so I didn't want to tell him.

Now you may wonder why I didn't play center field for the New York Yankees. After all, I daydreamed it, didn't I? So shouldn't that achievement have shown up in my life?

Good question. I'm glad I asked it. There's a cliche running around that says, "Dreams come true." But I don't buy it...at least not stated that way. A more accurate way to say it is, "Dreams take you in directions."

Thousands of young boys wanted to play center field for the New York Yankees just like thousands of people aspire to be President of the United States. But there's only room for one at a time in those positions.

My dream of taking Mickey Mantle's job took me in a direction....toward sports. And that direction has served me well.

I never beat myself up for not making the ultimate achievement. Many people do, though, because they have bought the idea that if their dreams don't come true, with precision, there must be something wrong with them.

More next time......

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