Got the guts to be different? Have the guts to stand out from the crowd, to stand apart from your sad little herd? Have you got what it takes to stand head-and-shoulders above all the sad, pathetic people that you hang out with? Normal people are sad and pathetic – and most of us are normal. Years of psychological research and work in the field of personal development prove that the normal mind is out of control, preferring to take its cue from the events of our childhood years rather than actually taking real action – the only kind of action that will achieve real results.

Unfortunately, however, most of us are afraid to be different. I’ve met many people over the years who have told me that they couldn’t be a success because they’d be afraid of losing their friends! By the same token, I know plenty of people who, years later, feel liberated because they no longer hang out with some of their old acquaintances! It turns out that normal people hang out with other normal people as part of some bizarre support mechanism – normal people like being a member of their own little victim support groups!

Herd behaviour is bizarre and you’ll never change your life until you get away from the herd. Herd behaviour is positively dangerous to both you and all your fellow herd members. Once the herd agrees – albeit subconsciously or by omission – that some bizarre behaviour is alright, anything goes. Some years ago this was proved in glaring circumstances by what has subsequently become Philip Zimbardo’s infamous Stanford prison experiment – so-called because the experiment took place at Stanford University and involved student volunteers from that university. The volunteers were randomly split into two groups – one group were to be the prisoners, the other group the prison guards. And, even though the experiment was scheduled to take two weeks, it was stopped after six days – the prison guards had become obscenely violent, the prisoners totally submissive. The outrageous behaviour of the former group, through, was OK – everyone in that little herd agreed with it so none of the guards was behaving, in in their warped world, in an unacceptable manner.

All normal people behave inappropriately – because they never behave from a clear and focused state of mind that is present to the here and now. Normal behaviour is dictated by the subconscious mind and what we see as acceptable around us. Normal behaviour cannot be appropriate because it it isn’t dictated by the reality of the present moment.

In other words, even though Zimbardo’s Experiment is an extreme case of normal behaviour (by the way, there are quite a number of other experiments that all come to the same conclusion), it does illustrate just how dangerous it is to run with the herd. More importantly, at a more fundamental level – a level that is affecting your ability to achieve happiness and the kind of success you want – this herd mentality of normal people is stopping you from doing what your heart desires.

So forget about the herd – once you’ve turned your back many of them will forget about you – and start putting your own life first. Step out of the norms of herd-like behaviour – and you’ll be amazed by the liberation.

Ever had a good idea that you simply never did anything about? And have you ever noticed that some of the most successful people are where they are because they pursued some really simple idea – the kind of thing that you say to yourself “I could have thought of that!”?

You need to realize that the difference between normal people and these super-successful people is down to one simple thing – successful people take action, normal people don’t. Normal people prefer to listen to self-defeating useless thoughts like “There’s no way that I could do something like that” or “I wouldn’t have a clue where to start” or, the one that’s the most pathetic of all “There’s so much I could lose”. You’ve got to be abnormal to be a success. There’s nothing to lose except, maybe, the normal mundane humdrum of ordinary life and that regular sinking feeling that your life’s never going to amount to much.

We all know lots of people who simply haven’t got the guts to listen to their instinct and consequently will never live the dream. One long-lost friend springs to mind. He was never sure if he could earn enough money (whatever enough is) if he were to do the one thing in life that really excited him. And he never found out – he died of cancer in his thirties having settled for the predictable and safe option of doing more of the same with his life.

His time ran out – quicker than most. But that doesn’t take away from the fact that time is running out for you and I as I write these words. You’ve probably already had opportunities in you life that required bold decisions and you didn’t take them. You’ve got into an adult lifetime’s habit of taking the easy option, the one that doesn’t rock the boat. However, abnormally successful people wouldn’t regard their actions as either courageous or bold – it’s just something that they have to do.

So what do you have to do with your life? What do you really want to do? And, if you did it, you know, you’d find that you’d never have to work another day in your life because it would be a labour of love. And a labour of love is done extraordinarily and effortlessly. If you’re doing what really excites you, you simply cannot but succeed.

So listen to your inspiration – pay attention to the ideas that occur to you that are outside the norm. You’ve got to understand that what’s normal is simply a set of dos and don’ts agreed upon by normal people who, psychology proves, are crazy. The normal person’s subconscious controls them – not the other way around. It’s that out of control subconscious that tells you “No you can’t” when, in fact you can achieve anything that really turns you on, anything that you truly believe in.

What impact does your self esteem have on your personal effectiveness, your relationships and the reality of your daily life? Are you suffering from low self esteem? Would you like to understand how to build your self esteem?

Self esteem is all about how you value yourself as a person, how you perceive yourself in terms of your strengths and weakness and, indeed, what you think about what other people think of you. Let’s deal with the last one first, because this should be no big deal in your life. You shouldn’t waste your energy worrying about what others think of you – because they don’t, they’re wasting their time and energy worrying about what you think of them! If you’re worried about making a good impression, you’re not! Because worrying splits your focus, messes with your head, destroys your presence and prevents you making any kind of good impression at all. So, first off – forget about other people’s ideas about you – your perceptions of what their expectations may be have little or nothing to do with the reality of the here and now and your own innate ability to make the most of it.

But what if your inner ‘voices’ are telling you that you’re no good, that you’re useless or that you’re a failure? What if you just have a general discomfort with yourself as a person of worth? Well, you need to ask yourself: Who is judging whom? Are there two of you – one doing the judging and one being judged? Well, in fact, there are two of you. First of all, there’s the real you – the inner you that’s capable of achieving anything in which you believe. And, then, there’s your personality – the one that’s doing the judging.

You must appreciate that your personality is an imposter – a self-image that, like all images, is just a snapshot of the real thing. Your personality is invented for you during your childhood years – you learn this personality by taking snapshots of people and events that made you feel good or bad about yourself. And research confirms that you are more likely to pay subconscious attention to the negative snapshots – and this is where your misconceptions of inadequacy or low self esteem come from – they’re bubbling up from your subconscious mind, they are irrelevant to the here and now, they are unrelated to who you really can be, they’re nothing more than snapshot learning that you should stop paying attention to. In other words, low self esteem is a figment of your imagination.

Don’t try to counter your perceived low self-esteem with self-affirmation or positive thinking – you’ll end up having an argument with yourself! What you must to do is train your subconscious mind to focus on the present moment instead of focusing on ancient history. Take five minutes to start this process right now. Sit somewhere where you will not be disturbed, close your eyes and simply listen to what you hear. If you get distracted – and, chances are, you will – simply focus on the next big sound that you hear. This mental training or, in actual fact, meditation, will break the strangle-hold of your negative fantasy and break the spell that that is your perceived personality.

Think this through – the people who are the most important to you were at one stage total strangers to you. Whether by chance or what Deepak Chopra might view as synchronicity – or, indeed, what the science of quantum physics might consider as a type of quantum entanglement – you are where you now are as a result of a string of random events at the core of which are people who were, when you met them first, complete and utter strangers.

When I was growing up I was told, as most children were and still are, not to talk to strangers. Of course, there is a lot of sense in that from the point of view of protecting young children from the undoubted presence of some very strange people in this world. But, unfortunately, the subliminal subconscious message that stays with us into later life is that we should avoid getting involved with people whose path we might casually cross in the course of our normal daily lives.

Indeed, as we go about our normal daily adult lives, the fact is that we’d never really notice a stranger anyway – because, in childhood, we developed a self-preservational psychological capacity to categorize new people that we encounter without paying any attention to who they actually are or the importance of the role that they migh play in our lives. As a consequence of this facility of ‘categorization’ and, indeed, our pre-programming, we pay no attention to people that we don’t know. The next time you’re on a subway, metro, tube, bus or train or the next time you’re in an elevator, notice how carefully people avoid making any kind of contact at all.

What are all those people missing? Possibly the next most important total stranger who could change the course of their lives. You have no idea who might totally change your career, who might become your most important customer ever, who might become a life-long friend and mentor. You simply don’t know who might be the next person to change your life. But you’ll never find out if you can’t take of your blinkers.

Pull yourself together. Opportunity abounds – but is totally missed by the automatic normal mind that’s too closed and blind to see anything. Psychology asserts that the normal person only perceives what they expect to perceive and only experience what they expect to experience. What a life sentence we all are given – by our programming and by our own inaction and dread of taking the small leap of faith that making personal contact with a total stranger requires.

You’ve got to open your eyes, you’ve got to smell the roses, experience life’s opportunities and go with the flow of a world that is just waiting to respond to you. I am not proposing that you start behaving irrationally and outrageously in public places! I am proposing that you put up your antennae, start tuning into the here and now, let yourself off the hook of normal living. Because, until you do, you normal life will continue to be mundanely, repetitively and boringly normal – and it will be your own fault.

It could be a myth – but many myths are basic facts lost in the passage of time – that, having struggled for many years to discover the meaning of life, the Buddha understood the truth whilst simply sitting under a tree. It may also be legend, but legend has it that Sir Isaac Newton made is most important scientific discovery, once again, whilst sitting under a tree. And although it was an apple that reputedly dropped for Newton, you’ve got to find your own tree to allow your very own pennies to drop for you – your personal development depends upon it.

Inspiration only comes to the clear uncluttered mind. And the normal mind is anything but clear and uncluttered. Psychology has concluded that the normal mind is overwhelmed by random thought – some fifty thousand random thoughts whizz through our heads every single day. The majority of those thoughts are harmless but, on the basis of research, some of our thoughts are self-destructive – I was going to say positively self-destructive but that would be an oxymoron – these thoughts are both negative and toxic. I refer to the thoughts that create the illusions of low self-esteem, worry, stress, anxiety and depression. Left to itself, the normal mind simply cannot experience inspiration.

Is life worth enduring without the spark of inspiration? Surely life is nothing more than going through the motions if you’re not excited and delighted by the cut and thrust of the out-of-the-ordinary? Sadly, the out-of-the-ordinary is far too rare an event for the normal mind that wallows in the comfort of the routine. However, if you don’t shock yourself out of the slumber of the mundane you will simply not have lived life to the full. Not just that, you’ll be a drain on the energy of those around you – particularly the people that you claim to love.
Everyone is capable of being inspired and inspiring. You are capable of leaping out of the norm and living your very best life. But you’ve got to make space for inspiration, you’ve got to give yourself the uncluttered and clear time to let the inner you out. Our neighbour in the Alps has regularly asked me what work I do. And, although I have explained it to him many times, he still persists in asking – in his own words “It seems to myself and my wife that you spend a lot of time doing nothing!”

Doing nothing is not a waste of time. Doing nothing can often be the time most fruitfully spent. The clarity and peace of mind that comes with spending time doing nothing is the incubation chamber in which inspirational ideas simply spring to life. Thomas Edison found that he only became inspired in his mind’s quiet moments to the extent that he set about creating quiet moments for his mind every day. A prolific inventor, he had had over four hundred inventions patented to his name. Pablo Picasso is reputed to have said that he was never sure when inspiration would strike so he made sure that he cultivated a prepared mind.

Are you prepared to be inspired? How regularly do you simply let your mind set off on flights of fancy? I’m not talking about wandering into negative thought – I’m talking about effortlessly allowing your mind wander onto what normal people would find unachievable or undoable. These things are only undoable to a normal mind constrained by preconceived negative notions. De-program yourself – let yourself go, let yourself off the hook of normal ‘living inside the box’. Seek out your tree, sit down and devote quality time doing nothing.

What would you say to the proposition that you can achieve anything – absolutely anything – that you believe in? Well, that’s what you’re actually doing at present – you’re living the life that you believe you’re meant to live. Psychology tells us that we only perceive what we expect to perceive and only experience what we expect to experience. Unfortunately, as a result of our socialisation into a normal world and upbringing by normal parents, our expectations are normal and these normal expectations are way off the mark of where we could set our sights.

Psychology also explains that our lives are dictated by our subconscious mind’s view of life. We learn our perceptions of how the world works, who we are, what our strengths and weaknesses, our own self image during our childhood years. Our perceptions, which over time gradually become deeply held beliefs are stored in the depths of our subconscious and, in as adults, when faced with a situation where we have to take action, our actions will be governed not be what is actually happening but by what we perceive as happening, based on our subconscious beliefs. In this way, normal people are unable to spot opportunity when it stares them in the eye, because it’s not something that they are expecting.

The result of this automatic process is that our subconscious perceptions, learned during our formative years, are our beliefs. These drive our expectations and our behaviour and, in this way, our beliefs create our lives. Or, put another way, you achieve what you believe. In essence, we live down to our expectations.

You’ve got to give yourself different beliefs – you must believe that you can achieve all that your heart desires. You’ve got to be able to make a massive impression on your subconscious mind to ensure that it can focus on what you want to achieve to the extent that it believes that it is part and parcel of and a logical step up from your current life. Believing is not wishing hoping and wanting, believing is seeing, feeling, hearing smelling and tasting. Your five senses are your interface with the world. They are what you used when you developed your views of your self-image during your formative years. As adults, we pay almost no attention to those senses, preferring to use what we learned in our formative years to make sense of the present moment – and, in the process, make nonsense of it!

You must explain to your subconscious mind what it would be like to achieve your goal. It has to see it, feel it, hear it, smell it and taste it as if you already have it. You can make the necessary impression on your subconscious mind by handwriting the experience of the outcome, as if you’re there already, using all five senses, writing in the present tense. But – and this is a big but – be careful what you wish for, for a focused mind will bring about what it believes to be the life that you live – remember, that’s what its’ doing already.

How many good ideas have you had that you simply never did anything about? Have you ever noticed that some really successful people are where they are because they took action to progress some really simple idea – the kind of idea that you say to yourself “I could have thought of that!”?

In fact, we’re all inspired from time to time – it’s just that normal people will laugh it off as some flight of fancy. And that’s what makes normal people normal – and the few that actually do something about their good ideas are abnormal – abnormally successful, exceptional people.

So, next time you catch yourself wishing that your life were different – and if recent surveys in relation to how so many people don’t like their jobs are anything to go by, wishing your life were different is happening all the time – realize this: for your life to change, you have to take action yourself. You’re the one who’s got to do something a little different, a little courageous and a little brave. Not a lot – a little will do for starters.

However, you’ll say to yourself that you’re not the type who could set up a successful business or develop an innovative idea. You’ll say to yourself that you’re not the type who takes a risk – you’re not the kind of person that would ever appear on the front of Fortune Magazine. However, it’s only this defective thinking inside your own head that’s keeping you off the front pages of international magazines. It’s only the pathetic little voice inside your own head that’s holding you back.

Is your life not bad enough for you to take some positive action? Are you not uncomfortable enough to get up off your normal ass and start living instead of trudging along? Are you afraid that others will sneer at your ideas or the idea that you could be a success? Don’t waste your energy worrying what others are thinking about you – they’re not – they really don’t care.

It’s up to you to lead your life – otherwise you’re just going through the motions. You’re the one who’s got to take action – otherwise you’ll lie on your deathbed wondering “what was that all about?” You’re the one who has to do something – and that something has to be done now. There’s no point in waiting for a miracle – you’ve got to set things in motion yourself.

So, today, do something different, do something brave – even if it’s only shaving with the other hand! Once you do one thing differently, you’re setting your mind up to do lots of things differently. And until you do something differently, nothing different will happen.

With the huge growth in sales of self improvement books and the proliferation of personal development websites, don’t you think that you would by now have witnessed an important shift in human consciousness – a marked improvement in the human condition? Not only is there little evidence of improvement, everything points to the opposite – increased levels of anxiety and worry as the economy slips and slides having been hijacked by a small number of people obsessed with their own greed; an increase in anti-social behaviour and violent crime and the ongoing inappropriate behaviour of people who should know better on the international stage of politics and international diplomacy.

We must ask ourselves what are all those people who are indulging in self-help books doing? in fact, in the course of my work I meet or speak with quite a few of these people and, undoubtedly, whilst some are taking major leaps forward in their lives, there are many who, just like in every other facet of their lives, are going through the motions, hoodwinking themselves into believing that their attitude, mental state, behaviour and lives are being transformed.

It’s all too easy to pursue a course of personal development and slip into a routine similar to all your other routines – habitual, repetitive, automatic and ultimately mindless. The moment anything becomes routine, it becomes useless to you in creating a better life. As a result, I encounter many people who have convinced themselves that they are developing their mindfulness – but who have ended up doing something else mindlessly! I’ve met plenty of people who meditate, who tell me that they’ve never felt as calm and focused in their lives – but, if they were to take one step back and take a look, they would find that their lives are crumbling around them.

If you have started the journey of self improvement you should immediately see positive results in your normal life. If you see no tangible results or benefits in terms of both personal effectiveness and the downstream benefits in your professional, personal and financial life, you are conning yourself. And the longer you fool yourself the more dangerous it becomes – because you will begin to convince yourself that your life is changing for the better when, in fact, you are becoming further divorced from the real world.

There are very useful and practical personal development resources around – but they are tools that have you have to put to the right use. They must be used during the moment to moment cut and thrust of your day – not just whilst you’re sitting in the lotus position at six o’clock in the morning! Mindfulness – and all that flows from it – is something that has to be practiced within the day – not in preparation for it. Until you bring what you’ve learned in your self-help books and personal development courses into the very moment to moment behaviour of your daily life not only will things not improve, they’ll get worse.