The short answer to the question is “none!” – unless, of course, you’re prepared to put what you’ve learned into practice. Unfortunately, that’s where most of us fall down. Yeah, they spent a day or two and it was wonderful, they felt renewed, uplifted, ready for action. But research shows that it takes about six weeks for the effects of the average training course to wear off – completely – and personal development training is no exception.
Why? Because it’s easier to stay the same – it’s easier to stay “not too bad” when everyone else around you is not too bad as well. It’s less hassle to not have your friends – or, as some of my personal development clients have told me, their family – looking at you as if you’re some kind of born-again weirdo! It’s always easier to fit in. And, it doesn’t matter what new learning we take on board, sooner or later, to a greater or lesser extent, we revert to type, we revert to our default settings, we go back to being normal. But normal is crazy – there’s over seven decades of research that proves that. And not-too-bad isn’t good enough when you think about the life that you could have – effortless happiness, effortless success, peace of mind.
So, what will you do to change your life? Because, you need to understand, if you want you life to change, you’re the one who’s going to have to do something new, something different. Don’t pay any attention to anyone who tells you that you can change your life in five minutes – they want to make a fast buck. Don’t listen to anybody who tells you that success is all about making cart-loads of money – they’re the ones who want loads of money and some of it is yours! Pay no attention to people who keep recommending the latest wonderful book that they’ve just read to you – you won’t change your life by reading – you only change your life by doing.
Doing what? You’ve got to do little things in your life differently. Try starting with little things – like try brushing your teeth with the hand that you don’t habitually use – and your mind will get used to the idea that, in every single thing that you do in your life and in every single situation in which you find yourself in your life – you have a choice. You have a choice – can choose to live automatically and mindlessly like all the other normal crazy morons that are happy being not-too-bad, or you can choose to focus on the here and now, feel the toothbrush’s bristles on your teeth, notice how differently you’re holding the brush, taste the toothpaste. It’s in the minute detail of the normal that you will find reality. And when you find reality, you will realize that you can, indeed, achieve effortless success and happiness because, in reality, it just happens.
