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"When every physical and mental resource is focused, one's power to solve a problem multiplies tremendously." -- Norman Vincent Peale
Empowerment.
It's what I'm all about. It's the name of my company. It's what I teach in both my Huna and NLP trainings. My mission statement is "to empower the planet."
But what the heck does it mean?
From an early age, through my studies in metaphysics, the teachings of my spiritual path, Huna, my decades of training in Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP), and my studies in psychology, I've come to this conclusion:
Each of us is fully equipped with all the resources we need to live satisfying, successful lives.
Okay, great. You've heard this before. But if we all have everything we need, how come life can be such a struggle? Why is it so hard to push ahead in our careers? How come we can't find that perfect love? Or if we find it, how come it turns sour? Why can't we create the body/lifestyle/spiritual awareness we crave?
The thing I've come to understand is this: We do have everything we need but we often aren't accessing it. It's like having one of those unbelievably powerful super computers and not plugging it in.
Before we talk about how to plug your super computer in, let's take a quick look under the hood at the "technology" each of us has been given.
Our bodies are brilliant self-regulating systems. When we get cold, our body shivers to help warm us, dilates the blood vessels to protect the skin, and makes us pee more frequently to reduce blood pressure. When we get an infection, the body creates a fever (raising temperature to kill certain bacteria) and sends armies of white cells into battle. At any point in time, our body is processing food, filtering air and separating oxygen from carbon dioxide, and pumping blood to whatever area is in most need. Our physical bodies are so intricately designed that we've spent centuries trying to figure out how it works -- and still don't really understand it.
And that comes as standard equipment.
What about our brains? Don't get me started! According to Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in his book Flow, every second, our five senses pick up 2,000,000 bits of information and our brains filter that 2,000,000 bits down to a manageable 126 bits by deleting, generalizing (and distorting) the input. It instantly organizes the data and stores it, draws conclusions from the input and tells our bodies how to respond, and formulates lessons and learnings.
And that too is part of our standard equipment.
Think about any part of your natural resources: your eyes, your feet, your ability to hear and understand language, and your capacity to turn pepperoni pizza into energy so you can stay up late watching The Daily Show. Isn't it mind-boggling? With all this going for us, how can we possibly not create extraordinary lives for ourselves?!?
Unless we're not plugged in. Unless we're wandering around in a state that can't access the power of all we've been given.
In NLP, we train people to be in a "resourceful state." A resourceful state gives you access to all the incredible resources you have. You've experienced it. It's the state where you feel "on" or "in the zone." Where all you do seems to be flowing effortlessly. Where you feel grounded and powerful. All is in sync.
But too often, we operate from a non-resourceful state that's at odds with the power of our natural equipment. We worry and get tense -- so our body is blocked from moving naturally and our golf swing gets choppy. We second guess and try too hard -- so our brains are not allowed to respond to the environment and we blow that important interview. We panic and feel insecure -- so we get tongue-tied when that attractive stranger approaches rather than letting our natural ability to relate take over.
Sound familiar?
Common wisdom (which might be common but usually isn't wisdom) says that "exceptional people" and top performers have much better equipment than we do. Really? Are Adele's vocal chords or Inbee Park's forearms better than ours? Does Stephen Hawking have a better brain? Okay, maybe he does, but what about Donald Trump? Steven Spielberg? We're all built differently, but I'd argue that we all have plenty of everything we need to be successful.
It's not about getting new, improved equipment. Our standard equipment is definitely well-designed. It's about putting ourselves in that resourceful state so we can access all we've got.
And that's exactly what I'll cover in my next blog.
Until next time...
Mahalo!
Dr. Matt
Got questions? Please respond here or contact me through my Facebook fan page or my blog.
Matthew B. James, MA, Ph.D., is President of The Empowerment Partnership, where students learn Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP), Huna and Hypnosis. To find out more about Huna and forgiveness, we invite you to attend Dr. Matt's free webinar Ho'oponopono: The Secrets to the Hawaiian Forgiveness Process taking place on Tuesday, September 3rd at 7:00pm PT.
For more by Matthew B. James, Ph.D., click here.
For more on emotional wellness, click here.