What’s wrong with me? I’ve sabotaged relationships, my business is failing, I’ve gained all of this weight, and my life is a mess. Do I need medication? Am I mentally ill?“ He was sincerely distressed and desperately seeking answers.
Softly, as I leaned in toward him, I said, “First of all, you are not mentally ill. Secondly, you’re asking all of the wrong questions, but I can help you with all of that!”
I knew from the little that he had shared, that he needed help with his Owner’s Manual and his operating system. And likely, you could use the same help.
That was the conversation I had with my client last week when I began writing about our Owner’s Manual, and what is programmed on our hard drive through our operating system.
Remember, these are deeply installed between ages five and seven. It’s important because it determines everything we think, every choice we make, every decision we make, who we show ourselves to be on a daily basis, and ultimately, it determines our destiny. Pretty important to examine, don’t you think?
When we allow ourselves to drift along with what was installed, we are not likely to arrive at the destination of legacy that we would have otherwise chosen!
Last week I gave the first two steps to recovering your Owner’s Manual, and the information on your operating system. We will continue this week, almost in workshop style. I hope you will seize the opportunity to take charge of your life with the steps!
Let me remind you of the first two steps (you can get the detailed explanation by clicking here to read more).
1. Begin to examine what is on your hard drive and in your Owner’s Manual. I know that sounds simple, but it requires some real digging in, and some work.
2. You must carefully identify how these beliefs have affected your life and how they have played out.
This week, we will continue with the remaining steps:
3. What is it that is the most important in life to you? What three things do you want to accomplish? And what three great traits and qualities describe who you destire/need and hope to become? Take time to write those out.
When I began doing this exercise with myself, I was only considering goals and outcomes. And those are certainly critically important to living an extraordinary life. However, regardless of accomplishing all of your goals and dreams (which I support 100%), the more important question is who do you need to become?
This was an important consideration for me, because at the time, I was beginning my journey of becoming a therapist. For me, the numbers of clients in my caseload was of minimal importance compared to my ability to help them become all they were created to be.
But in addition, I definitely considered some of my goals and aspirations, such as opening treatment centers. But the most important question I asked myself was this: “who do I need to become in order to help people become all they were created to be?” That first year I selected three words:
- Compassionate
- Determined
- Non-judgmental.
I immediately knew that my Owner’s Manual and my operating system did not contain the data that would help me become those things. To the contrary, they had data that would prevent me from those things.
What about you? What three things are important to you? First in your dreams and aspirations, but then secondly, who you need to become to become your very best?
Take some time to identify those things and write them down.
4. Identify changes that must be made in your Owner’s Manual and/or on your operating system in order to accomplish those things and become those things.
If you have difficulty accessing this information, it will help you if you will ask various questions such as these:
- What does my operating system say about _____________ (opening a business that would change lives?)
- What did my family say about that?
- What did they believe about it?
- Does my Owner’s Manual say I could do _________?
- Does it say I could be successful?
- If not, what does it ay would be some of the challenges?
(For example, my operating system had a bunch of rapidfire questions like:
- Where will you get that money?
- What makes you think you know enough to do that?
- Who do you think would come to you for help?
- Where are you going to find the people?)
I had to go through the same questions with the words that described who I needed and wanted to become to accomplish all I felt called to do.
For example, with the word compassionate, I saw great compassion installed in my Owner’s Manual from my mother. But my father had zero compassion and spoke strong things against it. So I had to fight some of his entries in my Owner’s Manual that said:
- People who need sympathy are week.
- If you are soft toward people you’ll have to pay
- No good deed goes unpunished
What parts of your Owner’s Manual support who you want to become and all you want to accomplish? And which oppose? You must identify those to reprogram them!
Take some time to do this step. It is critical for successful reprogramming with will cause you to set sail toward extraordinary!
5. And before you can program some thing new in, you must make room for it by removing the old.
You can unprogram the old in several different ways:
- Write a letter to the message and or quality that you no longer want to keep. Tell it that it has served you well but it needs to go now … that there is no longer room for it. If you choose the letter method, you need to go in some detail as to how it has served you and how it has not served you. And you must tell it goodbye.
B. I prefer this more active, intentional method because it works at a much deeper level, and does a more complete job of removing it.
Write each message, each word, each idea that you desire to get rid of on a separate piece of paper. Turn on some loud music, while moving your body as fast as possible (jump up and down, swing your arms, dance, do jumping jacks. MOVE!) Do this while tearing each sheet, one at a time, into as many small pieces as you can. While tearing them up talk to that word or message that is contrary to our success, and tell it you are done with it! Do it in rhythm to the beat of a loud, powerful song. (I usually use the song “Simply the Best!“ by Tina Turner. Then once it is torn to itty bitty bits of paper, then jump up and down on them and tell them they are under your feet! They are no longer in you! They have no more control!
People tend to want to skip this step because it might seem silly or outrageous.
I say to my clients, “Who cares if it’s silly or outrageous? Especially if you are getting it out so that you no longer have an internal war holding you back and pulling you back from all you were created to be? And from doing all you were created to do!?
Actually this is fun to do in partnership with someone else, so if you have someone else on the same track you are on, you might want to include them in this exercise.
6. If you do a good job of this, you will need to spend some time considering messages, actions and statements that you need to add to your hard drive and your Owner’s Manual.
Usually if you do a good job, it will include:
- New things you will need to embrace
- New statements you will need to say to yourself
- New habits that you need to form
- New/improved things you need to do daily to remind yourself of the new messages
- New ways to interpret, regard and perceive things
- New routines to program your success daily.
Write out these things for each of the items you hope to accomplish, and for each quality and characteristic that you wish to become.
Spend time with this. Ask mentors for help. Get a coach if needed.
7. Spend time doing an installation process.
So what is an installation process? It is something that takes in these things that are necessary in order to accomplish and become all you were created to be deep within.
Of course you can create your own way of doing it, but this is the way I do it in Coach Training with my coaching students. I have them write out all of these things.
Then to very loud music, usually “I Am Ready to Fly” by Richard Marx, or “I Believe I Can Fly” by R. Kelly. I have them speak these things out very loudly, boldly, with determination, while standing tall, and marching proudly. Almost as a declaration to the world.
This is not just a three-minute exercise. I have them repeat it again and again, louder and louder, until they feel it down deep in their soul. Who cares if it takes 10 minutes, 30 minutes, or an hour and a half? These things go deep and get lodged within.
When I was working on compassion, the statement that I needed to say again and again was this: “My heart beats in perfect rhythm with the heart of God, and therefore I can feel what they feel and care from the depth of my being!“
When I’m in a difficult situation with someone and I’m struggling for compassion I say that to myself, and compassion rises from deep within me! Every time.
Decide what your statements and declarations need to be. But it doesn’t end there.
8. You must write a daily proclamation that you say aloud that contains things that continue to reinforce what you just programmed.
Sometimes I do it in fun ways, sometimes I do it with scripture verses from the Bible, sometimes I do it was just powerful I am statements. But what ever you do, you must continue programming it in until the grooves are deeply formed in your operating system and on your hard drive.
People often ask me so if I do the eight steps, will it really make a difference? Indeed it will! When I began, by one year later, I had inpatient and outpatient treatment centers. It was a powerful place of healing for many.
But more importantly, I had learned how to listen with my heart, how to walk powerfully with my clients, and the way I cared for my clients was totally transformed.
As a result, their results were dramatically increased and improved.
I feel so privileged and honored to work with people who come to me. I am able to do work with them in a manner that is priceless and monumental. Just because I am present for them and truly making my best attempt to see where they are, all while shining the light forward for them … To become all they were created to be!
I hope you will take the opportunity to use this information. Not just to read it, but to work the steps. To follow through with a proclamation, and to begin to see yourself become all you were created to be! You deserve that! And the world the needs you to be that!
