Category Archives: Confidence

Beware of GPS Systems That Lead You Astray

Once upon a time, there was this guy. He was a normal, every day guy, and the kind you usually run into in the grocery store, or at the cleaners picking up your shirts. The kind of guy who you see on a regular basis, but if you saw him outside of the usual places, like say if you saw him at the ice skating rink, you wouldn’t likely get anything other than a vague, “that guy looks familiar” feeling.

That was the kind of guy that this guy was. He had a decent job, he made decent money, and he lived in a decent neighborhood, in a decent apartment. He dated some decent girls, and most of his dates went pretty decently, meaning that he never got to second base.

If you are wondering where I’m going with this, that only means that you are starting to find this interesting, and perhaps a little upsetting at the same time, the reasons of which shall likely be explained soon.

So anyways, something very peculiar happened to this guy. He had one of those GPS navigators in his car. It didn’t come factory installed; he had it put in after the fact. Of course, he was smart enough to know that you should never get something like that done at the dealership, because everybody knows they charge way too much for things like that.

Anyways, he really liked the sound of the voice on his GPS. She always sounded so soothing, and so comforting. Warning him of upcoming on ramps and off ramps. He would sometimes drive by himself and pretend that he had a woman with him in the car.

But that’s when the creepy stuff started happening. Pretty soon he noticed that his navigation system was taking him on longer and more roundabout ways to get to where he wanted to go. At first he thought it was just a glitch in the software, but it kept happening with more and more consistency.

Pretty soon, his GPS was leading him way out in the boonies where he’d never been before. Every time he tried switching off his GPS, she would politely ask him not to do it. It was as if she was starting to read his mind.

Pretty soon he just gave up. He listened to her, and went where she told him, without question. And the more he obeyed her, the further and further she took him from his destination. Sometimes he would end up completely lost, and became completely dependent on her to take him back home.

Because he was late several times for work, he quickly lost his job. And with his job gone, he lost his apartment, as he couldn’t afford the rent. All he did was drive around and listen to her sweet, soothing voice take him wherever she thought he should go. And he obeyed unquestioningly.

Pretty soon he was receiving messages from her on how to get loose change, and a few odd dollars here and there so he could pay for gas, and some food. Because he was living in his car, he began to listen to her direction twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Pretty soon he felt completely alone and vulnerable every time he left his car.

People would see him standing on the side of the road, mumbling incoherently as he got out of his car. He would wander off into the city, and come back with enough money to buy another weeks worth of gas and food. Then he would climb back in his car, and she would tell him where to drive, so that they could be alone together.

Everything was fun until he got pulled over. It seemed that either he or she (whatever she was) neglected to renew his registration. Normally, this would have been a regular stop, with a warning from the police officer to renew his registration.

But because he hadn’t shaved or showered in several days, he was more than a little suspicious to the police. When he mumbled completely incomprehensibly to the police, they asked him to step out of his car. When he started asking his car for permission, they knew something was wrong.

Naturally, they took him in for questioning, and because of his completely deranged description of how he came to be like he was, they deemed him a menace to himself and to society. They locked him up in the psychiatric ward, where he remains to this very day.

His car, however, is another story. When they interrogated him, he said some interesting things which made the police want to search his car further. When they went out to the impound yard, the car was gone.

And they haven’t found it since.

Instantly Remove Stress With Ancient Breathing Techniques

Stress is a huge problem in today’s society. Stress is a huge problem in any society. A growing number of doctors attribute stress to as much seventy percent of all illnesses. Stress can also cause a host of other problems. Problems at work, problems in relationships. It quickly becomes obvious that finding a way to reduce stress can go a long, long way to not only improving the quality of your life, but also to improve the length as well.

The biggest cause of stress is the idea that you have lost power, and something outside of you, be it your job, your financial circumstances, your relationships, and has control over you. You have lost choice.

Researches have determined through experiments that losing choice and a sense of power leads to immediate increases in blood pressure, heart rate, and breathing rate. It would appear that maintain control of your own choices is a simple way to immediatley reduce stress.

The good news is that although the above mentioned experiments were done in such a way that the test subject really did lose control, in normal every day there is a simple way to maintain that control through some simple and quick exercise that combine breath and thought, causing them to be deceptively powerful.

First is the way to breath. Breath in slowly, through the nose. Take a long, slow, deep breath. Hold it just for a moment, and then release it through your mouth. Make the exhale a little bit longer than the inhale. And while you are inhaling and exhaling, keep the tip of your tongue firmly planted against the roof of your mouth, just behind your teeth, as if you are preparing to make a “la” sound.

Next is thought. Take three breaths, as described above, and think three different thoughts for each breath. You’ll want to break each thought in half, and think the first half during the inhale, and the second half during the exhale. Here are the thoughts.

First: “I release…the past.”

Second: “I release… the future.”

Third: “I choose…now.”

By releasing the past, you remove all guilt and anxiety associated with things that happened before, either by your choice or not. And by releasing the future, you effectively remove any worry or doubt regarding anything. By choosing to exist only right here, right now, and asserting your choice in the present, you will gain an enormous amount of centeredness and personal power.

You can do this as often as you like, as your desk at work, at a red light, even sitting in a meeting while your boss is droning on about something. The more you do this, the more it will become a natural part of who you are, and it won’t be long until your stress levels are significantly lower, giving you the peace of mind you deserve.

Easily Banish Public Speaking Fear For Good

If you’ve ever been called up to give a speech, either on the spot, or maybe you’ve been given a few weeks preparation time, you know how incredibly terrifying it can be. I’ve had to give a few best man speeches, and although having a few drinks beforehand helps a little bit, it takes more than a few shots of whiskey to kill public speaking anxiety.

One of the reasons people get so nervous when speaking in public is because it’s easy to imagine that you are being “judged” somehow by all those people sitting there watching you. But I had a startling revelation once when I took a public speaking class at a community college.

We had to draw straws to see who spoke first, and I picked the short one. And halfway through my speech, I noticed something interesting. If you’ve ever given a speech maybe you’ve noticed that after you started speaking, you might have calmed down a little bit after you realized nobody was going to throw tomatoes at you.

That’s what happened to me. I was about a minute into my speech, and I started to get a little relaxed, to the point of being able to actually pay attention to the facial expressions of the rest of the class. What I saw was interesting, to say the least. Every single student in the class had a look of utter fear and terror on their faces. They were no doubt petrified about their upcoming turn to speak. That’s when it really hit me. Everybody in the class was so far into their heads that I could have been speaking Portuguese and they likely wouldn’t have noticed.

The following week I decided to try my “experiment” again. Only this time I went about halfway through. I noticed something a little different, but still extremely helpful. The half of the class that had yet to give their speeches were still paralyzed with fear. The other half, who had already gone, had looks of complete peace and relaxation on their faces. For them, the worst was over.

For those still waiting to speak, I could have been speaking Klingon, and they wouldn’t have noticed. To those had already gone, I could have been speaking about the impending destruction of the Earth, and they wouldn’t have been fazed.

So when you get up to give your speech, whatever the situation, people are likely thinking about a million different things that the quality or content of your speech. So long as you don’t vomit on the front row, or start shouting obscenities, you’ll likely be fine. Especially if it is a situation where many other people will also be speaking. Half will be looking to their turn in dread, the other half will be so relaxed the will applaud your speech no matter what you say.

When you take this consideration into mind, you can relax and give the message you intend to give. One thing that really draws people’s positive attention is a relaxed and confident speaker. When people listen to somebody that is relaxed and confident, they are much more likely to see the person as an authority figure and take what they are saying as truth.

And of course, the more you practice, the easier this will get. Which is why I really recommend joining a local Toastmasters group. It will really boost your self-confidence and speaking ability, and you’ll be surprised to notice your new charisma showing up in other parts of your life as well.

Remove Public Speaking Fear

If you’ve ever had to give a speech, you know how terrifying it can be. Giving a speech has long been known to be a bigger fear among North Americans than dying. People would rather face death than a polite audience. I could understand if it was like in the old days, where people would throw tomatoes and rotten eggs if they didn’t like what you were talking about, but people really don’t do that kind of stuff anymore.

So why are people so afraid of public speaking?

Child development experts tell us we spend the first two years of our lives learning how to walk and talk, with fantastic encouragement from all the adults around us. Then the rest of our lives, society as a whole (our parents, teachers, religious leaders) tells us to sit down and be quiet. Is it any wonder we sometimes feel an incredible rush of anxiety when we stand to talk in front of many people?

One idea that can give you enough motivation to move past this irrational fear is that people that can regularly and comfortably speak in front of others generally make a lot more money. The best speakers can command six figures for one speech. If you’ve ever seen somebody give a speech, and then sell a bunch of products in the back of the room (e.g. backroom sales) you’ve probably already figured out that just in selling those products alone they can easily make another six figures. That’s just for one afternoons work.

Of course, not everybody wants to become the next Tony Robbins, but wouldn’t it feel good to feel as confident making a speech in public as it would to ask a stranger for the time on the street?

Luckily, there are many ways around this. One way is creative visualization. The reason many people get scared when giving a speech is that they imagine the worse possible thing coming true. (Those tomatoes and stuff.) So naturally, when you think about giving a speech, and all you can imagine is getting booed and laughed at, and maybe getting hit in the face with a couple rotten eggs, getting nervous is a natural response.

But when you practice imagining a different outcome, things slowly change. When you consciously practice imagining giving a speech with a great ending, you will slowly become less and less nervous over time. This does take effort, because your brain naturally gravitates to worse case scenarios, it’s just a leftover aspect from evolution. Running from tigers and stuff like that.

But just like eating the right foods, and exercise overtime can shape your body into a much more attractive, right thought and practiced visualization will just as readily change your automatic feelings when it comes to making a speech.

While there is no magic bullet, consistent practice will yield inevitable results. And pretty soon you’ll not only be looking forward to giving speeches, but also people will be looking forward to hearing you.

Tough Decisions Make A Happy Life

The other day I was watching this old movie on some obscure cable channel that I almost never watch. The movie wasn’t actually that old, not like it was black and white or anything. Maybe ten or fifteen years old. You could tell it was not a big budget film, as I didn’t recognize any of the actors, and production quality seemed almost as if it was made for TV.

It’s interesting when something like that happens. You’ll be sitting there, flipping through the channels, and something suddenly catches your attention. And suddenly when you find this really interesting, all the plans you’ve had for the afternoon (or evening) suddenly fade away.

That’s the kind of movie this was. Something about this was just kind of intriguing, I don’t know if it was the dialogue or the content, but once I started watching, I couldn’t help waiting to find out how it turned out.

It was basically about two kids that grew up in a not so affluent neighborhood. And it pretty much spanned their whole lives. As they grew up, they slowly drifted in and out of each other’s lives. One of the boys ended up being a police detective, and the other one slowly went further and further into corruption. He ended up being a prominent politician, with strong ties to organized crime, but the only person that could really prove anything was his old friend from childhood.

The interesting part was how the movie moved so believably through each of their lives, every time one of the two characters had a “decision point,” so to speak, whether or not to choose good or evil, you could easily sympathize with them and understand why they would choose either way.

I was eating lunch at a deli the other day, sitting at the counter. Usually I sit at a big booth, and bring a newspaper with me. I like to spread out, and take my time to eat so I can relax. I usually have to go in at odd hours; otherwise there won’t be any booths available. Sometimes when you want something that everybody else wants you have to go at odd times or places to get it. But the other day I was sitting at the counter for a change. I started chatting with a local priest that was sitting next to me. He was telling me the biggest type of question people come to him with are big decisions they are facing, and how they aren’t really sure how to make it.

He said that the best way to decide is to think five years in the future and pretend you are looking back on your decision. Then you can really judge if it is a good decision or not. Many people don’t take the time to do this, and consequently they make a series of poor decisions, which can lead up to a pretty unhappy life.
And he said surprisingly enough, when you go into your future and look back on the decision that you are about to make, many times you choose something that you hadn’t thought of before.

The best part of the movie was the end. They worked the plot so the good guy could confront the bad guy and give him one last chance to do the right thing. They had it set up so it was pretty much a do or die situation. If the bad guy chose bad, then the good guy would kill him, and it would be a justified killing based on police procedures. If the bad guy chose good, then the good guy was prepared to let him walk away. They were childhood friends after all.

I’m not going to ruin the ending, but it was a well-scripted conflict that really highlighted the difficulties most people face every day with making decisions. Sometimes you make much harder decisions than you give yourself credit for.

How to Persuade Others to Give You What You Want

There has been much debate over the last several years as to why the human brain became so large. Compared to our body weight, it is much larger than our nearest relatives, the other apes. Some of the leading theories are that we need large amount of brainpower for spatial processing. It has been argued, notably in Howard Bloom’s “The Lucifer Principle,” that the need to hunt via action at a distance (e.g. throwing a spear and hitting moving target) required quite a bit of mental development.

Others have argued that our brains developed such large size due to our need to communicate. But why so large? Scientists have known for years that other mammals communicate through verbal interaction. Dolphins, whales, wolves. This is certainly not related to humans. But why did human’s language become so much more complex than others?

It might be easier to understand when you change your paradigm of the purpose of language. Most assume that the purpose of language is merely to exchange information. Researchers are beginning to wonder if this is a foregone conclusion. Some argue that the entire purpose, the entire driving force of language is not to communicate information, but to persuade. Even when a simple communication of information is the apparent goal, the underlying intent, even if it’s subconscious, is to persuade. Persuasion with statistics is but one of the many ways to convince others of your way of thinking.

If you could remember back to when you made your first sound, you would probably recall being under a great deal of stress. You had just come out from the safety and protection of your mothers womb, and were thrust, painfully so, into a harsh and unfamiliar environment. You had to breath for the first time. It was cold. You couldn’t feel the familiar thump-thump-thump of your mother’s heart. Naturally, your first response wasn’t to shout for joy to the skies, or voice your appreciation for your new discovery, but more likely to curse the gods for your predicament.

Then a funny thing happened. The more you cried, the more attention you got. Attention that brought you back to what you were missing. Comfort, attention, protection. The more you cried, the more you learned that you were cause, and the new world in which you lived was effect.

As you grew up, that repeated over and over again, thousands of times. You had a feeling; you expressed that feeling through your voice and actions, in attempt to manipulate your environment. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it doesn’t. Many people go through their whole lives frustrated because it is not as simple as it was when you were a baby. When we all reach the age of two or so, suddenly a simple cry doesn’t bring with it the immediate and comforting response we expect. And that is both frustration and worrisome. Does that mean that our world doesn’t care that much about us any more? Or does that simply mean we need to change our strategy? To formulate a new way of expressing our desires with a greater probability to getting them realized by others?

Luckily, there has been a whole lot of study in that area. There are specific ways to structure your communication to persuade others to give you what you want. Good ways and bad ways. Ways that will leave a good taste in the mouth of those that help you, and those that leave them with a funny feeling that they’ve been had. Ways to help you out in the short term, and ways to ensure your long-term success.

Just as surely as you expected your mother to pick you up when you cried, you can be sure of others actions based on your communication. It’s not that the world doesn’t care any more, it’s just that you need to be more specific with your requests, and frame them in such a way that the person fulfilling your requests will be happy for doing so. There are numerous strategies and methods I will share with you over the next several weeks that will give you incredible power over others, so much so that they will enjoy doing that.

Stay tuned.

Seventy Five or a Hole in One

When I was a kid I had this kit that I bought from Radio Shack. It was a 75 in 1 do it yourself electronic kit. It had a large circuit board, and it had a booklet that showed you how to hook up seventy five different simple electronic circuits from strobe lights, to radio receivers, to lie detectors. It was pretty cool, and most kids had them. They were really popular. The cool thing about them was the way they were designed. You would think that having seventy-five different electronic circuits would have a lot of complex components, but it was actually fairly simple. There was quite a bit of overlap between the circuits, so the whole kit could easily fit inside a small box, much smaller than you’d imagine.

I remember a friend of mine bought a specific golf club once. He had played golf for several years, and for the longest time only had this set of clubs that he’d bought a long time ago, back when he was in high school. For the longest time he never used any other club except for these. Then one day he was invited to play in a tournament at a course that he normally couldn’t afford. His boss knew somebody and he got picked at the last minute. He showed up, with his old inexpensive set of clubs. He was ok at first, but somewhere along the line he got into trouble

On the back nine, he found himself in a particular unique hazard. It was a partial pond, but also a partial heavy grass. He looked into his bag, but he didn’t have a particular club for that shot. After a few moments delay, he finally settled on an eight iron. Not the best club for this, but it worked. For some reason, even though the shot was a good shot, and everybody complimented him on his resourcefulness, he felt a little ashamed of having to pull out an old eight iron into that situation. He’d noticed that all the others around him had all kinds of specific clubs for each particular hazard.

Of course as soon as the tournament was over, he went out and shopped and shopped until he found a club that was designed for that particular hazard in mind. He promptly put it in his bag, where it stayed.

I had this professor in college, a professor of philosophy. Dr. Mclurg at San Diego State, probably one of the most influential professors I’ve ever had. He had a particularly engaging way of arguing. He’d grab your attention, pull it in, and you couldn’t help but to see things from several different perspectives at once. Whenever the class finished, I always felt as if my mind had been irreversibly expanded, and I could never go back to my previous way of thinking. One of the striking things about him was that he almost always wore the same shirt. It was a normal, regular button down shirt, but he seemed to always wear the same one. It was if he had decided that the particular thing you are using, despite whether it’s an article of clothing, or an electronic component, as long as it works, it doesn’t really matter what other people think about that. It’s not like the shirt that you wear is going to affect your philosophical arguing points.

Probably the coolest thing I ever did with my seventy five in one electronic kit was to take the strobe light, which was only set up for the amps and current for a small 1.5 volt bulb, and run the light in my bedroom through the circuit. It created a really cool powerful strobe light. And it actually lasted a few minutes before the whole circuit board caught on fire due to overheating. Probably the best thing about that was, by the time I’d saved up my allowance to buy a replacement kit, the newest version was a 150 in 1 kit. Me and my friends really had a blast with that one, and I managed to not burn down my house in the process.

Last time I saw my friend, I asked him if he’d ever used that club, and of course he said he didn’t. He kept it as a reminder to always make sure he was using things for the right reason, and not because he thought he was supposed to according to what other people supposedly thought.

Speak Your Skills and the World Will Listen

Once upon a time there was a bricklayer. He had been doing this job for about ten years, and he was very good at it. He was well known amongst his peers as having a very dedicated work ethic, and an incredible amount of skill. There was a waiting list or at least three years long for those that wanted to apprentice under him, as he was well regarded as having the best skills in the area.

He mostly did non-residential buildings, like museums and churches and some city centers. Occasionally he did some small residential projects, fountains, and a few private temples here and there for the religiously inclined. He was very successful, and very happy.

He was also very young. He had only been in the business for ten years, starting fresh from high school. His father had died when he was very young, and as soon as the law would allow, he took full time work. He quickly realized that he had found his calling, as the work was both rewarding and challenging. And he had always made decent money. Yet to start a family on his own, he still gave the bulk of his salary to his mother, who had raised him alone since he was six years old.

Something was happening, though. Although his list of apprentices kept growing, the jobs he was finding were becoming fewer and fewer. Many companies were starting to buy pre-fabricated walls and other structures, as it was much cheaper. The work slowly began to dry up, until he had a list of apprentices wanting to learn under him, but no work to do. Finally he had to suspend his apprenticeship program, as he had to take on simple mundane jobs that even his would be apprentices were qualified to do. Many times he found himself working right alongside of them.

He started to get worried to the point of letting his fears overcome the pleasure he had always received from doing the work. He began staying up late at night, unable to sleep, imagining a future where his skills were no longer needed. His life, which had been so promising, filled with delight and a positive future now was clouded by thoughts of a life filled with performing unskilled labor for low wages, never knowing where his next paycheck was going to come from. It became almost too much to bear.

Then one night he had a dream. In the dream his father came to him. He had always kept a picture of his father on the nightstand next to his bed, always imagining his father looking on hi with pride. In the dream his father said to him:

Son, you have a skill that few possess. When people hire you, they hire you for the beauty that you impart on their buildings, their places of worship. Before, you relied on your work to speak for itself. But now, you must speak for your work. You must proclaim your skills. You must make it easy for others to choose your work over the easier path. You must convince them of your value, and the value your work will bring them. I have faith in you.

He woke up, barely remembering the dream, but he had a new motivation. He set up a meeting with three of the projects that had canceled only a few weeks before. He asked for a meeting with whoever was in charge of deciding on traditionally laid bricks or prefabricated bricks. When he met with them, he spoke with passion and belief and conviction. All three of them agreed to hire him. Soon word spread of his work. Word spread of the conviction with which he spoke of his work. Soon he needed to hire a personal secretary to handle all the calls from around the country of people that wanted to hire him. And now he had two lists of apprentices. One to learn bricklaying, and one to learn how to tell others about their skills, and the value that they would bring to others.

They are Waiting for Your Ideas

I was in this bar the other night, hanging out with some friends. My friends left, but there was an interesting match on TV, so I decided to stay and see how it turned out. I didn’t even know that team was playing but that quickly turned into one of the more important things that night. As I was watching the game, I couldn’t help but notice all the other people that were paying really close attention to this. Most people could find this very fascinating. Of course, the game eventually ended, and everybody’s interest quickly fractionated into various splinters of interests. I started talking to a guy that I happened to be sitting next to at the bar. Funny that I didn’t notice him before.

We started talking about various things, sports, work, etc. He started telling me about his friend whose roommate just got this massive promotion at work. Massive promotions are pretty good when you can come across things like this. What had happened was this guy used to be a production worker in a factory that produced highly technical products that are used in various high-end electronics. Because of the nature of the work, and the small degree of error tolerances allowed in the manufacturing process, the work was sometimes a bit anxiety causing. One the one hand they had extremely tight technical specifications inside which they had to build a certain amount of products. On the other hand they had very important production thresholds they had to achieve on a consistent basis in order for the company to remain profitable. It was a business that had a very slim profit margin. And in today’s economy, I’m sure you can appreciate how important something like this is.

This guy had been working there for a while, and the management was a bit interesting. The production facility itself used to be part of another company, and they produced elements of a similar product. Then they initial company split up into different smaller groups, to try and maintain their profit, and the production factory was sold off completely to yet another company. Because the production process was very similar, the incoming management company didn’t change much.

While this didn’t present a problem to most of the workers, this guys friend had a bit of a problem. Just before the new management team took over, he had some ideas on how to promote the efficiency and consequently the profitability of the production line. He was just getting enough courage and confidence to suggest these to upper management when they made the change. At first he thought that he was just going to wait until things settled down, and then present these ideas to them. But then something interesting happened. Upper management just kept their hands off approach and was content to let the workers continue to produce, just like they had before. They didn’t have any meetings, or offer any insight or suggestions. It seemed to most of them that they were happy with the way things were. Which of course was fine for most people, because keeping things the way they were is very comforting to most people. Change is very scary to some. But this guys friend had an idea, and now he not only was unsure of whether or not his idea was going to be accepted, he wasn’t sure if his idea was even in line with what the new management team wanted to do. This was all very confusing. He had an idea, but wasn’t quite sure they would be open to hearing it.

For a while, this caused him some anxiety. He had all these ideas on how to make things better, but he didn’t know if he was supposed to voice them, or even if they would be accepted. He wasn’t content though, to keep things the way they were, because there’s no fun in that. He wanted to take things in a new direction, but the wanted to make sure that it was safe to suggest this new direction to management.

So after waiting several weeks, hemming and hawing, he finally thought to himself:
“You know what, what’s the worse that can happen? You have good ideas, you have an idea of what can make things better, if they don’t like your ideas, at least you will let them know that you want to make things better than they are. Because if one thing is certain in all this confusion, you can always improve things. And the more you improve things, the easier they become.”

So he finally strode into the management office, and whey they learned that he had some ideas of how to increase productivity, and therefore profits, they were all ears. What he thought was going to be a brief five or ten minute meeting turned into a three hour brainstorming session, with him at the controls. After the meeting, he got a good idea of where they wanted to take the company, and then gave some very good ideas on how they could easily get there. Soon he was promoted to a manager position, with his salary almost doubled. Now he is the new managing director of manufacturing engineering and design, something pretty good for a guy with only a high school education. And because of his ideas, the company is now extremely profitable, and they seek this guys opinions on all major decisions that upper management makes. Pretty good if you ask me.

Train Your Brain for a Fight

I used to have a friend that was a boxer. He wasn’t a professional or anything, he belonged to a boxing club, and he went to sparring practice a couple times a week. Once a month or so, they would have several boxing matches. There were about twenty or so members, and the first Sunday of every month they would have several fights that members of the community, as well as friends and family of the boxers could come and watch. They fights were only two or three rounds, and they wore that thick protective gear. None of them were serious enough about it more than just thinking of it as a hobby and a very very good form of exercise.

I don’t know if you’ve ever boxed before, or if you’ve ever trained before, but training to box, even if you never step inside of the ring against an opponent can be an incredibly thorough workout. When I was in high school I was on the wrestling team, and those workouts were murder. It’s no wonder that boxers and other fighters are in incredibly good shape. I think one of the main reasons that training for fighting of any sport is not so popular is not because it is not effective, but it is incredibly intense. If you train as if you are going to fight, then you will get the best workout you can imagine. Sometimes It’s a good idea to train for something even if you aren’t going to do the actual thing you are training for.
Some people practice public speaking and public debating, not because they ever intend to run for political office, but because simply practicing these skills can make you incredibly confident in your communication. And when you can become incredibly assured in these areas, they will undoubtedly bleed over into other areas of your life.

My friend had one main problem when he boxed. He had only been in one fight in his life, back when he was in fourth grade. It wasn’t even a fight. He said him and some guy he really didn’t know were talking, and then they started insulting each other, and the guy just suddenly hit him in the side of the face, with a left hook. Not too many fourth graders are skilled in the defensive arts, so my friend naturally was completely caught off guard. So when he used to box, he always had a deep fear of getting caught by a left hook. He said that his boxing coach did a really cool experiment with him.

He asked him to think of what makes him feel the most invincible in the ring. What feeling, what pictures he saw in his head when he felt like he could beat anybody. He thought about, and he felt really good when he landed a very strong right jab against his opponents jaw one time. He was able to do this because his opponent had lowered his left arm momentarily, and my friend felt a sudden rush of excitement, and snuck in a quick right jab, that connected so well, they decided to call off the fight.

So what this coach did, was he made two videotapes. One was of some opponent about to land a left hook, just like the one that hit my friend in fourth grade. He made another video of an opponent dropping his left hand, and opening up his face for a right jab. He then spliced these two videos together, in about a three second movie. There was one quick one of the opponents winding up for the left hook, and then it switched to a slow motion video of the same guy dropping his left arm.

My friend said he watched this three-minute video about ten times, and after he was finished, and interesting thing happened. Whenever he was in a fight after that, and something caused him to remember the left hook, he immediately got the feelings of super confidence and invincibility he felt from when he landed the right jab. He said that he fought a lot better after that.

I guess when you brain is giving you information, you can choose to accept it, or make a habit of changing it into something else that is more resourceful and useful. After all, it only took my friend a few minutes to re train his thinking from fear and defensiveness to confidence and power. How many ways could you apply this?