Magic is one of the techniques included in my NLP coaching programs. This blog is about the magic of your mind and how you are only using a fraction of what you could be using to make your life a whole lot easier. Magic is a special, mysterious, or inexplicable quality, talent, or skill. It is a subject that delights all children and tantalizes their imagination. Sadly, it is something that most adults reject—or do they?
My book Get Lucky Now! is about how to get what you want the easy way—not least by using magic amongst other things. This blog continues the series of excerpts from Get Lucky Now. Thousands and even millions of people have used magic to achieve success throughout history. They did not have to pay millions for these secrets or even join some weird sect. They just had to discover how to use their minds more effectively.
Who Believes in Magic?
Is there still some deep recess of your mind that believes that your childhood magic is still alive—a vague conviction that your universe is not quite as random as it sometimes might appear? I hope so.
A world that is limited to just laboratory results will be much smaller, less colorful, and far less happy than one overflowing with an abundance of nature’s daily miracles, even if they are currently poorly understood.
Curiously, success and magic appear to be linked. While either can exist independently, their combination increases their potency many times over.
Set your sights high. The enemy of the best is the good. In other words, if you accept the good, you are far less likely to achieve the best outcome. You will delight in reconnecting with the person you were meant to be before the self-limiting beliefs exerted their restrictive influence. Soon you will be able to tune in to the creative deeper areas of your mind and see things with a new clarity.
For perhaps the first time, you will experience being the driver of your life rather than being the passenger. You are in control of your life, imposing your demands on life rather than accepting the demands that life imposes on you.
If You Can’t Beat Them, Join Them
Ask yourself this question: “What do successful people do differently from me?”
Their success is not an accident. It is not just a result of luck, either. Although, intriguingly, many successful people believe that they create their own luck.
It is about people who have found success in different ways. Reassuringly, there are some common strands that have stood the test of time. At least one of these might point you in the right direction when you feel a little lost in an increasingly confusing world. Embrace two or more strands, and who knows where your journey might end?
When All Else Fails, Read the Instructions
How you use this book will determine, to a large extent, what you receive from it. It will take some commitment, but not as much as you might fear. Life would be simple if I could just let out the secrets of success now. You could then memorize them and use them immediately.
Indeed, I could share some secrets right away. I know that at least one would help you, and you would probably be very happy with it.
I’m not going to, though, for two fundamental reasons. First, you would add me to your long list of all the well-intentioned people in your life who have tried to persuade you to do stuff “for your own good.” Most people’s lists are way too long already.
Second, there is a much bigger prize out there almost within your reach, and certainly a lot closer than you can imagine. The secrets (that I’m not sharing just yet) are good. The ideas that come from your own mind will be so much better; indeed, they will be the best for you.
My role is only to tickle your brain. More specifically, it is to tickle the large bit of your brain that you are not using to anywhere near its full potential—your unconscious mind.
Writing is Doing Part of Thinking
Let me give you an example. In my work as an elite performance director, it makes no difference to me whether my client is a sports star, business mogul, TV celebrity, or a friend who lives next door. When I see a client for the first time, I ask for only two things: an open mind and a brief description of the issue.
First, I want my client to have an open mind. There is no problem with skepticism; that is to be expected. Indeed, it is a healthy attitude, as long as it is combined with an open mind.
Second, I require a note detailing the issue before our session. This note is vital to me, as it describes the client’s view of his or her problem at a superficial level and projects a desired outcome. Ultimately, my client will measure our success working together, or lack of it, against this yardstick.
At a deeper level, something magical often happens when my clients write their notes to me. These notes take on a life of their own. I start to appreciate the words they use, I gain a glimpse of their view of the world and what makes them tick, and I start to develop the skeletons of strategies that I believe they will find helpful.
Their notes are often anything but brief. The magic is often hidden in the final paragraph.
“Steve, I’m sorry I rambled on a bit. I hadn’t thought of some of these things for years. You will be really surprised, but I feel a lot better already, just for writing this down.”
We have all probably heard something similar and so are not in the least surprised, because this is how the mind works. Writing about a problem often helps. So I’d like to stress this fundamental point with you right now: writing is the doing part of thinking.
This sentence is really important, which is why it has appeared so early in this book. It is important because writing is a simple way to connect to the unconscious mind. It can put us into a flow state, like the zone in sports or the groove that musicians describe. These are creative places to be in, because these are places where many successful ideas germinate and grow.
