Self Motivational Speaking to Measure the Past, Observe the Present, and Imagine the Potential - By Sharon Bender

The saying, “What the mind believes, the body achieves,” has been repackaged through the philosophy of acclaimed motivational speakers, like Tony Robbins, in their visualization mantra. Supposedly, we can change or control our thinking and outcomes by using this technique for seeing ourselves accomplishing the task at hand. Frankly, developing the “five-year plan” works just as well, provided we “plan our work and work our plan” sufficiently

Another handy approach I’ve used over the years, garnered from the likes of Zig Zigler, is realizing the beneficial use of the term, “enthusiasm.” Note that the last four letters of this motivational word is “iasm.” IASM is an acronym for “I am sold myself.” This is where the self-motivational speaker comes onto the stage in our lifelong success. The role it plays is imperative. Selling ourselves is the key to unlocking success.

The problem is that long after we’ve been so-called motivated by a professional and powerful speaker, we return to our old selves again. We revert to whatever comes natural to us. If we don’t practice what they’ve preached, all is lost and we may as well have sat in the bleachers to an empty stadium for the hour or two we invested in attending the lecture. We must remember to feel, think, and do what we learn, provided it makes sense for each of us individually. What we learn can be garnered in a variety of ways. Our personal experience tells us nearly all we need to know about our wins and losses in life, but it can take a lifetime to finally “get it.”

Spending a fair amount of time becoming exposed to what the various motivational speakers and self-help books, tapes, and videos have to offer is often a worthy investment to begin our own mind control journey. Why let others take control of our thinking? Aren’t we able to think for ourselves? The answer is often, no. This is a reason why so many humans around the globe permit mind control at the hands and mouths of others. It can remove us from the responsibility equation. Personally, I’d rather think that “if it is to be, it’s up to me.” We are who will become blamed for our actions (wrongly or rightly) and no higher power. Why, then is it not taken upon ourselves to examine our own behavior and discuss with ourselves our own form of correctional motivation?

What motivates one individual may not be what motivates another. Dr. Stephen Covey’s habit to “begin with the end in mind” may sound better to us than Tony Robbins asking us to create a “compelling future” by imagining the end result. They mean the same thing essentially. The “five-year plan” is another rendition. In any case, we can generate our own “enthusiasm.” Remember that word? I am sold myself? We just need to get a picture formulated about our potential. From that point, we can perform the visualization act.

Personally, I believe that in order to understand the “end-game” philosophy we must “measure the past, observe the present, and imagine the potential.” Tony Robbins tells us that the past does not equal the future. Well, in some respects it does. If we are able to carefully weigh the past, make changes in the present, we will indeed be able to affect the potential. In this instance there is an equation in the past and the present equaling the potential. In this respect, the past therefore does indeed equal the future.

We can apply any of these philosophies. They nearly all are telling us the same thing. Simply put, we can formulate a picture of where we’d like to be in a few short years. The image must be developed with great clarity, the pieces and patterns to the picture help us to visualize the past, present, and potential that is unique to each of us. The “potential” picture is based on the pieces of our lives from the “past” and a pattern we’ve formulated to the “present.” It is not helpful to pretend away our history. We can use that to make the necessary adjustments today that will help us to become featured in the picture we’ve formulated.

Once we have the terminology that works best for us, the picture will come into focus and we are ready to begin self-motivating. We don’t need another lecture to do that. There is truly a self motivational speaker and coach in all of us.

Sharon L. Bender, Ph.D. is an educator and author. She is also the inventor of the Q3 Inquiries approach that utilizes the quantitative past, the qualitative present, and the quasitative potential to help us meet our objectives. For more about this approach, please visit http://www.sharonbender.com/index.htm.