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One of the darkest moments of my life came during my second year of high school when I was living in Bangkok, Thailand. I was sitting in my bedroom in an apartment building, looking at a backpack filled with all sorts of school work I needed to do that evening. I was failing most of my classes and was very unhappy as a result. I realized if I continued on the same path I was on, I would inevitably be presented with the worst life had to offer. I had the same backpack for several years. Each day after school, I would take my books home from school and would refuse to study. Over the course of a few years I’d been kicked out of one private school, and I’d done poorly in every other school I’d ever attended. I left my books unopened because I didn’t want to study and face what was inside.
The problem was each day I didn’t open the backpack, things would get worse and worse. The algebra class I was taking would move further and further away from me, becoming progressively more difficult to understand. The Spanish class I was in would learn more and more words, with which I couldn’t catch up. The history class would leave me seemingly decades behind. With each day’s scholastic failure it became more likely that I never would go to college. And more likely that I would soon be kicked out of another school. In addition, the more I ignored the work that needed to be done inside that backpack, the more books I would need to take home each evening. I’d been in school for a few months and the backpack had grown so heavy with work that I could barely carry it any longer.
At that time, I was a horrible student, and didn’t have a lot to look forward to in life. The best part of my existence, as it is for many kids, involved the time I spent out on Friday and Saturday nights. In the evenings during the week, I wasn’t allowed to go out and have fun. Instead, I was required to stay inside and study. Of course, instead of studying most evenings, I would do anything but. I would read crappy fiction novels and spend my time thinking about things completely unrelated to school. Sometimes, I would drink liquor with my stepsister. Anything but study and face the problems inside that backpack.
I want you to understand something at the outset: That backpack is a metaphor for the problems many of us carry around in life. We all have an incredible number of issues that are tucked away in the back of our minds, making us uncomfortable and holding us back. The longer we ignore these problems, the more they build up, controlling and governing a large part of what happens to us in our lives. Try as we might, we can never fully suppress our problems. We can choose friends that don’t remind us of our problems. We can choose jobs or careers that allow us to keep our problems in the background. We can occupy our time and our minds with all sorts of things in order to avoid dealing with these problems–and almost all of us do.
Something about this one evening in Bangkok was different, though. I knew I needed to open that knapsack and face what was inside. I was in my second year of high school, flunking all of my classes. My life was headed in the wrong direction. I opened the knapsack, took the books and notepads out, and put them on my desk. I held the empty knapsack in my hand, opened the window of the ninth floor apartment building I was in and tossed the bag out of the window. A gust of wind picked up the knapsack and carried it like a kite. I watched for several minutes before that old backpack finally disappeared, as the sun set over the city.
I sat down that evening and studied all night. I did the same for the next several weeks. I took a nap each afternoon after school and was tired all the time. However, within several weeks I caught up in school and was eventually back on track with my studies.
For the next several years, I never carried a knapsack with me to school. My reasoning was that if I carried a knapsack, I would never face the work that needed to be done inside of it. It was symbolic for me but very powerful. By the end of that first year of not carrying a knapsack, I was the top student in my class. My life changed completely, and it was largely due to my facing what was inside of the knapsack. Carrying those school books home in my arms each evening forced me to look at them, rather than keep them hidden.
When we face our problems, everything changes. Most of us are hiding problems, issues that are uncomfortable for us beneath the surface. We suppress and avoid them at all costs–pretending they aren’t there at all. Your life is probably being controlled to a large extent by the very issues you are avoiding.
I have attended numerous seminars in the past, and at the best seminars I have witnessed individuals experiencing “breakthroughs”–truly life transformative insights, which altered the course of their lives. When people have these breakthroughs, they end up experiencing more happiness, peace, love, and less fear in their lives. Typically, when people experience breakthroughs there’s a massive change that comes over them. It starts when years of built up tension leaves their faces, and their bodies become more relaxed. The people look noticeably happier than before.
A breakthrough means the food you eat will taste better.
In the few times I’ve followed up with these people after their breakthroughs, I’ve seen that their lives have undergone fundamental and profound shifts. It’s incredible how successful some of them have become. They have created giant companies. They have started families. They have become better workers, husbands, wives, and children. I’ve been impressed to no end by these stories, and have learned from them that a breakthrough is something that’s available to everyone.
Typically, the process of experiencing a breakthrough is as follows: the leader of the seminar will start questioning individuals about one aspect or another of their lives. For example, someone may get up and start talking about his life, which is horrible because his mother hates him. The leader of the seminar will then spend an hour or more showing the person how their mother actually really loves him, demonstrating this with one example after another. Once the person accepts that his mother loves him, the person’s relationship with the world is fundamentally altered forever. It’s an incredible thing to witness because some of the fundamental ideas, around which a person may have based his entire life, are changed completely. As a result, the person is able to live a happier and more fulfilling life.
Most of us feel a tremendous amount of discomfort in regards to people, or various situations throughout the average day. In fact, our lives are typically more controlled by what we avoid and move away from than the things we are comfortable with. We build rituals and have other methods for keeping ourselves comfortable, which allows us to avoid the things with which we are uncomfortable. Most of us spend our lives distracting ourselves, avoiding these challenges instead of coming to terms with them.
For a shift to occur in your life, you need to learn to face the discomfort you feel and to navigate through underlying issues. As much as you may hope for it, these issues will not simply go away. It starts with having an awareness and acceptance of the pain or issues you’re trying to avoid. Then you need to experience whatever it is that causes you discomfort, totally and completely. It’s only by doing so, that you will be able to move beyond the discomfort and feel better. Anything when fully experienced, has the power to fully transform you. It’s in awareness that you learn.
When most of us are angry or feeling discomfort, we focus on others instead of ourselves. We are always looking outside of ourselves for the explanation for why we feel uncomfortable and angry. For example, imagine if you were shot with an arrow this very second. What most people would do is look around them and ask themselves “WHO SHOT ME WITH THE ARROW!?” However, logically the first question that should be crossing your mind is “HOW CAN I GET RID OF THIS ARROW?” The focus should be on fixing the problem instead of looking for someone to blame immediately. It’s appropriate to blame someone, of course, but you also need to address the source of the pain and this should be your first priority.
Find the source of the pain in your life and confront it. The sooner you confront your pain and work through it, the faster you will experience a breakthrough and transform your life.
THE LESSON
Most of us carry many personal problems around with us in life. By not confronting them, however, we only make ourselves even more miserable. Problems build up as you ignore them, growing until they ultimately control your life. Everything changes when you come to face your problems and take back control over your affairs. The sooner you confront your pain and work through it, the faster your will experience a breakthrough and transform your life.
Read More about Appearing Defensive and Angry: |
About Harrison Barnes
Harrison Barnes is the Founder of BCG Attorney Search and a successful legal recruiter himself. Harrison is extremely committed to and passionate about the profession of legal placement. His firm BCG Attorney Search has placed thousands of attorneys. BCG Attorney Search works with attorneys to dramatically improve their careers by leaving no stone unturned in a search and bringing out the very best in them. Harrison has placed the leaders of the nation’s top law firms, and countless associates who have gone on to lead the nation’s top law firms. There are very few firms Harrison has not made placements with. Harrison’s writings about attorney careers and placements attract millions of reads each year. He coaches and consults with law firms about how to dramatically improve their recruiting and retention efforts. His company LawCrossing has been ranked on the Inc. 500 twice. For more information, please visit Harrison Barnes’ bio.
About BCG Attorney Search
BCG Attorney Search matches attorneys and law firms with unparalleled expertise and drive that gets results. Known globally for its success in locating and placing attorneys in law firms of all sizes, BCG Attorney Search has placed thousands of attorneys in law firms in thousands of different law firms around the country. Unlike other legal placement firms, BCG Attorney Search brings massive resources of over 150 employees to its placement efforts locating positions and opportunities that its competitors simply cannot. Every legal recruiter at BCG Attorney Search is a former successful attorney who attended a top law school, worked in top law firms and brought massive drive and commitment to their work. BCG Attorney Search legal recruiters take your legal career seriously and understand attorneys. For more information, please visit www.BCGSearch.com.
Filed Under : Featured, Life Lessons
Tagged: backpack, confronting your pain, transform your life, transformative insights
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Do not be distracted by your insecurities and doubts, or you will never achieve success because you will not allow it to happen. Focus only on the message about your skills and capabilities. Identify your goals and create a gameplan, and fill your mind with positive and hopeful messages that will drive you towards said goal.
In this article Harrison explains how you can ensure success in your career by externalizing your opponents. Your job is like a game; if you work hard, play by the rules of the company and are seen as part of the team you will be viewed as a valuable player for the company. The most significant part of any game is the presence of an opponent. Don’t look for an opponent among your co-workers. Never speak negatively of your team members. Instead, concentrate on the external opponents. External opponents bring you and the team closer as you work towards a common goal. In order for you and your company to succeed it is important to have an external opponent. Harrison advises people to consistently work hard and not participate in the politics. This is a sure way to score big in your career.
In this article Harrison discusses how people who stand for something always do better than those who do not. Companies who stand for something always do better than companies who do not. The most successful companies not only stand for something, but they are completely consistent with their core principles. This is what keeps them going and this is what makes them successful. One of the largest problems that people have in their careers is when they diverge from what they are good at. When you do not stand for something, you divert from your true strength. Everything begins to crumble and slowly fall apart when you are not doing something that you are really good at. The biggest success comes when you stand for something and are good at it.
Companies necessarily seek to employ positive, forward-minded people. A firm’s success depends on their employees, and they seek people who will enhance them rather than merely contribute to the bottom line. People with positive natures, who contribute to a healthy social environment, prove essential to the growth and success of their employers.
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In this article Harrison discusses the importance of ‘energy’ over technical skills. When people are hiring you they are purchasing your “energy” more than they are purchasing your technical skills. They are interested in your ability to influence the world around you through your energy. When you are marketing yourself and seeking a job, or working in a job, there are essentially two things you are marketing. You are marketing your technical skills, but more importantly you are marketing an intangible sort of energy. The most successful people have mastered the art of projecting positive energy. The better your energy, the more employable you will be and the farther you will go.
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Resourcefulness can make you better at everything you do, and separates the truly extraordinary people from the general herd. Do everything within your power to be resourceful in your job search, life, and career to give yourself the best possible chance of achieving your goals, and learn how to employ the resources currently at your disposal for maximum impact.
The most successful people in the world share the common characteristic of sharing, or concentrating on the value that they give back to others rather than on their own growth and profit. Focusing on yourself never leads to long-term success, but leads instead to unhappiness as well as emotional and financial challenges. Your greatest consideration, therefore, should be how you can contribute to others, and how your actions can impact their lives.
The best way to attain your goal is through small, incremental steps on which you can build. Establish a routine, and make sure you are consistently working towards some kind of goal. Start small, and always build upon what you have done before. Most people fail to achieve their goals because they believe everything should happen quickly and at the same time, instead of progressively building upon their past achievements.
Make sure that you are involved in groups that focus on positive things. Your success in life depends on your ability to focus on the outcomes you want, and the focus of the groups with which you associate will in turn shape your own focus. You must endeavor to always choose groups with a positive focus.
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Your greatest successes will come from some of the smallest actions in terms of meeting people. You will cause a “stacking effect” the more you meet and connect with people; conversely, people cannot connect with you when you are withdrawn and nothing will happen. You must do everything in your power to connect with as many people as possible.
When myriad candidates are applying to limited positions, practicing unusual tactics in your job hunt will prove far more helpful than following the established routine and waiting for positions to come to you. Much like in military strategy, well-planned and unconventional moves can help you conquer your goals without suffering significant losses. You can land an excellent position by focusing on companies’ needs, rather than depending on job and recruiting advertisements.
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Your ability to help people will determine the extent of your success; the more powerful and effective your help, the greater rewards you will receive. One of the rarest and most profound achievements is to follow through on your goals and create a paradigm-shifting idea. The more revolutionary your work, the more people you will affect and the more memorable of a career you will have.
You will greatly benefit your career by helping and promoting your company’s expansion. A common belief is that expansion is fundamentally positive, and a lack of expansion is fundamentally negative. You must be on the side of expansion rather than contraction in every area of your life. All employers seek people who will help them expand, and the more your ability to contribute to this expansion will provide you increased job security and a greater likelihood of being hired.
The ability to fit into your work environment is among the most important parts of obtaining and retaining a job, even more so than your skill level. Fitting in means nothing more than being comfortable in one’s work environment, and making others similarly comfortable. Employers want to hire people who will embrace their approach to business and the world on physical and moral levels, so you must strive to fit in with their worldview.
Focus on what you are doing, not what others around you are doing. There are people to take action towards their goals, and then there people who sit on the sidelines and comment on the first group of people. People who are mostly interested in gossip and watching others usually lack the confidence and determination to take action themselves. The most successful people go account and accomplish things rather than sit back and watch others make things happen.
In this article, Harrison advises you to live the lives you wish to have, do the jobs you want to do, and basically live your dreams to your best possible ability. Life is fleeting and no one knows what tomorrow holds. So Harrison puts forward certain questions – when are you going to start living the life you want and when are you going to take charge of your life. The time to have the career you want is right now, not tomorrow, and not later. You need to take charge of your career and life and no one else is going to do it for you. Your entire life and the quality of it is a product of your decisions. You can have, do, or be anything you want. Do not create alibis for making comprises in life. What separates the best and the happiest people is the ability to stop to making excuses and Harrison wants you to be this person.
Anyone can be up when things are going well, but the real challenge comes when things are not. Do not look at problems, which are inevitable for any person or business, in a negative light; think of them instead as challenges, lessons, or opportunities. There is a silver lining to be found in every problem, and finding that silver lining will enable you to grow.
Understanding what you do for a living is very important for your career. You should understand the generality of your specific profession. You and your career are a product. You need to know where and how to market yourself in the best way possible. You need to be relevant and understand the skills you are offering. Being a relevant product is essential for your success. It’s easy to be relevant when you understand what you are doing and what purpose you serve. Being relevant is more than just getting a job. Being relevant also relates to serving the employers with the skills they need. You need to understand your market and what your customers want. This is the way to stay employed, and it is also the means to continual improvement.
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Having a goal or vision will propel you towards greater career success and happiness. Without a purpose, you will find yourself depressed and ultimately fail to achieve your goals. Do not subscribe to the unrealistic problem that you should never have problems, but instead regard problems as part of your overall growth strategy.
Don’t ever give up, and make the most of the tools at your disposal. Take chances and invest in your best skills, and persist in the face of unfortunate events. Have faith in your considerable work and capabilities, and use them to create value for others.
In this article Harrison discusses what a good hiring manager should look for. Many people who make hiring decisions really do not know what they are doing. In fact, they often make mistakes when hiring. They put too much emphasis on skills and experience. But the single most important aspect of hiring is evaluating the person’s unique outlook on the world. If the person does not have a positive outlook on the world, he/she will bring down the morale of the other workers. The person will harm the company through the negative outlook. The key to success is having the power to stick it out in jobs and finding happiness wherever you are. Hiring people who do good work and are always able to find happiness should be the number one objective of hiring managers.
To reach the goals to which you aspire, you must compare yourself with people superior to you for motivation. Most people prefer to look at life the way they wish it to be, rather than as it truly is. Move out of your comfort zones and face reality. Don’t seek out or compare yourself with the average people around you, as doing so will only mire you in mediocrity rather than push you forward.
You can better market yourself by taking a stand against something. Peoples’ personal beliefs, including the things with which they do not agree, define who they are as people. Standing against something differentiates you from the crowd; when done in the correct manner, without disrespecting others’ opinions, such a stance can help you land your dream job.
Maintaining a routine in both life and work is important to success. Not only do you need to establish a routine, you must make that routine demanding and push yourself to the limit. Budget a certain amount of time each week for networking, applying to jobs, brushing up your interview skills, and following up with employers. Such consistent effort on a daily basis will make a huge difference to your career success.
A recommendation from a powerful person can make a huge difference in your job search; a reference from an influential person makes a tremendous difference to a prospective employer, and thus can be a major advantage for you. When an important person whom the company trusts recommends you, you instantly qualify for positions that may previously have been unattainable. Make the absolute most of your connections with the powerful people in your life, because doing so can instantaneously change your career and life.
You must plant seeds in the minds of others, so that they will be more likely than otherwise to think of you when a future need arises. In planting seeds, you are making people aware of what you have to offer; you must make sure that you are ever present in the minds of your potential employers. Planting seeds is the most effective way to generate top-of-mind awareness, and ensure that the right people remember you at the appropriate time.
Recent immigrants exemplify the benefits of willpower, passion, and excitement in the way that they work so much harder for their goals than the people who have been here for most or all of their lives. Like most Americans, you need to rekindle the spirit of your immigrant ancestors and become hungry for what you want. The entrepreneurial spirit that brought people to America has often faded over time; adopt the fire and work ethic of new immigrants in order to achieve your goals.
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how can i get rid of this arrow-YEAH…GOLDEN WORDS…
THE ‘FIRST PRIORITY’ WAS SIMPLY SUPERB.SO I AGREE WITH YOU
As usual Harrison, this was yet another awesomely powerful sharing! Thanks!
“Every single thing I’ve written of any power or merit came through using the tools Barry taught me. Usually counterintuitive, sometimes dangerous, they only changed my life.” —Stephen Gaghan, Academy Award–winning writer of Traffic and writer/director of Syriana “Barry Michels and Phil Stutz are profoundly talented guides to the inner workings of the psyche. The Tools is breakthrough material that ignites your own capacity to transform your life.” —Marianne Williamson “These tools are emotional game changers; they can help you work through conflicts, get happier, and feel a deep sense of purpose. As simple and practical as they are, they do nothing less than deliver you to your best and most powerful self.” —Kathy Freston, author of Quantum Wellness: A Practical and Spiritual Guide to Health and Happiness –This text refers to the Hardcover edition.