There is only one thing you can do, and that is to politely let them off at the next station. I believe the people in our lives who are negative, competitive, jeal- ous, etc.
But no matter what form it takes, we all have it somewhere inside. And the worst part about this inner villain is that, in most cases, external factors in your life that seemed innocuous created this villain. You may not realize it, but this villain has created a glass ceiling—an artificial limit on what you can achieve and who you can be.
Which Wolf Are You Feeding? I once heard a fable about a Navajo woman who told her grand- son a story about how we all have two wolves that live inside of us, constantly battling one another. To that wolf, everything in the world is wrong and unpleas- ant. He believes that people are mostly bad, things are no good, and that the world is a cold place.
This wolf has empathy, love, compassion, positiv- ity, and knows it can accomplish anything it puts its heart and soul into. This wolf sees the bright side of everything and constantly sees things glass-half-full. And grandson, this wolf, the powerful wolf, can take you to so many amazing places. The one you feed. We all have the bad wolf, or the villain, as I call it, living inside of us, but we also have this hero just waiting to be released.
The Villain Is A Parasite A few years back, a man went to a third world country in South America to volunteer for a worthy cause, helping those in need. After his emotional journey, he arrived back in the States filled with gratitude and ready to kick his own life into high gear. But shortly after the trip he started feeling sluggish and a bit weak and sick. Over the next few weeks he stopped doing certain activities that he loved. He stopped playing with his recreational basketball team and being active in the community, and he started to try to process the new thoughts of an aging man.
And from that moment on, this parasite was living inside of him, feeding off of him. Every minute of every day it was robbing him of nutrients, sapping his energy, and diminish- ing his quality of life. He simply had no idea something was living inside of him, holding him back from his full potential. However, he eventually went to the doctor, found out about the parasite, got the right medicine, and the parasite was gone for good.
This man ap- preciated life once again. In fact, he appreciated it even more so after this experience. With a new perspective on life, he felt like he could accomplish anything! Why do I tell you this story? Because the villain that I spoke of earlier in the chapter is, to all intents and purposes, a parasite that is living inside of you. This chapter will be like going to the doctor and getting medication to destroy the self-doubt and the pessimistic voice that has made you miss opportunities.
And even worse, it will continue to erode your confidence. And we all know that reduced confidence hampers your ability to move in a better direction. When was the last time you made a great move, made a sale, had a great date, got a promotion, or started something new when your confidence was in the toilet?
Probably never. Think about your best days, best sales, and best dates; they happened when your confidence was high and all things seemed possible! And this is just the start. Every second of every day our brain is bombarded with the news of wars, scarcity, economic crisis, disasters, terrorist attacks, murders, sicknesses, and suffering. Then, through the years, Time Magazine realized that the more negative their stories, the more copies they would sell. The negative content reflects the increasing number of anxiety-producing global events such as the rise of terrorism, ecological disasters, and many other crises and calami- ties.
All this contributes to our perception that things are getting worse. Now is Time Magazine the only one who has gone through this transformation and is delivering negative news? Of course not. Time Magazine has to make a profit, as does every other news outlet in the world.
The negativity is overpowering the positive-thinking part of our brains. According to research done by UCLA, the aver- age human being has around 70, thoughts per day. And I understand that throughout history there have always been wars, economic hurdles, and natural disasters.
But never before has all this information been so readily available. We get it from our apps, our phones, our social media accounts, and TV at an alarming rate. And it affects you, whether you like it or not. So what happens is that this barrage of negativity is strengthen- ing your inner villain. Why do you think you deserve love when famous movie stars keep getting divorced?
Why do you think you can get in shape when the world is more obese now than ever before? To kill off this aspect of the villain, do the following: Go on a day news diet. Spend that time work- ing on the things that can allow you to gain confidence, instead of something that strips it away.
So commit to yourself right now to take a day news challenge and write down a list of things you will be doing instead. Will you meditate, cook yourself some healthy meals, and hit the gym? Create the business plan for your new idea or expand your current one? Will you read the rest of this book without delay? Will you hang out with your kids, your spouse, or your parents? It will allow you to escape the drag of negativity and move forward in a positive direction.
No doubt, through- out your life you were taught to work on your weaknesses, to try to improve your skills and abilities in areas where you did not thrive.
At the end of the day, all this does is rob you of your confidence. By focusing on your weaknesses, though, you end up feeling inferior subconsciously.
Just as troubling, this focus time encourages you to ignore your exceptional capabilities and strengths. I was in serious danger of living a complacent life I loathed. And one of the things that almost sentenced me to a life of self-doubt and mediocrity was being told to work on my weaknesses. About 10 years ago I wrote my first book entitled, Totally Ful- filled. When I first decided to write it, the only reason I did so was because I wanted to share my passion for helping others.
As you may have figured out, I write books exactly the way I talk. But no, I definitely am not an English major. As I sat down to write my first book, all these thoughts about my lack of writing skills started to fill my mind. So I wrote my first book. Not without some difficulties and episodes of self-doubt, but I got through it.
When I was done, I knew it would need an editor to go through it and clean up some of the mess that I am sure I had created through my lack of formal grammar and writ- ing skills. So I found someone I was told was one of the best editors in the country, and I took a plane to meet her. We had a nice meet- ing, I explained my desires and my passions and the fact that I knew the manuscript needed some cleaning up.
However, two days later I got a call from her, and I remember to this day what came from the other end of the phone. This is a two-hundred-page conversation. I remember hanging up the phone and allowing disempowering thoughts from the past to flow back into my mind like some sort of dam had just broken. And the reason they came back so fast was because like many of you reading this, I had been taught to work on my weaknesses for most of my life.
My subcon- scious tried to make me believe I was incompetent for thinking I could ignore my weaknesses. Who are you, Dean, to think you could write a book?
The villain grew stronger and stronger as I spent about 24 hours beating myself up for not taking the time to work on my weaknesses before I wrote the book. Are you kidding me? I may not be a trained writer, but I have a powerful message and I need to share it with the world. This is who I am. What could be a better victory than that? You surely would not be reading my 6th book!
I let myself focus on the lives I was going to change with my message. What opportunities have you passed up through the years because you questioned yourself based solely on flaws you think you have or others told you that you have? As you think about that ques- tion, also think about this truth: Working on your strengths will help you overcome anything that you consider a weakness.
Ned is someone you may have seen on Dr. Phil or on Oprah numerous times. Having it is like having a Ferrari engine but, unfortunately, you have bicycle brakes.
I just teach kids and adults how to control the brakes. And when I do, they go faster than anybody else. To anyone with ADD, trying to read a book of little to no interest is harder than it is for other kids. Everyone is good at something, if not multiple things, so we dig for it and find it. When he becomes great at that one thing, his confidence goes through the roof and it trickles down to all areas of his life.
All of a sudden you fast forward a couple of months and Johnny is in that same classroom reading the book because he wants to. Have you been holding on to a weakness? Have you been letting it somehow define you, diminish your true value, or make you feel inferior?
If so, can you see how it fuels this inner success-robbing villain? And can you see why it has to stop today? I went through school struggling like the hypothetical kid in Dr. No one in my early years of school saw all the things I could do well and the talents I had. I could watch somebody drive a bulldozer for fifteen minutes and jump on and drive it like a pro.
I could watch people on stage and be able to emulate them with ease. Through these two senses, I was able to absorb knowledge and skills that took other people years to acquire. I was able to start things fast and get them accomplished fast, but I was told to work on my weak- nesses so many times growing up that it almost crippled my learning ability and career.
Many adults inadvertently strip kids of their confidence and their abilities because of this insistence on addressing weaknesses. Heck, I bet you are good, if not great, at a lot of things. Take a moment right now, stop reading, and write down a list of what you do well. You can find this form at www. Are you good at selling? Are you good at just being honest?
Are you good at being a friend? Are you good at being a listener? Are you good at organization and structure? Are you good at developing systems, or programming computers? Remember the story of the two wolves? About how the wolf that you feed is the wolf that wins? This one strategy will help improve more than just your bank account. It will improve every area of your life. Becoming exceptionally good at one key skill is far more valuable than struggling for years and years to become average at the things that you find difficult.
If you want financial success, if you want to build real wealth, make it a habit to focus on the things you do well. A few years back I was doing a small round-table mastermind and there was a great guy in the group named Tom. I taught Tom real estate investing skills to help him di- versify his portfolio and create long-term wealth. My home office has invoices and papers and clutter all over the place.
He sat in motionless silence. I think the others may have thought I was being rude. For a second I thought he was going to break down and cry. Go spend all your time getting even better at that. What if you did one extra deal a year and then paid somebody part-time to organize for you? You better learn to get orga- nized! And you can do exactly the same thing. What weaknesses are holding you back? What have people told you that you need to work on? What false beliefs do you have about yourself because of a so-called weakness?
Yes, of course: Bad advice. Let me ask you this: Have you ever had an inven- tion, a thought, an idea, or a creation that you thought could change the world and make you money? Oh, you want to get it on TV? Then, some years later, you see your original concept changing the world and making someone else wealthy. Well, what robbed you of that experience?
What robbed your life of that invention or opportunity being yours and those experiences being yours? Nothing more than bad advice. We get pounded with advice from our broke friends on how we should make money. This is truly why bad advice is the most costly advice in the world because we are learning from the wrong people.
Of course not, because they are not the right people to listen to in those specific instances! By safe I mean it stops us from taking the actions and calculated risks that can help us evolve to the level of life we desire. In some cases, people may sabotage you maliciously, but most people genuinely feel they are protecting you or saving you when, in fact, they are feeding the villain, creating doubt, lowering your confidence, and keeping you at status quo.
When someone is spewing their bad advice to us, we can force a smile, but we need to shove that ad- vice into our inner trash can immediately. I have no doubt that bad advice has created pain in your life or cost you dearly, as it has me. A handful of years ago, during a book tour, I found myself having a conversation with a group of students talking about why they had not yet reached the level of success they desired.
As each person shared his or her thoughts, I started to spot the similarities in their stories. Rather, each and every one of them had a basket of bad advice delivered by someone, and it robbed them of the courage to take action towards their next level of life. They heard it from husbands and wives, parents and coworkers, and it killed their momentum.
So after I left this group of people, I jumped on a plane and flew back to my office in Phoenix, Arizona. I have to admit, I was aggravated that all these people were robbing my students of their next level of freedom with often well- intentioned but destructive suggestions. So I got to my studio, threw on a sports jacket and a tie still wearing my gym shorts and sneakers which were hidden by the desk I sat behind , and we started filming.
From there, I proceeded to do my first ever direct-to-camera info- mercial, which means no host, no announcers, no fancy graphics, just me talking to the camera for half an hour and offering my book to viewers a few times throughout the show.
But I did the show with pure passion, no notes, and no script. I wanted nothing more than to serve and help people. And what was on my mind? The bad advice that was robbing my students of their confidence, happiness, and ability to go to that next level. For example, my parents have been married nine times between them. After I filmed the show, I completely forgot my spur of the moment reference to my parents. And about three months after it aired, my mom called me.
You had to tell the whole country that your mom was married five times? And of course I apologized and then explained to her that I had been in the moment and not reading a script. And even better, two days later I bought my mom a new car as an apology. Take the time to filter all the advice that comes your way and see if the person sharing it is qualified.
If you want advice on how to play tennis, get advice from someone who is a pro, or who knows how to train pros, not from your great Aunt Edna who has never played, but watches tennis matches on television religiously.
At www. Write down what they cost you. Create this new habit of ignoring bad advice and getting good advice from qualified people. Diminish your internal villain and gain a new level of confidence. Given this conventional path, let me ask you a question: In high school or college did you have a passion or a dream of what you wanted your life to look like? When you give up on your dream and you settle for less, these influential individuals will express their pride in your grown-up attitude.
As crazy as it sounds, it hap- pens every day, and maybe it has happened to you. You know what makes you light up and what dims your light. When you follow the same path everybody else is on, you get where everybody else has been.
What I am saying is, start realizing your true worth and know that you can evolve in the direction you choose. They thought outside the box. You have the courage to find your own way. If you actually listened to your heart, your dreams, and your desires, what direction would your feet be head- ing?
Think through what makes your heart smile and write it down. To make a change in any area of your life, you must start with a first step. Saying it out loud or writing it down can be that step, right here, right now.
Confidence builds and doubt dies when your heart is aligned with your actions. Draw a vertical line down the center of a piece of paper. Dig deep and answer with complete honesty. When done, circle the top 2 or three items on each side. Whether they feed the inner villain or empower us, they come at us non- stop. So pay attention to the external factors you need to protect yourself from, or adjust the way you receive them, because eventually they start run- ning you.
Let me explain through a story how the inputs from the outside world can affect us physically. One is an unsmiling man with poor posture. How do you think he does at work? Is he the boss, or a low-level employee? What kind of father do you think that person is? What kind of lover? How much passion for life does he have?
How much joy? Does he like his job? Does he make a lot of money, or is he struggling to get by? His posture, gestures, and appearance are giving off the vibe of com- placency at best and depression at worst.
Think about his enthusiasm on display. More than that, he seems comfortable in his own skin. Is he the boss, or a low- level employee? Does he like what he does for a living?
Your subconscious is like a hard drive into which you feed data throughout your life. When you have a gut feeling, that is your subconscious speaking to you.
The other guy, however, is most likely a go-getter, full of high energy, enthusiastic, and a winner. So given your intuitive, subconscious judgment, how important do you think your outer appearance is to your success and happiness? What matters is the effect, and that effect is bad. Spend the next few days observing yourself and other people. Pay attention to how you carry yourself and how others carry themselves. You will see all postures and styles, but your subconscious will clue you in to what you like and what repels you.
Check your physicality numerous times during the day and try to smile, stand, talk, and gesture in a manner that represents the best you. Would your shoulders be straight? Would your eyes be half shut or wide open? Would you be attentively listening or just waiting to talk? Create a role model in your mind God is good, but anyone will do and pretend they are always watching.
Not only will these physical traits become a habit, they will create a byproduct so much bigger than you think. What do you think a smile is worth? Did you know there have been numerous studies done about the power of a smile? This absolutely blew my mind! Some day when you have time try Google-ing the effects of a smile.
We must be happy! A doctor took a collection of high school photos and studied the people with the biggest smiles in the yearbooks compared to the people who took yearbook pictures with a seri- ous look on their face. They then studied them thirty years later because they wanted to find out who was happier, who made more money, who had better relationships, and who lived longer.
Insane, right? If a simple smile can do all that, what would life be like if you also stood up straight, held your head high and your shoulders back, and talked with energy and enthusiasm? What if you were a posi- tive presence for the people you like to be around? When you become that person with a better outer appearance, you attract similar people into your life and you repel the people who could bring you down.
Yes, this is a success habit that can allow you to attract abundance into your life, but it will also lift you up when you see yourself in a picture or the mirror. Choose Your Words Have you ever thought about what people say to you or what you say to them? Words can feed the inner villain or they can starve it. In this section I want to make you aware of their impact in a variety of ways. We know that if someone calls us stupid, lazy, ugly, fat, or hope- less that it can really hurt.
As humans, we feel sadness, loneliness, anger, and many other emotions based on the words we hear. But do they have to? As I write this, my kids are 7 and 9. Do you want to suffer from hurtful words and allow them to create negative physical changes tears, stress-induced illness, etc. You can absolutely choose to dis-empower the words that cause negative emotions.
The words said a month ago, a year ago, or maybe 20 years ago--if they still bother you, then you are the one respon- sible for providing them with the power to hurt. You can take away the capacity of words to hurt you.
Why not do so now? Keep the concept of the inner villain in mind to motivate your- self. The more we allow those negative, emotional-laden words to hurt us, the more we give strength to the inner villain. As a result, our confidence goes down, self-doubt increases, and we start having a negative perception of the world. We can easily go from an abun- dance mindset to a scarcity mindset in an instant.
Try this Tony Robbins exercise to take the power away from words that may have a strong emotional or negative affect on you.
Does that make anyone feel different or offend anyone? You can use your imagination to see the direction he takes those words. When he gets to the more colorful word that describes the same body part, you see people in the audience cringe or smile widely. All the words I said mean exactly the same thing. You just associated a different meaning to them.
You gave them the power they possess, and you can take that power away. Try writing some words that have tremendous power in your life. It can be any word or group of words. Everyone has a trigger word or ten or twenty! You walk around pissed-off! Each of us has different words that are strong triggers that lock in negative emotions in our life.
What are yours? Right now is a per- fect time to stop reading and write down what trigger words you sometimes say that put you in a negative state. You can find an easy cheat sheet at www.
Before I share it, though, consider the subtle ways in which our bodies reflect our words. His body mirrors his words—he looks okay but certainly not good or great. Contrast their physical reac- tions to Joel Weldon. His eyes light up and he looks 25 again! He programmed himself to feel good when he says those words and consciously or not he is be- coming fantastic as soon as he says it.
So write your trigger words. And as you write them, describe the emotions each word brings out in you. Here is the cool part about bringing those words out in the open. You can flip them. Earlier we talked about our appearance—shoul- ders back, big smile, and eyebrows up.
Doing those things alone can make a big difference in your life. Your days will be better with just those minor physical adjustments. But what if you also took all those negative trigger words out of your vocabulary? And if you slip like we all do, then just readjust and restate. Who surrounds you? Who do you spend the most time with? Who is in your inner circle? You probably know where this is going, but go there with me. We all know how impactful the people closest to us are. Some rob us of confidence while others empower us, right?
Maybe you could read this book to your partner or share its lessons with the people closest to you. Keep reading for another way to deal with this situation. You see, there are two types of people in this world and in your life. There are battery chargers, and there are battery drainers. I got this concept from my good friend, Joe Polish. The more time you spend with that person the more energy you have, the more you think you can accomplish in life, and more and more you start to pick up on their positive success habits.
In contrast, you can be around someone else for a few minutes and feel drained. That person is a battery drainer that is sucking away your positive energy! Pay attention to how they act, the habits they have, and even their work ethic. Your energy is too valuable to have it drained away by someone else. This law of human nature is very simple: If you want financial success you must surround yourself with financially successful people. If you want to be an entrepreneur and start your own company, socialize with other entrepreneurs and other people who have started their own companies.
Want to be in better shape? You get the idea. How do you develop your inner circle? You must make it a habit to expand your social circle and deliberately include successful, career-oriented people and business owners.
Read a lot of books about success, or listen to podcasts and audio books while you work out. Go where successful people are likely to be, like meet-up groups and master- minds; or get a coach. You can start with the Success Habits 30 day challenge at www. You can also call us anytime at and one of our certified coaches will share ways we can assist you on your journey.
They will, however, in many cases, drop by the wayside as you evolve. Instead, you need to model the way you hope they will begin to act. You have the strength to change the select few people that you want to take with you on this journey to becoming your best self.
Be a light in their lives and even the most negative people can change for the better. As simple as some of the preceding success habits may seem, their impact is undeniable. The fact is, they work. You just have to switch out a few bad habits with these new empowering success habits.
Same amount of time, totally different results. Speaking of time, I am grateful that you are spending this time with me. I know how busy life can get and that you have a lot of choices. If you can find the time to read this, you can find the time to start incorporating these success habits into your life. No one is holding your hand or making you read this.
You have the desire and interest to know what the next level of life is for you, and your actions will carry you there. I urge you to finish the entire book. You deserve all of the advantages you can get your hands on, and I have many more great ones on the way.
Now that you understand the villain within and what gives him power--your physical appearance, the words you use or the people you surround yourself with--you can put all those negative thoughts and habits into a bucket and shake them up. What comes out is the story you tell yourself. Your story is your internal narrative, and it can be the heaviest anchor in your life, hold- ing you back from experiencing the joy of using your full potential, or it can drive you to achieve massive success, wealth, and abundance.
In that struggle, we developed our character and our strength. At its core, your story is where you live, emotionally, mentally, and sometimes even physically. Your story can either be the wind behind your sails or the anchor that is weighing you down. Our inner villain tells us the stories that hold us back. What we need to do is figure out what stories we should be telling our- selves—the ones aligned with the new vision we have for our lives, the ones that enable us to leave our old story in the past.
Of course they are. And our first step is to understand why you tell yourself and other people certain stories. When I met Gena, she had a very specific story she told herself about who she was at that point in her life and who she believed she could be at some point in the future.
She was a stay-at-home mom, and an amazing one at that. Your brain understands behaviors as four separate stages that, when added together, lead to habits. These stages are the cue, the craving, the response, and the reward. Every habit you have is linked to these four stages. The cue is the element that triggers the brain to notice an opportunity for a reward, or pleasure.
A cue can be a smell, a sound, an event, an interaction, or anything else that triggers a desire. This desire is known as the craving. The craving is the emotional relevance attached to a certain cue. When you notice the cue, the brain anticipates an opportunity for a change in your physical or emotional state.
You crave the satisfaction that change will elicit, and this craving is what prompts you to act. The response is the actual behavior, or habit, performed to elicit the change you desire. Your brain prompts you to take a certain action it believes will create the feeling of satisfaction you want. The reward is the satisfaction gained from the action taken.
You have successfully satisfied your craving and changed your physical or emotional state. The brain builds a pathway from the cue to this state of pleasure. Every time you experience the same cue, the brain will be triggered to desire that pleasure again.
You will be prompted to perform the same action, thereby creating a habit. The process works like this: Cue: You walk past a coffee shop on the way to work and smell fresh roasted coffee.
Craving: Coffee gives you energy, and you want to feel energized. Response: You buy a cup of coffee. Reward: By the time you reach work, you are raring to go. Buying a cup of coffee becomes associated Outcome-Driven Habits Outcomes are synonymous with goals. Each action creates a path that leads to other actions.
Which actions or behaviors you perform dictate which actions or behaviors will follow. This is why forming good habits is so important. When you start with good behaviors, more good behaviors will follow. This idea is grounded in the concept of compounding behaviors and is the essence of Atomic Habits. To make the most of small increases, you need to adjust how you think about behavior change.
There are three directions by which you approach behavior change: outcome-driven, process-driven, and identity-driven changes. Outcomes are synonymous with goals. They represent the end result you wish to achieve through your behaviors. When you focus on the end goal of your behaviors, you tend to do whatever is necessary to achieve that goal. But those behaviors may not be the most beneficial or capable of being repeated long-term.
Further, once the goal is achieved, there is no reason to continue those specific behaviors. If you adapt your actions to serve one finite purpose, your actions also become finite. Processes are synonymous with systems. Within every long-term goal is a system of behaviors that link up to reach the desired outcome.
Focusing on a systemic level pushes you to form habits that continually lead to successful results, thereby becoming more inherent, continual, and positive in the long-term.
Identity is synonymous with who you are and how you live. Within your identity lies characteristics. When you approach habit change through this lens, you focus on forming behaviors that match the characteristics of the type of person you want to be. This direction is closely aligned with systems, in that the systems required to reach your chosen identity are informed by the characteristics of that identity. When you work through the processes of your chosen identity, you stop being someone waiting to achieve a certain goal and start living as someone capable of achieving that goal over and over again.
Outcome-driven habits help you win the game. Process-driven habits teach you how to play the game and keep playing. Identity-driven habits help you decide which game to play. So work in reverse —start with your desired identity to find the right habits that lead to the right results.
The reason you continue to repeat certain behaviors relates to the way the brain takes in the associated information. Your brain understands behaviors as four separate stages that, when added together, lead to habits. These stages are the cue, the craving, the response, and the reward. Every habit you have is linked to these four stages. The cue is the element that triggers the brain to notice an opportunity for a reward, or pleasure. A cue can be a smell, a sound, an event, an interaction, or anything else that triggers a desire.
This desire is known as the craving. The craving is the emotional relevance attached to a certain cue. When you notice the cue, the brain anticipates an opportunity for a change in your physical or emotional state.
You crave the satisfaction that change will elicit, and this craving is what prompts you to act. The response is the actual behavior, or habit, performed to elicit the change you desire. Your brain prompts you to take a certain action it believes will create the feeling of satisfaction you want. The reward is the satisfaction gained from the action taken. You have successfully satisfied your craving and changed your physical or emotional state.
The brain builds a pathway from the cue to this state of pleasure. Every time you experience the same cue, the brain will be triggered to desire that pleasure again. You will be prompted to perform the same action, thereby creating a habit. The process works like this: Cue: You walk past a coffee shop on the way to work and smell fresh roasted coffee.
Craving: Coffee gives you energy, and you want to feel energized. Response: You buy a cup of coffee. Reward: By the time you reach work, you are raring to go. Buying a cup of coffee becomes associated Millionaire Game Possessive Pronouns and Adjectives. Search Submit. Order of Operations Millionaire Game. In this millionaire-style game, students will use order of operations to solve math problems involving addition, subtraction, Secrets of the Millionaire Mind reveals the missing link between wanting success and achieving it!
Have you ever wondered why some people seem to get rich If you ever wanted to make the big money , there is hope for you today.