Think and Do
(Acting on Inspiration)
Hello My Friends. Dale here from Mind Hacks by Dale and this is a mind hack moment. Today, I am going to talk about getting it done, whatever IT is, what stops that from happening, and what you can do to act on inspiration, now.
I am going to share four words that can change your life. THINK IT, DO IT. That needs to become your life motto, that is if you really want to move ahead.
I remember that day when I stepped out of Gordon Neighbourhood House, in the West End of Vancouver, and sat on a nearby bench. I looked down and laying next to me was a book, by Napoleon Hill, called ‘Think and Grow Rich.’ Without any forethought, I picked it up and began to read. Reading it, led to a dramatic life-change for me.
But now after three decades of brain and psychological study about how we learn, I am now focussing on what STOPS US from learning and what stops us from acting on what we have learned. The reason why we fail to act is beautiful in its simplicity. This knowledge brought to mind another book from my past. A non-descriptive book that many of us were forced to read when we were children.
It was my primary school book called, ‘Think and Do.’ Yes, for those who remember, that was from the Dick and Jane books. Reading it wasn’t important. What stops you from being successful and the secret to success is all in the title. The secret is to ‘think and do.’
It wasn’t thinking and think again, it was Think and Do. ‘Think and Do’ immediately, because if you overthink or hesitate, you will not do whatever IT is, because your brain will stop you cold. As the title declares, AS YOU THINK IT, DO IT.
Your brain is designed for survival, not for success. Thinking uses energy that the subconscious brain wants to use to look for danger. Specific thoughts take away even more of that energy.
You have about seven seconds to act on a thought, any longer than that, and you are overthinking. Overthinking takes more than seven seconds and that gives your brain time to activate its motivational-idea eraser. As that activates, it clears your thought from the hippocampus, and zip, your thought is gone and also so too is your drive to do whatever you were originally inspired to do.
If the mind’s motivational-idea eraser doesn’t work, then your brain will begin to leak doubt’s or even use its ultimate no-change device that I call a logic bomb. If your thought has the sticking power to overcome that onslaught, you may gain a little success.
DO THINKING
There are three things that you can DO that can stop your brain from wiping away your ideas and inspiring thoughts. The first thing you can do is to repeat the exact same thought, but this time, say it out loud.
That conscious effort will momentarily stop the brain’s wipe-away weapon from being deployed. That repetition will move a thought from the hippocampus to the thalamus where it will sit for about an hour and a half, waiting to be acted upon.
The second thing that you can do, is to take a physical action toward doing whatever it is that you are being inspired to do. I often use the Connect hack (a physical action) and the repeating of a thought out loud, to reinforce retention long enough to take more concrete action.
The third is to move. I link my Connect hack to a more physical motion and feeling. I know that if I shower first thing in the morning before doing any writing or recording, that I get more done. Sitting about in my lounging clothes means, it is time to lounge. Lounging around doesn’t get a lot of interesting work done. An early morning shower keeps me focussed and productive.
So, each morning I lay in bed for a while which is my serious thinking time. This has become a habit of many months of early morning meditation. Now, I can perform deep meditation whenever I wake up without going back to sleep.
At some point though, I get the urge, or I am inspired to ‘get up.’ That leads to making a decision to either do lounge-around-time or to shower and get more productive and get things done. So, I make the Connect mind hack move and remember how wonderful a day filled with productivity can feel and I get up. That positive feeling of being productive causes me to head directly for the bathroom shower.
Mulling ideas around in your head increases your chances of failure and brain actions that result in de-motivation. So, stop thinking and act; immediately, whenever you become aware of an inspiring thought.
HOW TO STOP THE THOUGHT
How do you stop overthinking and act immediately? The brain’s motivational-idea eraser is at the subconscious level. So, to affect change, you must affect things at the subconscious level. The subconscious part of the brain that you need to affect, is only changed or impacted through feelings. The best way to foster change is through the repetition of habitual feelings. That subconscious part of the brain that wipes inspiration doesn’t speak, or read, or see pictures, it only feels things.
You can, however, activate feelings through motions (repetitive actions connected to a feeling), feeling-connected words (affirmations), feeling-connected fantasy or pictures (visualisation) and past recall of related feelings (a habit).
I remember the night of May 7, 1995. My wife and I, and 1500 other people, all walked on fire (or at least hot coals) at the Tony Robbins Fire Walk Experience. Tony had us think about an anchor move that we would use after we stepped off the hot coals. So, immediately after stepping off the glowing coals, and wiping my feet on the soft wet earth at the end of the fire path, to remove any hot coals from between my toes, I performed my special move as I had been instructed. To this day when I do that power move (my anchor move), I am filled with confidence and excitement.
I decided to create a success anchor too and did so using an action that we all do, but of which we are seldom aware that we are even using.
Often, when we are faced with an inspiring poignant moment where we feel both happy and sad, we put our hand to our chest near our heart just under our throat. We have been doing this for thousands of years. So much so, that when you place your hand there, it causes a positive change in your physiology. That simple motion is often a precursor to a paradigm shift in your thinking or in the way you act. It is a link to great inspiration.
I have created a habit move, based on this hand movement, that I call Connect. Now, when I perceive an idea or concept that requires action, I place my hand in the Connect position and it stops any doubt from the beginning.
To me, it also means that I am about to make a change that will make my life better. That spurs me on to take needed action, right now. I am writing this post because I was inspired to document a simple way to make a change in our lives. I simply had the idea, did my Connect move, grabbed my computer and began to write. Think and do!
I could have waited, and soon I would have been engrossed in a movie or in some rabbit hole on Tumblr, Instagram or Facebook. Immediate action on an urge to tell a real story, made me connect with you, so you could read that story.
I perform one of two other moves any time I feel positive or negative about a stimulus that is presented to me. That also creates a bias for action.
When presented with a recognisable negative stimulus, I fantasise that I reach inside of me at the Connect position, pull the negativity as a dark mass out of my body, hold it in my hand, change it to a positive white light with my other hand, and gift it out to the universe where it will do the most good.
When presented with a recognisable positive stimulus, I fantasise that I see the feeling in front of me as a white light of positiveness and I reach out and grasp that white light, draw it to me and then press it into my body at the Connect position. I dwell for a moment or two on how good this feels.
All three moves, as I stated above, use motions (repetitive actions), words (affirmations), fantasy or pictures (visualisation) and past recall of related feelings (habit) to create immediate action and consistent change. And man do those results ever feel good. It leads to a life that I find to be truly magical.
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Until then My Friend, let’s Connect!
Dale