John Halderman asked:
The things you have in mind for yourself, all those dreams, you’re living them – right.
Well since you’ve read all about what success is and how to get it, now you are a success, right.
OK, I know, you’re not yet living with all that you want, but you have read all about success, so you know everything about it, right.
So, if you know about success, what’s holding you back?
Why are you living with anxiety, depression and low self-esteem rather than happiness, joy, positive thinking and high self-esteem?
There seems to be a gap between knowing about something and your actual assimilation of it into your own life. Why is this?
Learning is an interesting thing. Most people think they learn a lot in school and from all the books they have read. This is not actually the case, particularly when it comes to developing your daily thinking and your behavior patterns.
Think about this; even if you went to collage, how much of what you needed for your first job did you really get from the college learning experience. Didn’t you still find that the real learning began on the job?
It’s always this way, real learning, what you use to form you predominant though and the routine actions you take came from modeling others. When you started that first job, you copied and followed what others were doing, sure there was some explanation, but most of your knowledge and skills came from watching and following others.
Most employers know that you are in a training period for a while after you start, even if you have been in the field for a while. My personal experience from working in small companies which you may be able to relate to, was that there was very little formal training, it was almost all from modeling others and my own abilities to apply my past experience to the present situation.
As you developed in a trade or career, how did you continue to enhance your abilities? Mostly in two ways, you continued to pick up on more details, tricks, methods and processes from others, or you developed them yourself using the knowledge you had acquired up to that point.
Formal learning and books gives us background on a subject and possibly somewhat of an understanding of the topic, but the real learning comes from watching the example of others along with our own actual personal experience and integration.
Let’s look at how you learned as a child?
Again, you mainly copied those close to you, at first primarily from your parents and siblings.
As you get older you are more and more influenced by piers, school and activity mates, and then by people you admire.
This all goes on for the most part automatically without your awareness or control. Your mind is perfectly capable of copying language skills, behavior patters, mannerisms, attitudes and ways of perceiving things, all with out the need of your conscious thought.
This capacity to model others is the most powerful and automatic learning method humans have. You didn’t have to study, read or memorize anything to learn most of what guides your moment to moment thoughts and actions. You did it by following what others did.
The most powerful mode of learning is live human interaction. You actually watch what they do, with full human interaction, using all of your senses.
The next, almost as effective mode is hearing someone describing what and how they do what they do. With this you get the power of what comes through their voice, including all the emotional and attitudinal nuances that are reflected through their speech. Hearing directly from the person actually doing the thing is more affective than having it told by another.
The least effective method for learning thought patterns and behaviors, which can’t actually be termed as modeling, is to read about it. This method does not provide any connection to true real human interaction. You are relying totally on your interpretation of printed text and imagination to gain usable value. Reading is a good way to get a basic idea about something. But just like with your formal education, you need to be around others to effectively assimilate it for your own use.
Ask yourself this, looking at yourself, how many people have you modeled directly versus those you have read about?
The more of your senses that are involved the better your ability to assimilate the behavior into your life. You are touched by the whole person rather than by a description of them.
Find people who are successful in life to model the kind of thought and behavior that will support the life you want for yourself. Learning from modeling can really only be considered when done live or through voice communication, otherwise it’s just studying ‘about’ them.
You need to get the nuances and the essence of the feelings behind their thoughts and actions, if you hope to actually take on those attributes yourself. The power of communication is in the emotional undertones that are unknowingly transferred.
This is where you will understand the self-awareness level, the positive attitude and thinking, the self-confidence, and motivation behind what they do that you can use yourself to support your actions.
Look for more than what is seen as the surface communication, and you will find a powerful self-improvement resource for yourself.
Your dreams are readily possible when you support them with the right thoughts and actions.