Saturday, May 1, 2010

How Lives Change

How Lives Change

The story I am about to share with you may not be relevant to your life. But I can assure you, someone you know can benefit from it. Read this slowly and then forward it to the individuals you know who feel stuck in life.

After close to fifty years of working in the field of personal development, I am acutely aware there are many people who feel caught in a trap. They're really not sure if or how they could ever spring themselves free.

A person feels stuck when they have no hope. You see hope gives you options. And a person without hope is not able to see any other way to live than what they're doing. And what they're doing is not working.

Today I am fortunate enough to own a company that operates all over the world. I have friends in many different countries. I have a fascinating team of people that work with me. I have great business partners. And believe me when I tell you, life is good.

However, it wasn't always like that. In October of 1961, I was unhappy, I was sick and I was broke. I was earning $4,000 a year and I owed $6,000. I had absolutely no assets. My formal education consisted of two months high school. And I had no business experience and a poor work record. I was 26 years old and I honestly felt like I was trapped. Life looked to me like a dark tunnel. But then something wonderful happened. I met a man who saw something in me that I was not capable of seeing in myself. He got me to sit down and explain my situation to him. It was fairly obvious I was a lost soul.

Then he asked me what I really wanted. And I didn't know. I couldn't answer him. He made it very clear to me that my entire mental focus was on what I didn't want and why I wasn't capable of doing any better than I was doing. I was totally focused on problems and believe me I was attracting them in abundance.

The man who befriended me was Raymond Douglas Stanford. He was the first of six individuals who coached me over the past fifty years. I can honestly say these people were responsible for leading me into the bright clear light of day. They helped me recognize that I had tremendous potential, and they assisted me in developing the awareness required to live a constructive, fulfilling life. Ray Stanford also made me aware that the mental prison I had confined myself in had no locks. I was capable of walking out of it at any time I pleased, but I didn't know how.

And I believe there are a lot of people today especially in the economy we are experiencing who may be losing a home or a job, who's attitude has been impacted by what's going on in their world. Many of these people feel there's no answer to their dilemma. They could and probably are doing what I was doing when I met Ray. They're focused on their present situation. The doom and gloom is filling their mind. And they have to do what Ray taught me to do - clear your mind for a moment. Make believe everything is fine, and think about what you really want. Because that is what Ray did for me. Then he began to explain to me how everyone including me has infinite potential and the difference in people is the choices they make and how they utilize the potential that God gave them.

It's as Steve Bow, who was the Vice President of Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, once said, "God's gift to us is more talent and ability than we'll ever hope to use in our lifetime. Our gift to God is to develop as much of that talent and ability as we can in our lifetime."

Raymond introduced me to Napoleon Hill's book Think and Grow Rich and he spent a lot of time explaining to me what Napoleon Hill had written about. He explained that the premise that served as the foundation for Napoleon Hill's life's work was the following: "Anything the mind can conceive and believe, it can achieve. " Ray made it clear that the operative word in Hill's premise was "believe." He said everyone's imagination brings beautiful pictures to the screen of a person's mind. However, only a very small percentage of the world's population ever achieves the beauty or the abundance that flows across their mind from time to time. And he said the reason people don't achieve the good that they desire is for the simple reason they don't believe it. Ray pointed out to me that if you hear anything often enough you will begin to believe it. And when you believe it, you'll achieve it. This is true of good and bad in our life.

Ray explained that if I would read Think and Grow Rich often enough and visit with him frequently to receive the support I required that I could literally turn my dreams into reality. I'll be honest with you, I did not believe him. But I did believe that he believed it. He actually believed that I could do better. And it was his belief in me that moved me on to the right side of the road.

I was prepared to do anything honest to earn some money, and I started to clean offices in my spare time. In less than five years, I had a company that was cleaning offices in Toronto, Montreal, Boston, Cleveland, Atlanta and London, England. My life was changing and it was changing rapidly. But as Ray pointed out to me, what was really changing was my attitude and my belief about what I was capable of doing. And he made it clear to me that was happening because I was listening to someone that knew more than I did and was eager to help me.

I got so involved in studying Napoleon Hill's work that I was led to Earl Nightingale's condensed narration of Napoleon Hill's book Think and Grow Rich. Now I was reading the book and listening to a long playing record. I was developing a greater awareness. What I was actually doing was getting good advice from people who demonstrated by results they knew what they were doing.

Prior to meeting Ray Stanford I spent all my time talking to and listening to people that didn't know any more than me, people who were living in the same situation I was living in, who sympathized with my negative perception of life and why I couldn't win.

A number of years after Ray introduced me to Napoleon Hill's book Think and Grow Rich and Earl Nightingale's condensed narration of it, I left my own business and went to work with Earl Nightingale and Lloyd Conant of the Nightingale Conant Corporation. It was then that my progress moved on to a fast track. Earl Nightingale and Lloyd Conant became my two new coaches. It was through them that I was introduced to two other men that had a profound impact on my life - Leland Val Van De Wall and Dr. C. Harry Roder. These four men taught me more about the mind over the next four or five years than most people would ever learn in an entire lifetime. And it was there and then that I made up my mind I would spend the rest of my life teaching what I had learned to everyone and anyone who had a sincere desire to win, to improve the quality of their life, to live the abundant life which is our birthright.

My basic nature is that I am a quiet, shy, withdrawn individual. There are many people in the world that would not believe that because they only know me as they see me today, but I can assure you 42 years ago, that described me perfectly. It was then that I met Bill Gove who was considered the Frank Sinatra of public speakers. I watched him speaking on a stage at the O'Hare Hyatt Hotel in Chicago, and I thought "wow is he ever good." And I thought if I could do what he does, I could teach what I know to thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of people. And I thought "but I can't do that." It was at that very point that a record started to play in my head. It was a record I'd listened to thousands of times. It was a recording called the Magic Word, and it was a record on attitude.

At one point in the recording Earl said "Now right here we come to a strange fact. We tend to minimize the things that we can do, the goals that we can accomplish, and for some equally strange reason we think other people can do things that we cannot." He said, "I want you to understand that is not true. You have deep reservoirs of talent and ability within you. You're capable of doing anything you desire."

As I said, I probably listened to that recording thousands of times. And if you asked me if I understood it, I would have said, of course I do. But as I watched Bill Gove stand on that stage and through his public speaking ability have that audience in the palm of his hand as I was thinking I wish I could do that but I can't, that record of Earl's started playing in my head and I suddenly realized "That' s what Earl means! -- If Bill Gove can do it, I can do it!" And I made a decision there and then that I would not only learn how to speak in public as well as he was speaking, I would have him teach me how to do it, and he did.

He was the sixth coach that I've had. And today I am comfortable on a stage in front of thousands of people sharing this wonderful information that helps anyone understand regardless of their situation there is a way for them to win. Today I'm living my dream. Through our coaching program we train thousands of people to change their situation and begin living the way they really want. We show individuals how to multiply their income, how to develop meaningful relationships, how to build their companies into global organizations, and we point out it all begins in their own marvelous mind.

I will forever be grateful to the individuals that coached me - that helped me understand we all have tremendous power within us. And life can be wonderful, but we must make it that way. The people I've just written about showed me how to do it. And they made it very clear to me that if I really wanted to be happy in life, that I should spend the rest of my life showing people what they taught me.

Bob Proctor
Bob Proctor was inspired to create his own coaching program in partnership with Carol Gates. They now coach people in 87 different countries. Bob and Carol have a comprehensive program where they work with you every week for 13 months to create life changing results.
http://www.getgreatdealstoday.com/offer/apply/26157/1830/20640
http://www.mycustomeventplanner.com

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