Never confuse aspirations with strategy

 
I had a conversation with a colleague recently about the relationship between having a dream and actualizing it. The quintessential self-help book these days that pursues this notion to an extreme is The Secret. It promises that if you follow the suggestions within, you can pretty much ‘have it all’.

The essence of The Secret is to have a vision, a dream—anything from winning the Super Bowl, to winning the lottery, or finding a parking space at Starbucks the second you arrive. All you need to succeed is to hold the dream and stay focused on it. Believing in the belief itself is the key to success.

That’s the illusion and essential fallacy within The Secret, indeed within all cult-like thinking. The reality is that dreaming is not a strategy for success—nor is hope or willpower. If dreaming and visioning alone were sufficient, everyone who ‘dreams big’ would realize their dreams. Few ever do.

“An ant on the move does more than a dozing ox.” (Mexican Proverb)

How many folks—perhaps even you—have dreamed and hoped for years and are still waiting for something to happen? Without a strategy and action to support the dream, nothing results. Willpower alone won’t do it. If that were the case,100% of those who resolve to follow their New Year’s resolutions would do so. By Valentine’s day, 98% have given up or failed.

The downside of The Secret—and other self-help books of the same genre—lies in the assumption that if you don’t realize a dream it’s simply because you weren’t consistent, intent and intense enough in focusing on it. You didn’t believe deeply enough, and long enough. Failure is never about the usefulness of the idea or self-help book itself, it’s about you. You didn’t believe in The Secret enough. You didn’t believe in the belief.

The reality is that no belief or vision is likely to come true unless it is fully supported by appropriate action. That combination is the only method that results in transformation or success; that and hard work. No amount of wishing and focusing on an intention will produce anything without determined and well-directed action. Sadly, in their resulting frustration, people go out and buy another book, CD, or video. Maybe this time it will work. Probably not.

What’s the real deal with The Secret?

The answer to what’s lacking is accepting self-responsibility. Are you honestly and sincerely taking action to pursue what you hope to achieve? Are you doing as well as hoping and dreaming. Are you showing commitment, engagement, self-discipline and action? Any intention, hope or dream is as small as the tiniest brain molecule that holds it; and will remain that way until you take action. That’s the problem with intention alone as the route to success. It won’t work, pure and simple.

When I come across people lamenting and bemoaning their life is not as they want, I suggest they take the myriad self-help books slewed across their coffee table, or piled on their night stand, and put them away—all except for the one book (video or CD) that resonates the most with them. Next, I tell them to take one principle from that one book that feels right, get a journal, put that one principle into action every day for six months and journal around it daily. “Live it and track how your life unfolds,” I tell them.

Yet when I run into these same folks later on and ask them how they’re doing with the practice, 99% have not followed through, quickly presenting me with all the requisite reasons and excuses for not doing so.

Why do so many fail in realizing their dreams?

Infantilizing, beginning in childhood and moving into adulthood, is a major culprit that accounts for inaction. Infantilizing is about hubris, power and control—both conscious and unconscious.

The “I know what’s good for you” approach of those in authority—be they parents, bosses, religious teachers or friends—enables people to do nothing, yet feel taken care of. Later, even when they have developed a capacity to ‘think for themselves’, they still feel lacking without authority’s constant guiding hand on their shoulder. Having never been allowed to develop proper feelings of self-worth or self-esteem, they jump at the chance to be taken care of once again. It’s learned behavior, become habitual.

What’s ‘having a vision’ for?

Are you really crafting and working your purpose and vision so you can materialize a load of cash or a parking space at Starbucks? Might it not be a good time for some deeper, more serious self-reflection and perspective on your priorities and values?

Maybe experiencing a lack of success is what is meant to happen. Perhaps not winning the lottery, or not finding that parking space, or being booted off American Idol in the first five seconds represents a much-needed opportunity to stand back and look at yourself; to ask what might be inappropriate or self-deceiving about your goals and desires? An honest, sincere and self-responsible inquiry like that is far more likely to reveal any real ‘secret’ to your future success.

Why do people become so dependent on The Secret and related self-help books?

It’s mostly because these books give some people what they need: a good feeling that makes them feel secure and helps them deny or withdraw from their inner pain. They make it possible to continue to be irresponsible, because they absolve people from having to face the challenges and pain of taking action. They give a sense of safety and security that’s ultimately false and ephemeral, which is why people keep going back for more. Feeling good and dreaming are the salves that allow people to hold on to their dreams, while doing nothing to make them happen; to enjoy the dream without the risk that reality might intrude.

How do people get stuck in dreaming the dream without acting on it? By going unconscious.

There are four basic levels of consciousness:

1. Not conscious (instinctual, ego-driven): the state of allowing lower-level, selfish desires to drive you, completely unaware of the consequences and the impact on others.
2. Subconscious: being habitual, robotic and reactive.
3. Conscious: being aware, intelligent, conceptual and reflective.
4. Super-conscious: being intuitive, guiding, truthful, loving and universal, at a collective level.

Try looking at your life choices and how being unconscious has brought you to a ‘do-nothing’ place: a place where you make habitual, unconscious choices that end up being self-destructive and self-limiting. To get out of there, reflect and explore and make a super-conscious choice to change and act on your dreams. Becoming conscious means making an honest and self-responsible evaluation of your life—then taking the requisite actions and choices that create positive change.

This week’s questions for self-reflection are:

• Garth Brooks wrote, “Every man dies, but not every man lives. . . .” Will this apply to your life?
• Where are you struggling in your life? Do you have an action plan to move through your struggles? One measure of success is not whether you are grappling with a personal or professional challenge, but whether it’s the same challenge you had last year, and the year before that, and the year before that. Is it?
• Treat fear as a question. What are you afraid of that keeps you paralyzed or stuck? What does your fear reveal about you? What one small action can help you move through your fear?
• How many self-help books have you read in the past six months or year? How well are you following any of the principles in those books? (That means in a consistent and intentional manner, on a daily or weekly basis)
• What are you attached to that restricts you from taking action towards change in your life? What defense mechanisms do you use to keep yourself from turning your dreams into concrete action and thus risking success or failure?

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