In the article “The Science of Repeatable Success” we discussed the foundational elements of success.

That article laid out the theoretical groundwork for success, but lacked application; now we’re back with real-world case studies, to fully drive home the application of the science.

To refresh your memory, here’s the framework of behavior change:

1. Self-awareness, which allows you to monitor your progress and make necessary course corrections.
2. Visualization of desired outcomes, which prepares the mind to make them real.
3. Commitment to a goal, which is much more powerful than simply “setting” a goal.
4. Taking continual action, which is what separates the frustrated mediocre from the celebrated excellent. (Tweet this)

To recap: you must cultivate self-awareness, visualize your desired outcome,  make an irrevocable commitment to your desired outcome, and you must take continual action to reach that outcome.

Now let’s dive into the case studies, to see how these principles apply.

(These are all actual examples from my private practice in behavior change — names have been changed to protect the innocent.)

CASE STUDY 1

PATRICK RECORDS HIS FIRST ALBUM

Meet Patrick.

Patrick  is never happier than when he is composing and recording music. He has a good-to-average sales job in which he makes about $65 to $75k a year.

Although he’s not materially wanting for anything, he knows that he is meant to give a deeper, richer Gift to the world in the form of music.

THE OBSTACLE

As Patrick develops self-awareness by practicing a few minutes of meditation each day, he realizes that he when he puts “record music” on his to-do list as a chore, he finds himself resistant to it, and procrastinates, putting it off indefinitely. He feels frustrated and thwarted by his own mind.

Also because of his self-awareness, Patrick realizes that the long-term goal is too much for him to consider right now; whenever he thinks about the idea of “someday being a musician”, he feels unsure, and stuck between many possibilities. Does he want to be a DJ? A producer? Have his own band? It’s overwhelming, and just causes his mental gears to grind to a stop.

THE APPLICATION

Instead of designing a life plan, Patrick sets a shorter-term goal: that by the end of one month, he’ll have released 3 finished songs on the internet.

Patrick can use the steps of the Science of Behavior Change in any order. He’s made a decision about a goal: now he has to do two additional things, the visualization of the desired outcome, and the taking of continual action.

The action is what will get him to his goal: he’ll have to spend time regularly recording and refining his tracks — and at some point, he’ll have to switch from ‘recording new material’ to ‘organizing and polishing what he’s got.’ He’ll use his self-awareness and executive function (strengthened by meditation, good diet, and proper rest) to do this.

But it’s equally important that he still visualize the outcome he wants.

Why is visualization so important, even if we’re already taking daily action?

This gets a bit esoteric, but briefly, it’s important to not slack on visualization because:

1. Visualization prepares the mind, the body, and the emotions for success. The body is designed to be steady-state…it always tried to return to a place of ‘homeostasis’ (which just means ‘steady state’.) The first shift is to move your body and emotions from a state of inertia to a state of continual work. You must habituate yourself to working towards your goals. The second shift is to be ready to move your body and emotions from continual work to the state of winning.  The “winning” state feels very different from the work state, and if we attain it without practicing, we run a high likelihood of self-interrupting or self-sabotaging and blowing up all our hard work — so our body can return to the work state. But if we rehearse the state of success, right down to rehearsing the emotions and where we’ll feel them in our body, we’re preparing for a smooth transition. The body and the emotions don’t like transitioning from a familiar state to an unfamiliar state; so, one of the secret keys to success is to make your desired future success state a familiar state — before you reach it.
2. Visualization plants powerful seeds in the subconscious. The basic concept is that everything we think, say, or do plants a seed in our unconscious mind, where it will spend plenty of time growing (according to the nutrients we feed it) before it eventually “sprouts” back into our conscious mind, shaping our perceptions. This is a basic explanation of the laws of karma, and it’s why people who lie to others are eventually forced to see others as lying to them. Another way to say this would be, if there’s an apple pie on the table, you know somebody planted an apple seed at some point long ago. It’s the same thing with success. If someone is experiencing huge success today, it’s because at some point, a tiny seed of success was planted — and nurtured, watered, shaded, given sunlight, etc — until it grew up enough to sprout as massive success. And the same applies to failure or tragedy. Nothing comes from nothing, and the real secret of success is that we are in charge of the seeds we plant in our subconscious minds.

If you don’t buy the above, you can always practice the science of success without visualization for a while….until you feel ready to try it. But I urge you to try it from Day One, and I think most people who try to ignore it will eventually come around and get curious again — particularly when they talk to many other successful people who swear by it.

So back to Patrick. He follows his daily routine of taking massive action, and also of visualizing success — which in this case looks like a fully-downloadable EP that people can buy online.

After fourteen or fifteen days of this, his emotions and his body are in a state where they can’t tell the difference — did his desired outcome already happen? Is it happening now? Is it still in the future? The body and emotions don’t know and don’t care. The subconscious mind is not in charge of time sequencing; it is purely emotional. So visualizing something NOW means it’s happening NOW.

When Patrick finishes polishing his tracks and uploads them, his body and emotions are calm  — “Of course this is what we’re doing” — and so they have no resistance whatsoever to him doing this, and so they don’t create any problems for him.

Similarly, when he gets his first online sale ever, although he feels a rush of validation, it’s tempered by his emotional expectation, which has gone through the scenario many times before.

Patrick no longer has any emotional resistance to attaining his modest goal — which is good, because emotional resistance is what stops most of us from attaining our goals, modest or otherwise.

Now Patrick can go wherever he wants with his music career. Of course, it won’t be easy — but he’s not worried, because he understands the applied science of repeatable success.

 

CASE STUDY 2

MICHAEL CONQUERS WRITER’S BLOCK

Let’s look at the case of Michael.

Michael is 34 years old, working a job that’s “just okay.”

He drinks a little too much beer (which he wears around his waist) and so he also has been meaning to take up jogging on a consistent basis.

Michael’s passion is writing for film. He’s got a great screenplay, but he’s been stuck with the worst case of writer’s block ever for the past 6 months.

With a little bit of self-awareness, Michael realizes he has some negative beliefs about screenwriters (they’re all sellouts, they are under-compensated, nobody really respects them, etc). He sits down quietly to clear his mind of these limiting beliefs, and even does a little journaling, reversing those limiting beliefs and replacing them with new, more adaptive beliefs about the craft.

As his commitment to a goal, Michael identifies that his best “writing time” is in the early morning — and that furthermore, he also wants to put writing and running together in the morning. He sets a goal to write on the screenplay every morning for at least 15 minutes, and then go running for at least 20.

As part of his commitment to action, Michael gets a friend to agree to meet him at 7:30am sharp, three days a week, to go running. The social pressure ensures that he, too, is ready to go running three days a week. (As a bonus, the physical exercise improves his willpower and brain function, so he’ll find it easier to sit down and write every morning).

For visualization, Michael envisions submitting a polished screenplay to a writer’s group over and over again. He also visualizes himself in a habit of writing every morning, and he feels the sense of accomplishment that brings. He envisions himself telling other people about his writing habit, and even coaching them on how to create a similar habit in their own lives. This begins to shift his identity from “I’m a guy with bad writer’s block” to “I’m a guy who helps others overcome bad writer’s block.”

The visualization powerfully changes Michael’s identity-level beliefs, and his orientation towards writing changes. Because he’s also engaged social help, he sticks to his commitment to run three times a week, as well as his decision to spend at least 15 minutes writing each morning. (In fact, some mornings Michael finds himself writing well past 30 minutes.)

In less than a month, Michael’s screenplay is finished. He’s now free to apply the same technique to whatever his next goal may be.

CHANGE YOUR MIND,

CHANGE YOUR WORLD

When we change our minds, we change the most powerful device given to us for change (click to tweet).

The mind is the very foundation of our daily experience, and our daily experience, compounded over time, determines whether we’ll have a good, average, mundane, terrible, or exceptional life.

To change anything in your life using the applied science of success, follow this recipe:

1. First, cultivate self-awareness.
2. Decide on an achievable goal, and commit to it. (For extra power, involve others).
3. Commit to taking continual action that leads you towards your achievable goal.
4. Continually visualize yourself reaching that achievable goal.

Those four steps are all you need.

My hope is that this article, with the in-depth examples, has been more deeply helpful to you. If not, please feel free to contact me — or post a comment below! with further questions or suggestions.

All success to you on your path!

We’ll send you the latest article every Sunday. Click here to get Fierce Gentleman in your inbox.

---

Also published on Medium.