Think of something you wish to improve in your life. Perhaps it’s a financial goal or becoming a better parent. Perhaps you want to travel more or overcome your anger. What do you want to achieve in your life right now? 

Making Your Goal

Write down how you will know that you have achieved success. Will it be paying off your house in 5 years? How about making $10,000 more by next year? Will you be a better parent by spending an hour a day with your child playing games with them? How about taking a trip each year to someplace you have never been? Will you go for a walk when you feel angry? How will you know when you have achieved that goal?

Now I want you to add a zero to it!

Adding a zero will increase the power of your goals. Let me explain. Sean Stephenson, an American therapist, self-help author, and motivational speaker taught that goals should be SO unrealistic they are nearly impossible to achieve. Once you set that far-reaching goal, you work every day to hit that goal. Here’s why: when you set far-reaching, nearly-impossible goals you way overshoot what you would have originally achieved with a “realistic” goal.

The problem with setting a realistic goal is you achieve far less then you are capable. If you set a realistic goal you will work toward that goal, but not much further. You will land somewhere near it, or maybe even exceed it a little bit being surprised that you overshot your goal.

How to Add a Zero 

If you set your goals high, you will achieve way more than if you set your goals low. It should be so high that you work crazy-hard achieving big things along the way. Once you have your goal clear in your mind, set achievable benchmarks along the way leading to that big goal.

Let’s look at an example. Say your original goal was to make $10,000 more next year. Imagine what it would take for you to achieve that goal. Think through the details of what you would have to do. A couple of ideas you may come up with could include getting a job delivering pizzas or working more hours at your current job. 

Now add a zero to it. What would it take to increase your income by $100,000 next year? A job delivering pizzas or working more hours would not even get you close. No, there wouldn’t be enough hours in a day. When you add a zero to it, you have to be more creative. You have to think differently. You have to open your mind to the possibilities.

This is easy to illustrate with a financial goal, but the principle still works for non-financial goals as well. For example, let’s say you want to be a better parent and your original goal was to spend one hour a day playing with your child. Well, add a zero to one to make ten. You may think that’s absurd! How could you possibly find ten hours a day when you feel like one is a stretch? Remember, this is supposed to feel impossible. Stay with me here. What would it take to spend ten quality hours with your child every day? You would have to find ways to integrate them into your day more. Could they help you fold laundry, or do the dishes with you? Could you sing to your toddler while you fold laundry? Open your mind to all the possibilities and increase the power of your goals.

The Power of Adding a Zero

Here’s why this is beneficial. If you set benchmarks and work toward achieving that 10x goal, but you don’t achieve it, what DID you achieve along the way? It will surely be well beyond the original $10,000 you set. Let’s say you only reach 25% of $100,000. That is two and a half times your original goal! You will have achieved way more than you were originally setting yourself up to achieve. If you set unrealistic goals and develop a pathway to them, what you experience is achievement far beyond what your realistic goals would have allowed. This will increase the power of your goals.

So dream big! Achieving anything more than your original goal is success worthy of celebration.

In the search for success, it is easy to get caught up in a long list of things that need to be done so you can continue to move along your path to achieving your Vision. This journey, however, is not about checking off a bunch of items on a list. If it were, when you hit a roadblock you would simply give up. When you lose focus of your purpose it’s easy to become overwhelmed and forget why you want to fight. It helps to remember that it’s not about what you do, the actions you need to take, but about who you become as a result of what you do. When you embrace resistance, you build the character of who you want to be.

I love to tell the story of the “Farmer’s Donkey. It hit home for me at a turning point in my life, when I knew who I wanted to be but was struggling to get there.

“The Farmer’s Donkey”

A farmer goes out one morning to find his donkey has fallen into an old well. The farmer sees no way possible to get the donkey out. So he decides to fill up the well to avoid any other animal from falling into it. He knows this will bury the donkey, but it is the only option he has.

So he grabs a shovel and begins to throw dirt into the hole on top of the donkey. The donkey becomes rather upset, brays, shakes the dirt off his back and stamps his feet in response.

Of course this upsets the farmer. There is nothing more he can do to save the donkey, so he continues to throw shovels of dirt onto the donkey. The donkey continues to bray, shake the dirt off his back and stamp his feet. After some time, the farmer realizes as a result of the donkey shaking off the dirt and stamping his feet, the donkey has now raised himself up high enough to jump out of the hole.

Embrace Resistance

At that turning point in my life where I knew who I wanted to be but was struggling to get there, I felt like this donkey. I was trying to get out of a hole I was caught in and I felt like life was simply trying to bury me in that hole. But I didn’t give in. I fought. I fought with every part of me that I had, and my fight strengthened me so that I could finally walk out of that hole. It was then that I realized it was the very things that I thought were going to bury me that actually strengthened me and helped me become the person I wanted to be.

As you work toward your Vision, you will face many difficulties and challenges. While these challenges may seem to you as efforts to keep you from ever achieving your goals, they strengthen you. They help redirect you. Through them you learn skills that will serve you all along your path to your success. They make you the person you need to be to be able to achieve your goals.

You are in control of your life and how you react to the obstacles you face. You are only responsible for what you can do. The key is that you do everything with purpose. As you do everything with purpose, no matter what blocks your path, you become the person you are meant to be.

So don’t give up!

Embrace resistance. See how your challenges help mold you into who you want to become. It isn’t the easy actions that create your character. You create your character during the tough times by working hard to pull through. Then you become who you want to be.

One of the greatest ways to help you on your journey to discovering your purpose is to follow The Rules of Purpose. These rules are founded on Galen Emanuel’s Rules of Improv. Each of the five rules are explained below.

Rule 1: Always Say Yes

The Rules of Purpose are based on a “yes and” mentality. What do I mean by “yes and?” Imagine you are moving forward on the path to your success and an opportunity or idea approaches. No matter how impossible that task may seem, when you approach that opportunity with a “yes and” mentality you will seek a way to make it possible, to say yes to that request.

It is so easy to say, “No I can’t do that because . . .” but where does that ever get you?

Let’s say you have a desire to climb Mount Everest. The old you would say, “No, I can’t climb Mount Everest because it costs too much, I’m not healthy enough, or I can’t get work off.” Sound familiar? Now think about what it would take to say yes. How much does it cost? If someone offered you the money right now to go, could you say yes? What else would it take to be able to say yes?

Think about every reason you keep saying no to something that you want and ask yourself, “What would it take for me to be able to say yes?” You may have to think BIG! You may even start by thinking impossible! Would a time machine make it possible? YES! There you go. You have a place to start. As you continue to think BIG, your brain will begin to help you think of ways that are possible. rePURPOSE your Mind to be open to all the possibilities in front of you.

Rule 2: Listen and Be Present

Have you ever been in a conversation and when the other person was done talking realized  you have no idea what they said because you were focused on what you were going to say in reply?

That is a perfect example of what it means NOT to listen and be present.

When you choose to listen and be present, you make the other person your focus. You choose to listen to what they say and make the effort to understand WHY they feel that way, or WHY this story is important to them. You need to be present in the moment and the conversation. Instead of thinking about what you need to get done that day, where you are going this weekend with your friends, or what your next appointment is – Be Present.

Rule 3: Always Make Others Look Good

Have you ever spent time with someone who constantly speaks badly about other people? How does it make you feel? Most likely, you wonder what they say about you when you are not around. That’s because people who always speak badly about others, have trained themselves to only see the bad.

In everything you say and everything you do, you should always make every effort to make others look good.

Why? 

Making others look good does two things. First of all, it makes you view others through the lens of what they did right. This improves cooperation and lifts both of you to a higher level of intent.

More importantly, it teaches you how to make others look good. It rePURPOSES your Mind to see the good that others do. This will turn back to you and help you see the good inside yourself.

Rule 4: Accept Change and Failure

For some, this can be one of the hardest things to do. Failure is a necessary part of success, so is changing. If you approach your journey being unwilling to bend when change occurs, or afraid of trying something because you just might fail, you will never succeed.

In the words of Robert F. Kennedy, “Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly.”

As you begin your path toward your vision, be willing to accept that things will happen that you can’t control. Be ready to readjust when things need to change, and never be afraid to try something out. Sure it could fail. Just remember what was discussed in the blog, “Everything’s a Success, Even Failure.” You can either win it or you can learn from it.

Rule 5: Be Positive and Have Fun

Following your purpose to success should be FUN! Having fun is not the same as taking the easy path. You may find hard things fun to do. That’s where “Be Positive” comes in. When you are on the path to your success, sometimes difficult things need to get done. Can you do difficult things and still have fun? Of course you can! When you choose to be positive, to focus your attention on positive things, you can find ways to have fun.

Imagine that you got a great deal on an office rental. When you go to move in, you discover that the previous owners left it a mess. You’ve signed the lease. There’s no way to escape cleaning up. You can choose to hang your head and dig in, accepting the terrible situation, or you can turn on some dance songs, invite a few friends, order some pizza and have a party. Both ways will get the job done, but the second option would be so much more FUN!

Use the Rules of Purpose to help you rePURPOSE your Mind. Once you have learned how to rePURPOSE your Mind toward your success following the Rules of Purpose, use The Five Pillars of Success to implement your purpose to success. You will learn how to take action on the purpose that you discovered.

What is a Trigger

Triggers are things in your life that cause you to react negatively.  This reaction distracts you from the important things in life – your purpose, your current goals, and your focus.

Everyone has something that triggers them, something that bothers them so much that they have an instant reaction. Your reaction may cause you to act out toward others in an undesirable way. It may cause you to turn to bad habits such as doing drugs or overindulging in food or alcohol. It may cause you to harm yourself with negative thoughts, binge-watch TV or cower into laziness. In all cases, it stops you from moving toward your life’s goals.

This often occurs as you are working toward your goals. When you are moving along and suddenly you feel like you can’t keep going, you need to identify the trigger that switched you from feeling like you could succeed to feeling like you cannot. It could be an influence from outside yourself, such as a fight with your wife, or it could be an internal battle, such as a natural inclination to think negatively. Once you understand your trigger, you can recognize when you’re triggered and work toward a more positive response. 

Recognize Your Trigger

To recognize your trigger look at the negative response you want to change, and then review what caused that response. For example, what caused you to overindulge in brownies last night? Or what happened right before you picked up that cigarette? What occurred in your day before you yelled at your kids?

You may need more than one point of data; sometimes the trigger is buried deep. We may think it was simply something someone said. However, when you dig deeper you realize it goes back to a feeling of insecurity from your childhood or a realization that you aren’t in control. Sometimes you may need the help of someone on the outside, like a coach, who can help you see the triggers in your life.

Flip Your Response Positive

Have you ever tried to help someone quit smoking? Telling them why smoking is terrible never helps. First of all, everyone knows it’s bad for them that’s why they want to quit, but having a reason why they want to quit is not enough to stop the habit. You have to know why they want to smoke, this is their trigger. Once they understand what triggers them, they can find ways to replace their response with something more positive.

The same thing can happen as you work toward reaching your goals. You could be moving along just fine and then suddenly, something happens and you feel completely unable to continue . . . and you don’t know why.

Something triggered you. Maybe you feel inadequate, or you get angry at your partner or coach. Whatever it was that stops you from seeing your path with an abundance mindset, you need to identify it and regroup.

Once you have identified the trigger, rePURPOSE your Mind by flipping your response. Choose a healthier response you will always do. Think about positive triggers, for example, things that make you smile or give you energy to continue. So if your trigger with smoking is stress, you may decide when you recognize stress that you will eat something healthy, go for a walk, or call a friend. If how someone treats you at work triggers you to feel negative about life, you may decide when you recognize this trigger that you will Force Positive, by texting a friend something positive about your day. Choose something you know you will do.

Act With Purpose

Once you have identified a new response, write it down.  This is so you remember the trigger and your new, programmed response. You may even need to write it down every day; then every time you feel triggered, say how you will respond out loud.

Yes. Out. Loud.

Words have power. Their power grows with each action. Writing it down gives your words power. Thinking those words, gives them more power. Saying them out loud gives them even more power. When you hear yourself say those words, it is very difficult to ignore them.

Then Do.

Flip your old response to a new one. As you do this, you will discover that you have rePURPOSED your Mind to the healthier person you want to become. It won’t happen overnight, but every day you act with your new response to your trigger, it will become more natural and easier to do until you find that your trigger disappears.

Words are powerful. Words from your past programmed who you are today, and the words you use today program who you will become. What you say to yourself, what you say to others and what they say to you affect the future you. It affects how you think about yourself and how you interact with the world. What you say to yourself, even when joking, programs you. 

Your Past

Adults don’t give kids enough credit. Kids are brilliant; adults teach them not to be. They’re physically capable of amazing things; adults teach them not to be. Too often adults limit a kid’s imagination by telling them to focus on the “real world.” They teach them there is one right way to learn, one right way to sit and one right way to respond. They teach them to follow the rules and live within their guidelines. Think about how adults programmed you as a child. The adults in your life taught you the art of suppression. You are the result of your past programming.

As a result, when you get hurt, when life throws lemons at you, you suppress the childlike belief that you can do anything. To succeed now, you need to recognize this suppression and learn how to put it aside. Like a child, you need to believe you can do and be anything.

Your Present

The words of your past helped determine your current self. The words you use today give you the power to change. What you say to yourself, and what you allow others to say to you today, will program your future you. Words are so powerful.

Once, a client of mine said, “Look at me being a giver-upper.” It was just a joke. She said it to relieve tension because she had not completed her tasks. It’s dangerous, though, even in jest. The words you use program how you think about yourself. The words you say to others program how they think about themselves. When you continue to say the same thing to yourself again and again, you begin to believe it.

This programming affects you and your actions. If you continually fail to progress, examine your thoughts and your words. What do you tell yourself? What are others telling you? Do you believe you can accomplish your vision? Do you put yourself down when you struggle? When things are difficult, what is your internal dialog? Do your internal and external words backup who you want to be?  What others say to you over and over programs you. However, you have the power to rePURPOSE those words to become who you want to be.

Your Future

Think about who you want to be! What version of “you” inspires excitement? Sparks your ambition? Close your eyes and imagine making this “you” a reality. Think about the passion you feel as that person. Envision who you will be, what you will do, how you will achieve success as this person. Grab that vision and hold on tight! Now think about the words that describe this person. Use these words in writing, in thoughts and in speech to describe yourself.

Stop using “stop words:” can’t, don’t, won’t, etc. Start using “go words:” will, am, can, able, etc. Here’s why: when you focus on what you will stop doing, your brain focuses on that thing. You’ll never stop doing those things because you continually feed your brain what you want to stop doing.

Focus your inner and outer dialog to who you will become. For example, if you say, “I am organized,” you are organized by your perception right now.  Maybe yesterday you weren’t, but today you are. You can see it, and it feels good! Everything about it is good. You want to wrap it up around you like a warm blanket and be like, “Ah, organized! I love you.” What feels better? Looking at it with a positive focus, “I am organized” or negative, “I will stop being disorganized.” Positive is more enticing, and it’s only words.

As you use these words, you can feel their programming – just words. That’s how powerful they are. You have the power! As you feel the power of these words, your actions will follow. If you want to become this person, why wait until tomorrow? Start now.

On rePURPOSEDMIND.com you will find free force-positive exercises. These exercises will help you practice rePURPOSING your Mind. It will train you to focus your words on who you want to become.

Any successful person sees failure as a necessary part of the process. No one succeeds 100% of the time. Those who succeed do not fear failure. They see failure as an opportunity for learning and growth. Only those who do not try at all truly fail.

Think about your own failures. How do those experiences make you feel? Do you feel frustration or anger? If you look back at your challenges and feel frustration, you lose. You lose your confidence, you lose your hope, and you lose your vision. If you feel that frustration, you need to rePURPOSE your Mind to view those experiences as opportunities for learning and growth. A rePURPOSED MIND Coach will help you do that. Learning this helps you view every difficulty you face with a smile.

It’s all a matter of perspective. When you truly believe in your vision, any failure simply redirects you to the path that ultimately leads you to your success. When you approach failure with an abundance mindset, you learn. This makes you better prepared to succeed.

Most people would not think of Bill Gates, Michael Jordan, Oprah Winfrey, Walt Disney, JK Rowling or Thomas Edison as failures. That is because they didn’t quit when they failed. They learned from their failures and tried again and again and again until they succeeded. Thomas Edison attempted over 10,000 times to refine a cost-effective, long-lasting light bulb. He said, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”

Oprah Winfrey was fired from one of her first jobs because her boss said she was, “unfit for television.” She admits being fired led her to the success she has today.

Michael Jordan is one of the best-known basketball players of all time. Yet he admits that has failed more than most other players. He has said, “I’ve missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I’ve been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.” He attributes his success to using his failure to motivate him to achieve success.

When you accept failure as part of your progression, you cannot fail. As you begin to rePURPOSE your Mind, in every endeavor, you either win it, or you learn from it. When you look at failure as a lesson it makes you better. As you learn from your mistakes, you become stronger and better able to succeed.

When you have an abundant perspective in your life, anything is possible. You view failure as an opportunity for growth. You view obstacles as experiences that show you the way. You understand that failure is a natural part of success. Nothing stops you because anything that gets in your way is simply a part of the process of achieving your dream.

You’ve seen the movies, or read the books (there are scores of them). The main character finds themself in a monotonous job they hate. They chose the career because their parents pushed them to it, or a mentor encouraged them to choose something secure. While each story unfolds differently, the final lesson is always the same: in order to find true happiness in your life and your career, you have to follow YOUR dreams and not someone else’s. When you choose to allow someone else to tell you what you should do with your life, you are applying their filter.

Getting Stuck

Applying someone else’s filter can influence more than just your career. For example, maybe you want to learn how to downhill ski, but when you tell your sister, she says, “Oh, I think you would do better cross-country skiing.” Or perhaps you dream of hiking the high peaks of each state and when you tell your best friend, he says, “Why do that when you haven’t hiked all the peaks in your own town?”

When you toss away your idea and move forward with someone else’s, you become stuck because it’s no longer your idea. When you accept someone’s plan, everything you do moving forward goes through their filter instead of your own. You gave your power away, and now you fulfill their dreams. When you try to fulfill their dreams, one of two things happens:

• You get stuck because you need their approval. You continually go back to them for advice or approval, because it’s their idea, not yours. You constantly need their guidance to know how they would approach the next step.
• You get stuck because you aren’t actually interested in following the idea.

In both cases, you don’t realize why you are stuck. You think maybe it’s become too hard. Or perhaps something blocks your path that you just can’t work through. In reality, you are stuck because you are pursuing someone else’s idea. You have no desire to follow that idea through to success because you are looking through their filter.

Self-Acceptance

Do you enjoy doing something that most people find boring? Maybe you get great satisfaction pulling weeds, balancing a budget or changing your car’s oil. Think about how you describe this activity to others.

Let’s say, you enjoy balancing your budget. One day someone asks you about your evening and you reply, “Ah, I didn’t do anything exciting. I just balanced our budget.” You just applied someone else’s filter to your joy. Why do you downplay things that you love to do when you think the other person may find the activity boring? It’s because you are looking at your actions through someone else’s filter. Instead say, “I had a fantastic night balancing our budget! I just love knowing where all my money is going.” Can you feel the difference?

You may also apply someone else’s filter through the words you choose to describe your life. Concerned about what others think, you water it down hoping they will accept your excuses and not judge you. For example, maybe you describe yourself as a packrat, unorganized, perfectionist, lazy, chaotic or stingy. When in reality you love spending time outdoors so your house is full of outdoor equipment. Your system for organization includes things on your counter so you don’t forget about them. You find joy in having a clean house. You watch TV to relax. You enjoy the active noise of children running around. You feel peace when you control your money. When you choose to see yourself through someone else’s lens, you choose to apply their filter to WHO YOU ARE. When you like the way you live, but choose to describe your choices negatively, you apply other people’s filters to your life. Constantly looking at your life through other people’s lenses makes you unhappy and unfulfilled.

As you learn to rePURPOSE your Mind, to accept your ideas as your own, and block others from redirecting your idea to theirs, you will find your path more successful and enjoyable. You will find true happiness in your life and your career. You will follow YOUR dreams.

Positive thinking carries with it great power. As you increase your ability to think positively, your actions will follow, developing your mind into an abundant state. An abundance mind is a result of positive thinking. Just as you run to be fit, you eat right to be healthy, and you read to learn, you think positive to develop an abundance mind. One with an abundance mindset uses the power of positive thinking, in combination with their purpose, to move toward their vision. It’s about seeing everything in your world with abundance. It’s about becoming someone who sees every obstacle as an opportunity, every challenge as a chance for positive change, and every event in their life, past, present, and future, as a positive necessary step toward achieving your vision.

The Purpose of an Abundant Mind

An abundance of something means that you have more than you need. You lack nothing. Someone with an abundance mindset sees opportunity in every challenge while those with a scarcity mindset see barriers. How you think determines how you act.

When working toward achieving your vision, you will encounter obstacles. One with an abundant mind will use obstacles to help them achieve their success. Perhaps they will climb on top of it to get a better view of their path forward, or maybe they use the obstacle to work for them. One with a scarcity mindset will become discouraged and stop working toward their vision. They see the obstacle as an impenetrable barrier that they cannot overcome. They may even decide to abandon their vision entirely because of the obstacle.

You control your life, and how you react to the events of your life is your decision. You decide whether you see challenges as opportunities or obstructions.

With an abundant perspective, you can also affect the perception of those around you. For example, let’s say you were a jerk and someone calls you out on it. As an abundant person you respond, “Yes, I was a jerk, that was silly of me.” While most would expect an argument or at least some sort of deflection, the surprised person will change their perception of you. Because you showed them another possibility, they will view the experience as a silly mistake instead of defining you as a jerk. Your actions can change others’ perceptions.

Creating an Abundant Mindset

Now that you understand how an abundant mind will affect your life, you must learn how to create that abundant mindset.

Stop/Go Words
One simple way to begin creating an abundant mind is to use “go” words instead of “stop” words. Stop words include: “can’t, don’t, won’t, incapable.” These words stop you from accomplishing your vision. Go words include: “will, can, able, possible.” These words propel you forward toward your vision. Pay attention to how you speak about your progress and what words you say both to others and to yourself.

Stop and go also applies to the steps you define toward your success. Too often when we work toward achieving a vision, we focus our goals on things we will “stop” doing. For example, maybe we desire to lose weight so we set a goal to stop eating sugar. When we focus on the things that we are going to “stop” doing, we put our focus on the very things we no longer want to be a part of our life. This makes it difficult to stop doing them because we are always thinking about them. If you instead change your original vision to “be more healthy” and have a goal to start eating more vegetables, you focus your attention on things that will ultimately help you reach your final vision.

Self Programming
Be careful what you tell yourself about who you are. If you continue to tell yourself that you are lazy, then you will believe that and become lazy. However, if you tell yourself that you are determined, once again, your focus will be aimed toward your vision. You can feel the programming of those words change who you become.

Just words! That’s how powerful they are. You have the power.

When you begin this process, you may struggle to keep thinking positively. If you tend toward negative mental thinking, force positive! Catch negative comments and rewrite them toward positive. Write it down because writing adds a physical action enhancing the power of the abundant thought.

Abundance in the Past, Present, and Future
Having an abundant mindset does not only affect your present moment. To truly become abundantly minded, you must also view your past abundantly, and see your future with that same abundance. This may be difficult for some who experienced trauma in their past. However, those who view their past experiences as growth opportunities, succeed more than those who still view them negatively; hindering their progression. In recreating your past and designing your future with abundance, you will find it easier to act abundantly in the present. If you are unable to move forward because your view of the past has created roadblocks for your success, creating an abundant mindset will change those roadblocks into opportunities.

Force Positive Exercises
A rePURPOSED MIND Coach will use several different exercises that will help you force positive. One of those exercises aids you in applying a smile to everything in your past, present and future. As you change your memories into learning experiences and view them with gratitude and a smile, your experiences no longer stop you from succeeding. In fact, you are able to see those experiences as building blocks to move toward your goals. You can then look forward and see future success with a smile. You can’t change what happened, but you can change how you react to it. Are you in enough control of your mind that you can change the dark into light and rewrite your past? Will you look negatively or positively at your past? The choice is yours.

Another exercise available on rePURPOSEDMIND.com practices forcing positive by actively and physically changing your thoughts from negative to positive. Practicing is necessary; the more you do it, the more natural and less forced it becomes. It’s hard, it takes practice to change negative thoughts to positive, but it can be done. Once you begin learning how to change toward an abundant mindset, you can help others do the same. As you do, you learn and as you teach, you retain.

As an abundantly minded person, you focus on that which moves you toward your vision and forget that which does not help. You will discover the possibilities open up before you while everyone around you grumbles about the problems they face. Once you become abundantly minded you will find yourself moving through The Five Pillars of Success more smoothly as every obstacle becomes an opportunity, and every challenge becomes a chance for positive change. Contact a rePURPOSED MIND Coach and learn how to create an abundant mind in your past, present and future.

We’ve grown up hearing our teachers offer “constructive criticism.” We’ve been taught to accept it as an appropriate way to redirect others. Instead of using the phrase “constructive criticism” I use the phrase “constructive support.” Here’s why.

Google the word criticism, and look at the images that pop up. The vast majority of images depict intense negativity. It shows people with slumped shoulders, angry, and sad.

The definitions you find are just as bad.

Oxford Dictionary: “the expression of disapproval of someone or something based on perceived faults or mistakes.”

Merriam-Webster Dictionary: “the act of criticizing usually unfavorably”

Wikipedia: “the practice of judging the merits and faults of something.”

Criticism is telling someone they are wrong. It focuses on faults and mistakes. It focuses on the past. If the frame of mind is critical, it’s not going to be constructive at all. Criticism is negative. When someone offers you “constructive criticism” it’s like they are saying, “I’m hurting you because it makes you better.”

What if, instead, they love you and support you because it makes you better. How different would it be if you grew up with others giving you constructive support–focusing on how you can improve instead of what you did wrong? Constructive support looks forward at the future and how to be better. Support inspires help to achieve more. Support changes your focus from negative to positive.

It comes down to semantics, and semantics is based on a frame of mind. If the frame of mind is a negative frame of mind, then it’s not going to be constructive at all. Those two things are at odds with each other. It just can’t happen.

How does this apply to rePURPOSING your Mind? You rePURPOSE your Mind with an attitude of support instead of criticism. Decide that instead of being critical with yourself and others, you will only be supportive.

Here’s how that looks. Let’s say for example that you want to be healthier, so you decide to eat more vegetables. You go to the store and purchase a bunch of fresh vegetables for snacks.

However, each time you reach for a snack, you look at those vegetables and decide you don’t have time to cut them up, so you grab a granola bar instead. A week later, you look in the fridge and all the vegetables have gone bad.

Instead of telling yourself, “Look at all the food I wasted. I should not have purchased all those vegetables.” You could say, “Well, now I know that I won’t eat fresh vegetables if they haven’t been prepared. Let’s try buying vegetables that are already prepared to eat.” Do you see how the first statement stops you from moving forward, and the second statement redirects you in a more positive direction?

As you work toward your vision, continue to ask yourself these questions: “What am I doing well? What have I made progress on? Did I get anything good from it? If yes, how do I get more? If no, what else can I do?” You do not need to dwell on things that do not work. Simply stop doing them and focus your energy on something that you believe will get results.

An important part of this process is to write down the changes you are going to make and then execute them, always moving forward. Move past those things that did not work, and don’t give them your energy nor attention. Put all your energy into those things that worked and move forward.

rePURPOSE your Mind to “constructive support” instead of “constructive criticism.” Make sure your communication with yourself and others helps move you forward. Focus on what you can do, what is working, and forget about the rest. Through these actions you rePURPOSE your Mind to an abundance mindset.

Words Have Power

Our kids are surrounded by a lot of negative people, and people who don’t know how to express themselves appropriately. They are encompassed by people with polarizing and liberal mindsets where filters are forgotten and anything goes. You never know if you are on the right side of anyone. Children are impressionable; they need value in every interaction.

I want my children, and the children in all of us, to know the good of humanity, and that if they can hold on to my belief that there is good in humanity (until they are able to discover it for themselves), then they will be able to do the same for others. Creating a better place one person at a time. This is time to heal people’s communications, and expose an opportunity for an abundance mindset.

So how can you heal people’s communications and help create an abundance mindset? In all things, you need to begin with yourself. Many obstacles or roadblocks will keep you from an abundance mindset. For example, using STOP words: can’t, don’t, won’t, etc., and start using GO words: will, can, able, etc. If you put your focus on things that you will “stop” doing, that is where your focus will lie. You will never see growth because you are focusing on the wrong things. Instead, be positive and focus on what you want to become. For example, instead of thinking, “I’m going to stop being unorganized,” think, “I’m going to be more organized.” This puts your focus on being organized instead of being unorganized. You can feel the programing of those words, just words, that’s how powerful they are. Your words have power.

Your positive outlook on your own actions can also affect the perception of those around you. If you were a jerk and someone calls you out on being a jerk, and you respond, “yes, I was a jerk, that was silly of me,” the person will change their own perception and view the experience as a silly mistake instead of defining you as a jerk. Your reaction through your words can change others’ perceptions.

Words are powerful. What you say to yourself, what you say to others, and what they say to you can affect what you become, affecting how you think about yourself and how you interact with the world. Others pick up what you put down.

The words you say become your reality, and the words you say to others become their reality. You need to apply them like you would your children. For example, would you say to your children, “look at you being a giver-upper” even jokingly, if you knew those words would forever change their mindset? Yet, how often do you do that to yourself?

As you learn how to use words to create an abundant mind, you will find it easier to use your words to also affect others. As you do this, you will not only change your own perceptions, but also begin to change the perceptions of those around you. In order to make a positive difference, we must first begin to look within ourselves.