Finding Your Power - Weekly Energy Boost

We may be clear on the direction we want to go in life, but external influences often steer us off course. This week we’ll discover how to take our power back in a way that propels us forward, no matter the circumstances. Episode 4 of 4. Original airdate: 9/27/21

Transcript

Good morning,

Everyone.

Good evening,

Good afternoon,

Wherever you are,

And welcome to this week's Weekly Energy Boost.

My name is Ellie Shevin.

I'm here this morning with David,

And more than ever,

We are excited to share with you the secrets,

The Kabbalistic secrets,

To finding your power.

The Weekly Energy Boost is your seven-day spiritual energy forecast that serves our listeners with the best and most practical and powerful wisdom and tools to navigate the coming seven days,

But inevitably in those wisdom and tools are lessons for life.

And we have been focusing this month on using the wisdom of Kabbalah and its tools to inspire change and a fresh slate.

We're still in the month of Libra.

We're still,

I think the best way to say it is it's like as though we're in the architect's office building our dream home,

And we haven't built it yet,

So we're still preparing the drawings,

Deciding how big we want the rooms to be and what we want to fill them with.

And to that point,

We're focusing this week's episode,

This week's energy is really about establishing our power,

Tapping into the infinite resource of the universe rather than our own.

I don't want to insult anybody,

So I'll talk about myself.

I know for me personally,

I have a limited capacity,

Whether that means I can only stay awake so many hours a day,

Whether it means I can only talk so many hours a day before I need peace and quiet,

But I can only provide as much of my own energy as I can garner myself.

And the wisdom of Kabbalah teaches that when we really tap into the infinite source that is our soul,

That is that spark of the light force of the Creator,

It's not just that we won't be tired,

It's that even in our exhaustion at the end of the day,

And I'm the first one to say there's a certain point in the evening where my stores are depleted,

But I'm peaceful and I'm energized and I am serene in the energy that I have put out during the day.

And I can't tell you I do it perfectly every day,

But every day when I do wake up,

My intention is that I will draw from that source.

So today we want to share with you not only how to access that infinite source of energy,

But also to be aware of the things that we do consciously or unconsciously that deplete that source,

That consciously or unconsciously connect us to other limited sources of energy,

Other people,

Other situations,

And how we can cut those cords and reconnect with that lifeline that is essentially naturally existing,

Naturally flows as long as we don't interfere with that flow.

So I know I have my list of.

.

.

Before I chime in,

Can you give practical examples when you say depleting that source?

I think when you say it,

People understand.

Sure.

I have a long list.

Give me an example.

Give an example so people can resonate with that.

Okay.

So for those of you that used to watch The David Letterman Show,

He would always have his top 10 list,

Right?

We used to talk about that years ago.

So here's my top 10 list.

I'm not sure we'll get to 10,

But I have in thinking about the people that I know or who I encounter,

What I encounter when it comes to people,

Again,

I say consciously or unconsciously,

It's willingly or unwillingly,

Knowingly or unknowingly giving away their power.

To me,

The number one that happens in these days is trying to prove other people wrong.

That is one.

.

.

Raise your hand if you're guilty.

We're all guilty.

There is so much of our valuable resources that we spend into trying to prove other people wrong.

You don't even need to open social media to see it.

The news is about that.

The music scene is about that.

If you listen to the lyrics in the top 40 hits in any country,

It's all about trying to prove people wrong.

I was right.

You were wrong.

Here are the facts.

Here is what you are missing.

Here is what you don't know,

Which is basically on an energetic level,

Breaking my veins,

My arteries,

And surgically fusing them with the other person.

That my joy,

My happiness,

My peace of mind will only come when they acknowledge,

Yes,

Oh,

Great and wonderful,

Elie Sheva,

You are right and I am wrong.

By the way,

If you're honest with yourself and you sit back and think,

How vindicated do I feel when after something happens,

Someone comes to me and says,

You know what,

I am sorry,

You were right.

I think I shared a few months ago on the show that I told my son,

I told one of my kids he wanted to buy a computer and I told him,

Mercury was in retrograde and it was a negative month on the Kabbalistic calendar,

And I told him,

Don't do it.

Please don't do it.

Three weeks later he's dropping him off somewhere and he's about to close the door and he says,

I just want to tell you,

I'm so glad I listened to you.

How good did that feel?

I'm here to be honest.

We don't hide our imperfections.

Not that there was anything imperfect about it,

But I felt so good.

Now,

The other honest part is,

Was I waiting for him to say it?

No.

I simply shared my truth.

I said,

If I were you,

This is what I would do and I left it there on the table for him.

The fact that he took it,

Bonus.

The fact that he acknowledged it was good advice,

Bonus,

But none of my energy was hanging,

Resting upon it.

I was not waiting for him to acknowledge the value of my,

Oh,

Holy wisdom in order to feel good.

There was no expectation on my part.

So I think that if we all just take that one,

If each of us can identify who we are trying to prove wrong,

By the way,

It might even be with spirituality.

I'm sharing my spiritual wisdom and I know that there are certain people in my life that need that wisdom and I am waiting for them to thank me for it.

To say,

I was,

My beliefs were wrong.

My beliefs didn't provide me with the peace of mind,

The direction,

Et cetera,

That I was looking for.

Your beliefs do.

Beautiful.

I was taking notes as you were saying that because I wanted to throw in some of the Kabbalistic perspective of that.

And usually when a person is insistent on being right and they have this resolute moral compass that it is this way,

It must be this way.

Whether that's right or wrong,

Meaning,

Let's say we felt that way about Kabbalah.

We said Kabbalah is the only way.

Even if that is the truth,

I'm not saying it is,

But let's say that was the truth.

When I'm an advocate of that,

That's actually a short circuit on my part.

If I say any.

.

.

What's a short circuit?

If I say short circuit meaning I'm disconnected from the light,

If I told somebody something is absolute,

I at that exact moment disconnect from the light of the Creator.

Because of the fact that everything is relative and the way that the light of the Creator interacts with every creature,

There's no absolute way that the light interacts.

It's all dependent on where the vessel is at.

So right away we should know every time we're absolutely sure about something and we try to convey that to other people.

It's good to be sure about things internally,

But when you try to convince other people to feel the way you feel,

This is a disconnection from the light of the Creator.

What it does actually is,

It's a little bit of a deeper concept,

But because it has to do with this period of time,

I thought maybe I'd share it.

It started last week,

This whole idea of.

.

.

We didn't even talk about the holidays yet.

We have these 22 days of holidays and there's the first 10 days of energy,

Of creating our new destiny,

And then there's the next 12.

To simplify it,

These 12 days represent what's called the light of mercy.

It's basically an energy we create every time we go against our nature,

Every time we are adding value,

Every time we're doing restriction,

We're overcoming ourself,

We create this energy called the light of mercy.

That light that's created,

That energy that's created,

Will result in fulfillment and happiness,

According to the Kabbalists.

There's a different kind of light,

And that's called the light of wisdom.

That's energy I try to take from the outside.

When I eat food,

I connect to that light.

When a person gives a kiss to somebody or you hug your family,

You get that light.

When a person's on drugs,

They get that light.

When a person achieves something,

They get that light.

The thing about that light is,

It does feel good,

But it says that when you connect to that energy,

You always feel half full.

You can never actually feel fulfilled,

So light of wisdom can only fill you up halfway.

How do we know that?

Think of any time in your life,

Maybe you got a thank you from somebody,

Maybe you got approval,

You achieved something and you felt great,

But always there was another feeling that you wanted more and it wasn't enough.

It's always like that.

That's called the light of wisdom.

To make it simple,

If you want fulfillment,

It's the energy that you create when you are going against your nature.

When people have to be right,

They're trying to take energy from other people.

That's why people who try to be right are never fulfilled.

I've never met a person who's adamant about being right.

It could even be about Kabbalah,

Who then when his head hit the pillow at the end of the night,

He said,

I feel full.

I feel fulfilled.

You're always feeling like there's a monkey on your back and you're being controlled and you're missing something and you're missing something and you're missing something and then you start to drive everybody crazy and that's a whole other show,

What happens after that.

I wanted to try to bring that deep concept of Kabbalah because right now is this time where we can connect to the power of the light of mercy,

This energy.

That's why this is the topic of the show is because we don't want to be nourished by false resources.

We don't want the fake high,

We want the real high.

The fake high is the light of wisdom.

It still feels good.

It is an energy,

But it will never fulfill you.

I'm thinking of a few people that we know that are very much bent on proving everybody else wrong.

When I think about them,

I realize that their original intention is good.

It's not about being right or wrong.

They're passionate about something that they feel is good for everybody.

That's I think what's the most confusing thing about it is that I mean well.

When I'm trying to prove other people wrong,

My initial intention is I want you to be as enlightened as me.

I want you to be as healthy as me.

I want you to be as smart as me,

As protected as me,

As strong as me.

That's the secret behind multi-level marketing.

I use these products and you should too.

In the end,

Where there's so many jokes about it,

We end up hurting people.

Forget about ourselves.

David just explained how we hurt ourselves in the process,

But we alienate ourselves from people.

What comes to mind is one of my friends was talking about how her parents got vaccinated,

Of course,

Next to someone who doesn't believe in vaccination and they said,

Oh,

They got the death jab.

I thought to myself,

Who was that comment for?

The parents in another country who already had it and it is what it is.

The daughter who's worried about her parents in another country that's riddled with COVID,

Who did that help?

The initial intention is I believe vaccination isn't good.

I'm not saying that that's my belief.

I'm saying this person.

They're an anti-vaxxer because they think it's healthy and positive not to take vaccines,

But in the end,

They end up crushing people's hearts and minds and emotional wellbeing in their quest to help everybody stay healthy.

I think there was this article in Psychology Today or I don't know what it's called,

Several years ago where it says,

The problem is,

And this is Kabbalistic,

When your desire to be right is greater than your desire to be compassionate and meaningful,

That is when you've entered the realm,

And we call them Kabbalah,

The realm of chaos.

Can you repeat that because that's very powerful.

It's okay to want to be right,

But when your desire to be right and you're adamant about a diet,

A spiritual path,

A belief system,

Vax,

No vax,

Whatever.

A guru,

A political party,

It's all qualified.

Anything.

Your desire and to convince other people of that is greater than your desire to be meaningful and compassionate to others,

That is when you've disconnected from the light of the Creator.

Now,

When your desire to be meaningful and compassionate is greater than your desire to be right,

Then you could still want to be right.

That's fine.

We all want to feel like we exist and we stand for something,

But your desire to be compassionate has to be greater than your desire to be right.

By the way,

That goes back to the episode we did a few months ago with Matthew Stevenson when he was talking about how he helped to gently make a difference in the life of a white supremacist.

He spoke specifically about that idea.

We are much more convincing when we are compassionate than when we are insensitive.

That's another big,

Big thing to remember,

Especially when you do know the truth.

You're waving your flag of truth,

But you lack human dignity and kindness for other people.

If you're interested in hearing more about how effective compassion is when inspiring change,

Go back to that episode and listen to it.

I have something really powerful that's going to be controversial.

I'm sure it's going to be controversial.

It's going to rub some people maybe the wrong way,

But it's a good rub.

I'm bracing myself.

Can you just say it already?

I want you to react to what I'm saying,

But let it in and try to see it from a 30,

000-foot view.

Take a deep breath with me,

Listeners.

I was talking to a student who was doing this really nice thing as a volunteer project in the Kabbalah Center,

Helping a lot of people.

This person gets a phone call and gets an earful and starts getting bashed,

Like,

Why did you do this?

Why didn't you do it like this?

She calls me and says,

I'm gay.

I'm just trying to do a nice thing here.

I got all this opposition.

One of the lessons I told her,

And now this also relates to the political system of today and the whole Vax thing,

Which is that there was this Kabbalist,

I forgot his name,

We were just studying about him,

But his life,

He had all these students and so much wisdom and there was respect and everything flowed.

He said that he would pray to the Creator to have opposition because he knew that if there was somebody who would be against him,

Somebody who would speak bad about him or somebody who would denounce him or some level of opposition,

That's the true way that he would grow.

But because everybody just kind of said yes,

Catered to whatever he needed,

Said,

You know,

You're the greatest,

It started to bother him.

So the way that the world is designed is that there always has to be an equal opposition.

So is there ever going to be a time where everybody believes in Vax or everybody doesn't believe?

No.

So this idea that I want to get everybody to believe is actually wrong because the creator has designed the world that for every believer,

There has to be a non-believer that will challenge that person.

Because the goal is not Vax or no Vax.

The goal is the light of the Creator.

And the only way you can achieve that consciousness,

That state of consciousness and being connected to the light is if you have opposition.

So for every person you recruit to believe in what you believe in,

You actually recruit a non-believer somewhere in the world who will be against you.

And that's a powerful concept.

It says that when a person gets married,

That their spouse is the,

It's called the oyev.

It's almost like an enemy,

The enemy of your negativity.

So if you've been married for however long,

You know at some point that you could be a great person and everybody could love you and you could be great at whatever you do.

But the person in your house,

Whether it's your spouse or even your kids,

They don't tolerate your negativity,

However little or big it is.

And they are the enemy of your negativity.

And it says that if you do your spiritual work and take responsibility for it,

They become the oyev.

The oyev to oyev,

They become the lover of you.

And so they start to celebrate you.

My point is,

And I was thinking- Where's the controversy?

Well,

The controversy,

I was thinking to myself,

Like what are the odds- That's an exhale because you haven't said it yet.

I'm thinking like even of our political system,

How it's like so like right in the middle,

It's like exact same amount of conservatives and liberals and like it's like the House and the Senate.

And I was thinking to myself,

What are the odds?

And it's always like this 50-50.

And that's a spiritual concept that for every person who believes in one thing,

The creator creates a person who believes in the opposite.

It's also in physics.

For every action,

There's an equal and opposite reaction.

And it's right there under our nose and we're thinking,

Well,

No,

I want there to be- There's going to be only actions and there'll be no reactions.

So this acceptance of having opposition is actually a very beautiful thing because it's the opposition that will force,

That will break your ego,

Which you want.

You actually want your ego to be broken.

It's painful in the moment obviously,

But you want this reality of a broken ego to occur,

But still you have joy.

And why do you have joy?

Because you know that's the way the world is designed.

So you break your muscles when you go to the gym,

But you're happy about that.

You don't go to the gym to get a massage and a facial.

And to get compliments on how sexy you are.

Tell your trainer just to compliment you for one hour and then you'll leave.

See what that does to your muscles.

You need to break it down.

So the trainer is your opposition.

You actually pay someone to oppose you.

I'm paying you to oppose me.

I had a student who's in his training and he's looking good.

And he's like,

I said,

Oh,

You have a trainer?

And he's like,

Yeah,

I told my trainer that if I don't look a certain way by whatever,

I'm going to fire you.

So and he's constantly telling me things I don't want to do.

He's constantly forcing me to come in in a consistent basis.

It's the content.

It's opposition.

Opposition is an amazing,

Amazing thing.

I think also our teacher's teacher told him that if you don't have opposition,

You've got to be worried that you're doing the wrong thing.

That opposition is a sign that you're doing something meaningful and powerful.

Otherwise the negative forces in the world would leave you alone.

How many people,

No offense to yoga,

But how many people are anti-yogers,

Anti-yoga yogis?

No one.

Right?

No,

But I mean,

Again,

It should make you laugh,

Not offend you when I say that.

Because on one hand,

Yoga is an amazing practice.

On the other hand,

Is it drastically going to bring an end to pain and suffering in the world?

Probably not.

And so if you want to see what's meaningful and powerful about it.

Well,

We don't know.

We don't know.

We don't know.

Okay.

You're right.

I don't know.

I'm sorry.

I just look at it because it's such a benign thing.

You know what?

The truth is me and you could be totally doing this whole Kabbalah thing wrong and totally missing the mark.

And maybe we're meant to be yogis the whole time.

And we have to be open to that.

I'm pretty sure yoga is not for me.

Well,

Yeah,

But we have to be.

By the way,

Moses used to do that.

Moses used to say maybe I'm doing the whole thing is wrong.

He used to let that go every night.

And then in the morning,

Go back to 100%.

I'm all in.

I'm all in with what I know.

Can I segue to another power suck?

Yeah.

Power suck.

This is a power suck.

I like that.

Trying to prove other people right is a huge power suck.

That's number one.

Number two.

And I love this one because it's so subtle.

We all do it and we have no idea how vicious this is to oneself.

You ready?

Yeah.

Feeling responsible for others.

The opposite of giving away your power.

It seems like it's opposite the extreme.

How many people have you counseled over the years that have said to you,

But I can't do this because it's going to hurt them?

Or I can't do it because.

.

.

And I'm not talking about there may be situations,

I don't know that what comes to mind is let's say a person has a company and they're thinking of closing down,

But they feel responsible for the employees and their families.

There is a direct correlation between the closing of that company and its effect on the employees.

However,

That doesn't mean that that person should continue to bleed out because they feel responsible for the employees.

What we're talking more about is.

.

.

I know so many people,

So many of us stay stuck in a pattern because we feel that if we move forward,

The impact on others is going to be so grave that we need to stay stuck.

And how much of our power we are just letting dribble.

It's maybe not a suck,

But it's a dribble because we don't move forward on other people's account for the expense of other people.

I can think of,

I know somebody who's not divorcing.

There's a lot of that.

Not divorcing her husband because she's worried about the impact on her child.

That's probably the most common one.

But think about how much energy she is that is wasting away because she doesn't have a relationship with her husband.

Not an emotional one,

Not a physical one.

Maybe they manage a household together and maybe not even already.

Maybe that's the best example to illustrate how there is so much energy that could be being channeled into something with growth potential.

It's basically like watering a dead plant.

Feeling responsible for other people is like watering a dead plant.

Now that doesn't mean we cannot impact or influence others,

Going back to point A.

But not doing things or not doing things because of your feeling responsible for others is absolutely.

.

.

Let's call it this.

It's not giving your power away.

It's donating your power.

Contributing your power to another cause.

And 99% of the time the cause is not existent.

With no tax benefit.

No tax benefit.

No tax benefit.

No kickbacks.

It is just a.

.

.

Maybe it's an energy dump is what it is.

And what ends up happening is the residual energy is resentment.

I stayed in this marriage because of you.

I stayed in this job because of you.

Maybe I'm thinking about somebody else who I know has this calling to do something really powerful professionally.

And she is not doing it.

I'm thinking of so many other things.

She is not doing it because of how it's going to impact or it might upset other people.

Well,

That's a great one.

Not doing things because you don't want to upset your family,

Because you don't want to upset your friends,

Because people will be shocked or upset.

I think a lot of people live their lives in secrecy.

They keep who they are in the closet and it has nothing to do with sexual orientation even.

Although this could definitely fall in that category.

We keep our true selves in the closet because we're afraid of how other people will react.

That is,

Again,

Taking the cords and putting it into those people and allowing them to be your source because you are doing or not doing in their honor.

It sounds like we've talked about this moving on from relationships thing,

But staying in it because of the kids.

I think people hear it all the time,

But it's still very hard for them to wrap their head around,

Well,

What do I do here?

I was thinking of another way of looking at it,

Which is what is the majority of examples you have,

People who have cut the cord,

Who have left relationships where maybe all it is is just a roommate scenario.

There's no more passion.

There's no more sexual chemistry.

There's no more respect.

Maybe there's a respect,

Maybe not for the other person.

The person feels shut down.

I always say that the test is when you leave for work or when you go on a trip,

You miss the person.

I always ask this question.

I'm like,

Oh,

You miss the person.

No,

No,

No,

No,

Don't miss the person.

If you don't miss the person,

What's going on?

What are you doing?

Do you have examples?

I do not know a single person- Who's left.

Who's left that regrets it.

Even with the kids.

Even with the kids.

Okay,

There you go.

That doesn't mean it's not hard.

There are people who leave in the wrong way without the right spiritual foundation reactively- That's a good point to mention.

Go down the mistress route.

That's chaos.

I tell my students,

Before you get into another relationship,

You got to clean up the one you got now.

You don't hedge your bets.

You don't do the hedge.

Try to keep the household,

To keep the kids happy,

But then have something on the side and think that energetically that's all going to work out.

By the way,

There are people who.

.

.

I'm sure we all know people whose divorces drag out for decades.

I'm saying it doesn't mean that the process isn't challenging,

But so is going to the gym with a personal trainer.

You know what I mean?

The growth.

.

.

I think what David and I are trying to say is that by staying there because of feeling responsible for other people,

You are staying stuck and sucked into those people as your source.

When you move on,

You open up the door for change,

And from change and growth comes true joy and fulfillment.

That's really the truth.

In the change and the growth,

We generate our own energy.

When David spoke in the beginning about the light of wisdom and the light of mercy,

Through the change and the growth,

We generate our own fulfillment.

That's what makes us completely full and not half full.

When I say that nobody's regretted it,

The path may be rocky,

But nobody says,

I wish I stayed in that loveless,

Empty marriage.

No one says it,

Literally.

I know people who have.

.

.

I know people who have left who have gone back.

Oh,

I don't know anybody who's gone back.

We know people who have gone back,

But then have gone back on new terms,

And the actual separation caused an opening.

Maybe the man changed,

The woman changed more,

Whatever.

Well,

Full disclosure,

I dated my husband,

Broke up with him,

And then got back together with him.

With Mordechai.

Yeah.

We dated,

We broke up for a year and a half,

And then we got back together.

That's healthy.

We're not saying don't ever break up or only break up,

Right?

But the point,

David's question was,

Do you know anybody that did take the leap and isn't happy with the results?

The struggle is real,

But so is the fulfillment,

And it's through the struggle that the fulfillment comes.

Nobody is happy about being stuck.

I think that the problem is that title of,

I don't want to hurt anybody,

I don't want to damage anybody,

I feel responsible.

That is not spiritual.

It sounds like I'm responsible,

Like I'm caring,

Like I'm considerate.

It's not.

At the very least,

I think most,

Especially for those people that stay for the kids,

The kids deserve to see what a healthy human being is and a healthy relationship.

When you're in that kind of pattern,

They're very much seeing two people who are not cohesive and also probably not at their most fulfilled.

I'm not here to convince anybody,

But the point is,

Feeling responsible for others is not the right reason to stay or to not stay.

I agree.

I agree.

All right,

You got a third one before we wrap up?

I do.

The truth is I have more than three,

But I want to say- But we can't give too much to our people.

You ready?

Yes.

Okay.

I'll tell you two of them.

You choose which one we're going to expand on.

How's that?

Okay.

All right.

Holding grudges.

Holding grudges.

Waiting for other people to change.

Waiting for other people to change.

Or circumstances.

It might not be other people,

But which one do you like better?

Flavor of the day.

I feel like holding grudges is probably more prevalent,

But I think we beat that one a lot.

Waiting for other people to change.

Waiting for other people.

Isn't there a waiting for the world to change?

Cue the music right now.

What did you say?

You said something to me a couple of weeks ago about the guy who took response,

He wanted to kill himself and then he decided,

I'm going to take responsibility for my life for a year.

Tell us about that.

Oh.

Oh.

You never shared that.

Can you talk while I look up the story?

Really?

I'm serious.

All right.

Give me one second.

All right.

It's very powerful.

I really want to find it.

I actually did want to say one thing about the last one,

Feeling responsible for others.

You also have to be careful because the opposite extreme of feeling responsible for others is shutting down and becoming desensitized.

So you got to always catch yourself.

Spiritual work is about the balance of not going into the comfort zone of one way or the comfort zone of the other.

So there are people who are just like overly invested and a lot of it has to do with their own insecurity and self-image issues.

And then to compensate for that,

They over-correct and then they say,

Well,

Fine,

Screw you or they start to shut down and this will shut down their emotions and their feelings.

And that's the other way of disconnecting from the light.

So you just got to be careful about that.

Are you ready?

Yeah.

Okay.

I'm going to read.

It's like a page.

So tuck in,

Grab your popcorn.

It's going to be good.

In the mid 19th century,

A boy was born into a wealthy family.

From the beginning,

The boy suffered serious health issues,

An eye problem that left him temporarily blinded as a child,

A terrible stomach condition that forced him into a strict diet and back pains that would plague him throughout his life.

Despite his father's disapproval,

He aspired to become a painter when he grew up.

He practiced the craft for years and years,

Every attempt ended in failure.

Meanwhile,

His brother went on to become a world renowned novelist.

As he entered adulthood,

Many of his health problems worsened,

His relationship with his father fell apart and the young man began to struggle with severe bouts of depression and suicidal thoughts.

Desperate to fix his son's situation,

The young man's father used his business connections to get the young man admitted to Harvard Medical School.

Unfortunately,

The young man was smart.

He could handle the coursework,

But he never felt at home or at peace at Harvard.

After touring a psychiatric facility one day,

The young man mused in his diary that he felt more in common with the patients than the other doctors.

Dissatisfied with his medical training,

The young man looked for the other opportunities within academy that may have suited him.

He was desperate,

He was willing to try anything,

Even something radical and completely different.

He soon discovered an anthropological expedition to the Amazon rainforest.

The young man signed on,

Excited to get away and start anew,

To perhaps discover something new and interesting about the world and about himself.

In those days,

Intercontinental travel was long,

Complicated and dangerous,

But the young man made it to the Amazon.

There he promptly contracted smallpox and nearly died alone in the jungle.

He was rushed back to civilization and the expedition left him behind.

Upon recovering from smallpox,

His back spasms returned worse than ever.

He was emaciated from the disease,

Stuck in a foreign land alone with no way to communicate and continued to exist in daily excruciating pain.

The young man managed to return home to a disappointed father,

Nearly 30 years old,

Still unemployed,

A failure at everything he'd ever attempted,

With a body that betrayed him and wasn't likely to ever get better.

Despite every advantage and opportunity to be given in life,

He had failed them all.

The only constants in his life seemed to be suffering a disappointment.

The man fell into a deep depression and planned to take his own life.

Here's what David wanted me to share.

But first he had an idea.

He made an agreement with himself.

In his diary,

He wrote that he would try an experiment.

He would spend one entire year believing he was 100% responsible for everything that occurred in his life,

No matter what.

During this period,

He would do everything in his power to change his circumstances,

No matter the outcome.

If he wrote,

At the end of one year of taking responsibility for everything in his life and working to improve it,

If nothing in his life had actually improved in that time,

Then it will be apparent that he was truly powerless to the circumstances around him,

And then he would take his own life.

The young man's name was William James,

The father of American psychology and one of the most influential philosophers of the past 100 years.

Of course,

He wasn't these things yet,

But he would go on to become them,

In large part due to his experiment.

James would later refer to his experiment as his rebirth and would credit it with everything that he would later accomplish.

There is a realization from which all potential growth emerges.

This is the realization that you are responsible for everything you do in your life,

No matter the external circumstances.

When I first heard it,

I was very inspired.

Do we have practical things he did that constituted taking responsibility for one's life?

Do we know this?

Or do we just have to read the book?

He goes on to explain that part of what.

.

.

Okay,

James wasn't dumb though.

Here we go.

He knew that values require more than a simple choice to believe them.

You don't just wake up one day and decide,

I'm a happy,

Successful person,

And become it.

Values must be cultivated,

Consciously tried and tested,

And steeled by experience.

Values are worthless if they don't contain some sort of real world manifestation,

Some tangible benefit in form of positive experience.

He said,

We don't always control what happens to us,

But we always control A,

How we interpret what happens to us,

And B,

How we respond to what happens to us.

Whether we like it or not,

We're always taking that active role in what is occurring with us.

His book is called The Will to Believe.

You can read that.

We're not promoting the book,

But that's where the story comes from.

I read this from Mark Manson.

I think the point is that change only takes one person,

Whether you're in a relationship,

You're in a family,

You're in a business,

You're simply a cog in a machine.

You may just be packing boxes or driving a delivery service.

I don't mean just,

But you may think you have tangible evidence that you don't matter when the truth is you do matter.

Waiting for the political climate to change,

Waiting for things to go back to normal,

That's a huge energy suck,

Power suck in my opinion.

There's a lot of people out there that are saying,

Well,

When things go back to normal,

Honey,

Things are never going back to normal.

For those of you that think,

Well,

I just want to do this and I just want to do that,

You are basically giving away your energy to some future event or experience that may or may not happen when you have the opportunity right now to put your energy into something that's viable now.

I remember when my wife first decided to study Kabbalah,

She came to an intro and then she's like,

Yeah,

I'm too busy.

I can't take this course now.

And then the teacher told her,

You're always going to be busy.

You hear that stuff.

She's like,

Yeah,

You're right.

All right,

I'll sign up now.

And to think that we would have never met if she finally realized I'm just going to always be busy.

It's make the decision now.

What do they say?

If you want to get something done,

Give it to a busy woman.

Yeah,

A woman?

Yes.

Did you just- No,

No,

That's the original statement.

Is that the original?

Go to a busy woman.

I see.

Absolutely,

Absolutely.

I didn't know that.

But I hope that it's clear.

I don't want to sound like we're putting anybody down for any reason.

The problem,

There are probably people out there that are saying,

I'm going to publish my book.

I'm going to go out on that speaking tour.

I'm going to be the person I know I can be when all my ducks are in a row,

When everything is perfect.

When Trump comes back into office,

I don't know what.

There's so many different reasons that you could say I'm waiting for things to be X,

Y,

And Z.

It's like throwing air into a basket.

You can't.

Things will never be perfect.

And the people who are out there cooking,

I didn't mean to use the word cooking even,

The people who have the product that they're waiting to launch.

David,

You once gave an example about how there are people that are trying to perfect their one product rather than releasing seven versions of it and seeing which one is the most successful.

Totally.

Right?

And they're like,

Well,

Everything's going to fail.

They just don't want to deal with the failure.

But what about the one that succeeds?

Well,

But that's a whole other episode,

If you're asking me.

My point is the one year,

Let's say,

That William James took and said,

I'm going to try this theory,

This philosophy,

And see what happens,

I think that the power in that statement is he said,

Now.

I'm going to do it now.

I'm not going to wait to be healthier,

Stronger,

Wealthier,

More inspired.

The opposite.

He was at the end of his rope,

Literally.

And he said,

If this doesn't work,

Then I'll know.

But the fact that it worked,

And maybe this is the message that David and I want to leave you with today,

Is that things will never be exactly the way you want them to be.

People will never be,

Oh,

God,

I sound so pessimistic.

People will never be as perfect as you want them to be.

The environment won't be as perfect as you want it to be.

The market won't be as perfect as you want it to be.

But jumping into the water,

And I missed the opportunity to say my favorite phase.

The water is always going to be cold.

Your hand is on the camera.

For those of you that are watching,

And anyone wants me to stop talking.

I'm very sensitive in people getting more than the vessel can handle.

I want you guys always to feel like you're anticipating the next show.

So when he doesn't,

When he only gives three of his five points,

That's the reason why,

To keep you coming back for more.

Boys and girls,

The water is always going to be cold.

You might as well jump now.

And with all of the intensity of the energy that we've experienced in these last few weeks,

This is the time.

Take back,

Recoil back all of the cords that you've been taking,

Letting energy get sucked from you and drained from you.

Reel them back in.

And start to be more connected with the authentic and actual and most powerful source,

Which is the one in yourself.

Thank you for rating and reviewing.

All those of you that are going to the podcast apps and sharing your feedback,

We really appreciate it.

You can share this podcast with anybody and anyone you know that needs to hear it.

We love hearing about how people found out about us from this person and that person or a friend of a friend of a friend sent me.

Keep it up.

It's amazing to see how far reaching this wisdom can get.

And we'll see you next week on the Weekly Energy Boost.

Reviews

Loving these more and more everytime i listen to a new episode. Thank you