Control your Mind. Control your Destiny
Master Wong,
I have a close friend. Three years ago she gave up her job as an Sales Engineer and joined an MLM company. She is doing very well and asked me to join her. I am very tempted.
Last year I was offered junior partnership in my trading Company. How can I be sure that joining her is the right decision? Please advise. Ten years from today, I do not want to regret any decision I make today. How can I be certain I am making the right decision?
Your Student
Marisa, Butterworth, Penang.
Hi Marisa,
Can I ask you, what do you usually do when you have a particularly tough decision to make? What have you done in the past when your options were not at all clear?
Just like Marisa, when faced with a difficult decision, how many of you wish you had a tool, an approach, a concept, a formula or a strategy that could help you make the right decision?
Marisa, I would like to offer you a simple, practical and fast method of arriving at any decision you desire. It will create absolute clarity, give you priority to your choices and help you decide what is important to you, based on your most important values.
It is called the Rocking Chair Test.
The Rocking Chair Test will help you see your long-term options in the present. You will have the benefit of knowing how differently your life would have gone had you made an alternate decision. It is almost like viewing a parallel Universe and having an insight into the outcomes of opposing decisions that you make on any single issue.
At any rate, if any decision that you make passes the test, then you will know that it was a good choice.
The Rocking Chair test is a great tool when it comes to making difficult life changing decisions.
Like Marisa, maybe you need to decide if you should quit your job and start your own business?
Maybe you need to know if you should follow your childhood dream and do what you really feel passionate about?
Maybe you need to be certain of taking a risk and doing something new and different that you have never done before?
We all come across questions like these during our life. And if you are like most people, you probably just shut them out, choose the safe choice, and go with the familiar, even if it means sticking with the boring dead end job you despise.
We all want incredible results in our lives. But we also want to do things that are safe, practical, pragmatic, secure, logical, realistic and normal.
We are unwilling to do anything New and Different because it’s a risk. I say to you,
YOU MUST BE GILA!
The rocking chair test is a great way to ensure you live your life without regret because it helps put things into proper perspective based on what is important to you right now and in the future.
What decisions are you presently struggling with?
What decisions are stopping you from having the life that you desire?
What one decision do you keep putting off that could turn your life around?
If you feel you must make a decision but fear that it might be a wrong one, then I suggest you take the “rocking chair test” right now and make a better decision for tomorrow, and your life might never be the same again. And all it took was one well-informed decision.
The Rocking Chair Test decision-making process imposes no risk because it helps you make an educated decision based on what outcomes are important to you.
It allows you a peek into the future. A glimpse at the possible outcomes tells you what decisions you need to make today, that will lead you to the preferred outcome in the future.
It is like going into the future and looking at where your life ends up based on the decisions that you made in the past. You then get to come back into the present and make exactly those decisions.
Powerful stuff!
As Tony Robbins often says: It is in your moments of decisions that your destiny is shaped.
The Rocking Chair test is unbelievably simple, and yet dramatically powerful.
All you have to do is to imagine yourself as an old man or an old woman, nearing the end of your life. As you sit and rock on your porch and contemplate upon your life, just ask yourself if this decision will have any meaning to you in the future.
Will you be proud or ashamed of your decision?
How will this decision have affected the course of your life?
How different would your life have been had you made a totally opposite decision?
Marisa, the next time you reach a fork in your road of life and are not sure which way to go, I suggest you just find a quiet spot, get relaxed and get on your imaginary rocking chair.
THE BUSINESSMAN’S ROCKING CHAIR TEST
To illustrate the simplicity and power of the process, let me give you an example of how you could use the rocking chair test in a business situation.
Lets say; you are hesitating about jumping into a new business venture (as in the case of Marisa). Think about sitting on your porch when you are 80 years old in a rocking chair. If you are already 80, pretend you are 100.
If there is a chance that you will miss out on a huge opportunity to grow your business, and the downside will not kill you or put you in jail, and you cant make a decision, I suggest you may want to take the rocking chair test.
Just imagine yourself as an old man or woman, maybe in your 80’s. Then sit yourself down in your rocking chair, get comfortable and look back at your life. Look back to where you are right now struggling with the decision of what to do.
As you move into your future, ask yourself:
What if I never did this?
How would I feel?
Would my life be different?
Do I regret not taking the chance?
Is this something that would haunt me and I would always wonder about?
Do you find yourself feeling like something is missing?
Is there a sadness or longing?
Or is there great pride and comfort of having made that decision?
Get specific and feel your way through the answers.
What if I just stayed here in my job, would I regret not taking the chance to explore my options when I was younger?
What if I did not at least try to follow my dreams, would it be something that I would always look back upon and wonder, what if…?
In life, we find we are more disappointed by the things we did not do then the ones we did. So if you are feeling regret as an imaginary 80 year old, take it to heart.Use this tool as a shot of courage to go for something that you really want out of life.
Next time you are trying to decide which way to go, put the rocking chair test to work for you.
The rocking chair test allows you to live your life fully and release regret.
Too often, we do not take risks now because the downside seems too scary, but what if the upside totally changed your lifestyle?
What if for the next 50 years, that one decision brought in more money than you could spend?
What if that one decision totally turns your life around?
Then would it be worth it?
I will tell you this much, it is much better to wear out than rust out, and it is much better to have a few cuts and bruises on your way to success by taking a few risks, than it will be to play it safe and settle for a normal, frustrating, meaningless existence.
Sydney Harris said…
Regret for things we did, can be tempered by time; it is regret for things we did not do, that is inconsolable.
Live with Purpose
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