Ask Yourself How and Why

Transcript

Welcome!

I’d like to talk to you about two very important questions to ask yourself how and why.

I was thinking about this yesterday with a CBT client an we ended up coming up with an action plan that involved making a to do list.

I remember this very useful formula that comes from Tony Robbins.

It’s very simple, it’s just this: OPA. Outcome, purpose and action.

When you’re making a to do list it’s not always clear why you’re doing the thing and that can sometimes leave it to seem like it’s not that important.

If you don’t know why you’re doing something you might not do it in the correct way.

So I remember Tony Robbins gives this example of going to lunch with his son.

So the outcome is having lunch with his son. The purpose is spending quality time. Being focused and present and enjoying his son’s presence. Helping him if he has problems and giving him his best side.

So the action is simply to call up his son or go to the appointment to meet his son for lunch.

If he hadn’t thought about that purpose, maybe he would phone it in so to speak.

Maybe he would go and meet his son and he wouldn’t be aware of the purpose and maybe he wouldn’t be present with his son which is actually the whole reason he was doing it in the first place.

Writing it down on the page sometimes we can forget these things. It’s also the fact that when we write a to do list we might not know how important something is so if we have it on our list we might just say “Well, I didn’t get to it today.”

If we remember the purpose, have like one two three really good reasons for doing it we will much more likely follow through.

I also like to ask my CBT clients these questions when we make an action plan.

One of them I got from the CBT course that I did with Kain Ramsey. And the question is “who is responsible for this?”

And the answer is almost invariably, me.

Me the person making the action plan. That’s important to remember because if something is important to you and you do not do it, it will not get done.

The other side of that is to ask “Who benefits from this?” and almost all of the time the answer is at least primarily, me.

The person making that action plan.

And so its good to keep that in mind, if you’re going to do something to improve your life. You have that to-do list which is just blank, maybe just a list of tasks looking like a shopping list and you don’t have that depth of purpose.

You don’t have that reminder that you’re doing that for you.

But when you do, you will do them with more focus. And you will do them with a certain energy or lust for life.

What our teacher guru Michael’s “chijivisha” that supreme will to live, will to grow and will to be the best that you can be.

I said the other question was how. Outcome purpose, action. You want that action plan, which things are you going to do?

I mentioned Kain Ramsey, this also comes from his CBT course and I’m suspecting he probably picked it up in NLP stuff, maybe Tony Robbins or some other NLP source.

He talks about chunking up and chunking down. If we ask ourselves, what is the purpose and we can discover our deeper motivations and find out why something is important to us.

When we ask ourselves how are we going to do it, how specifically we can find out the practical steps and break it down into things we can do today.

What is some dream that you want to achieve? Maybe you have a very abstract vision of it.

Why do you want to do it?

Maybe you have the concept of starting a charitable organization or going out to feed the homeless in your spare time.

Or calling up a friend and maybe it passes through your mind and you let it slip. Maybe it doesn’t, maybe you ask yourself “why is it important to call up this good friend?”

To make human connection, to find out how he’s going with the mutual benefit of happiness for both of is.

How am I gonna do it?

A specific timeline so today at 6:30 I’ll pick up the phone or instant messenger. Let’s face it this is the 21st century and I’ll type in that message and say “Hey brother, how have you been? Are you well? I want to share these wonderful things about my life and found out what’s going on. Are you good? Do you need emotional support or is there anything I can do to make sure your life more complete?”

So we can move forward in this world together, more connected and continuing to explore the beauty of this universe.

Thank you for asking those questions for when you wanna do something. Thank you for asking why do I want to do it, what is the greater purpose, what is the need it will fulfill in myself and others?

Thank you for asking how can I do this, how can I make this practical? How can I set a timeline to make it something specific and achievable. Realistic so I can begin to get it done.

So I can begin to change the world for the better.

Thank you so much for listening. Have a wonderful blessed day and I’ll talk to you soon.