The Genie we all have inside us is awaiting our instructions and ready to grant our every wish. Of course, if it were this easy we would all live in castles and zip around on magic carpets. If you're not where you want to be in life, what commands are you giving your Genie?Your Three Wishes
Want to change your life? Here's
quick answer: pay closer attention to your thoughts and
instructions you give your Genie. If that sounds too simple, just grab your magic lamp and read on...
Sometimes we think what we say to ourselves doesn't matter, that these are just random or fleeting thoughts. The fact is, what you say to yourself (your Genie) really does matter and it will determine your fate for
day, this week... your entire life.
Where can you find this Genie? He is your subconscious mind. And here's
rub: we don't have an option as to whether or not we give him instructions. He pays attention to our every thought. Our only point of control is
type of instructions we provide.
If you're thinking, "Life sucks. This is really lousy," your Genie hears that. You may not think he is effected by this negative self-talk, but Genie takes it all in and attempts to give you what you have requested. He is very disciplined that way. The trouble is... he's not real good at deciphering moods, doubts, and fears. In fact, your Genie has no reasoning capabilities whatsoever. That is your domain. His only job is to obey your commands.
When you tell yourself "today is going to be a bad day because that's
way my 'luck' runs," your Genie hears that and says, "Okay... I have received your wish... here is your bad day!" Of course, you didn't mean for him to take that literally, and you may not have even realized you used up a wish when you had that thought.
I Hear You
Think about
last time you balled up a wad of paper and threw it across
room into
trash can. Bull's eye! It felt so good to make a shot of that distance with deadly accuracy that you decided to do it again. This time you give it some thought. That little nagging part of your brain you thought was asleep starts telling you, "That first shot was luck. You can't do that again." And sure enough, your next shot bounces off
rim onto
floor. You immediately spring up and grab
wad of paper, not dropping it in
trash, but taking it back to
spot from where you missed to try again. It's
Trash Can Game and we've all played it. It's also an excellent example of Genie executing
commands we provide him.
We must be very careful what we tell ourselves because our Genie–as wonderful as he is–cannot distinguish our real intent. Everything we say passes to him without going through any filters. We may tell ourselves, "This is stupid. I'm not going to try very hard to do my best because I'll probably fail anyway." Our intent may have been to give ourselves a cushion to fall back on just in case we didn't do as well as we hoped. The trouble with giving ourselves that 'out' is that Genie will do everything in his power to grant our request of failure. He is undermining our ultimate desire to be
best we can be. He doesn't mean to do this, of course, he is just following
orders we gave him.
Thinking is Creating
Everything you see in
space you are now in was once a thought in someone's mind. The chair you are sitting in;
car you drive;
television you watch. None of these would exist had they not originated in
mind of their creator. The thing to recognize is that we are all creators. We are
creators of our own destiny,
authors of our own story.
The story I created for my life, up until I was 36 years old, was that I wasn't very smart. I hated school and couldn't wait to finish my education at age 16. The two decades that followed found me comfortable with that story, if not somewhat unfulfilled. It took me twenty years to realize I had
power to change my life; to write a new chapter, to alter
direction of
story all together. Once I recognized this, I wrote chapters into my life I didn't even think were possible. I went on to complete my graduate work in Education and Human Development at a major university and created a new and fulfilling life for myself.