Self effectiveness, wealth, health: Questions are the answer?

I have recently been reading Awaken the Giant Within by Anthony Robbins. I'm only half way through it. In my personal opinion, an excellent book!

There are many concepts and theories that if implemented in earnest, I believe will yield tremendous results. Well, I'm not that effective yet. I am taking once concept and practicing it until it becomes a habit and then move on to the next. It may take longer, but I'm confident I'll be a better person for it.

The one thing that struck me like a ton of bricks was the section about questions. The use of questions is an extremely powerful tool. Asking yourself empowering questions will most definitely yield empowering answers, empowering you to act. Ask yourself disempowering questions, you get disempowering answers.

I recently began trying this concept. I was asking questions like "Why is this situation so bleak? What caused this situation to become so dire?". The reason was because I wanted to seek an answer in order to resolve an issue in an effective manner. I realized that these questions were good in this instance. However, I realized the limiting effects. I needed to act and propel myself and those around me to the next level of effectiveness, which is not about what went wrong and what needed to be fixed, but rather how to induce massive change to turn a bleak situation around. I began asking questions like "What can I learn from this?", "What do I need to do to exceed the customer's expectations?". Simple as it may seem, I got an answer that allowed me to excel and push the boundaries from problem resolution (which may please the customer) to delighting the customer by not only fixing the problem, but also going further in achieving substantial progress on exceeding the customers requests.

I am also asking more empowering questions about wealth and health. Instead of asking questions like "I'd like to be rich. How should I achieve it?", I ask "What do I need to do to create tremendous value for my customers in order to truly delight their expectation?", "What do I need to do to achieve financial abundance through passive income so that I can provide for those around me and help those in need?". I link my empowering question to a pleasurable need. In this case, my question and need for financial abundance is linked to my need to provide for those around me and those in need, which gives me happiness. I find that if I do not link the empowering question to a pleasurable need, the question loses its appeal and the answers seem mediocre.

I am a person who believes in simplicity. The simpler a concept, the easier to practice, the more you will achieve. Using this technique with writing (as posted in my earlier posts), you will realize that the activities you write will be empowering ones, in line with your goals.

Recently, I was tempted to buy a camera with 10 megapixels capability. I was close to buying one. Then I began asking myself, "Do I really need one now?", "What do I need to do to achieve financial abundance in order to provide for those around me and those in need?". Suddenly, my desire for the camera dissipated. I would still want to buy one, but not now. There are more things I can do with the cash like investing for a better return, which will help me achieve the answers to the questions of financial abundance. Only then will I reconsider buying the camera.

Try it. Go on writing (as stated in my earlier posts). Ask yourself empowering questions every day, every hour, every bleak or difficult moment you encounter. Let me know if it works for you.

I will be writing more about the system I use beyond simply writing. I will share about how to make the activities time bound and other effective techniques in managing your time in future posts.

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Copyright Bernard Ong, 2006.
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