Nurture Your Dreams

Do something. If it doesn't work, do something else. No idea is too crazy.
Jim Hightower, The New York Times, March 9, 1986

It’s so absurd today how many people in the early days mocked ideas that have changed the world ever since those ideas were realized. They were touted as ridiculous and crazy. Many authors of these crazy ideas have even been scorned at because their ideas were impossible. How many among us have been laughed at for lack of “realistic” ideas and for having silly thoughts about what we hope to become, what we hope to achieve or what we hope to produce in hopes of simply making our lives better or to achieve greatness? We fell many times at the first or second step of our strides toward achieving our goals simply because we were so discouraged by what other people might say about our ideas. “I wish to become a successful entrepreneur, but I don’t have a university degree. I don’t even know how to sell.” You’d recognize these people everywhere! They are the I-wish-to-but type. How typical.

I am reminded here of the way a child grows up with what we call diminishing dreams. You know this. As a child, one is so fascinated about airplanes. A child can’t quite get used to the sight of that giant steel bird hovering over the sky. The child eagerly wanted to own one when he grows up. But the “realities” of life slowly creep in to his life as he grow up and as he gradually becomes so accustomed to life’s norms he gives up all his enthusiasm to one day buy his own plane. Why? As he grows up he is being taught that he needed to go to school to earn enough for himself, to pay for the bills and to feed the family. Seeing dad had to toil everyday just to bring the bacon to the table everyday the child saw a trend and saw the “realities” of his dream slowly transform to become just another dream. His overall paradigm about life has already become one that is very much like every adult’s.

Nurturing your dreams
Even small dreams are seeds of greatness. They don’t have to die out simply because other people think that your dreams are ridiculous or impossible. Consider these:

• Before airplanes were built, the idea of a flying machine was ridiculous. More so was the idea of man one day flying through the air by these machines.
• When the airplane was at last realized, someone thought it had no military significance.
• A great inventor once said that man will never reach the moon “…regardless of any future advancement in technology”.
• Thomas Edison’s light bulb was deemed impractical.
  
  

I can go on forever with a list of silly thoughts about man’s achievements before they were realized. But the point that I would like for you to take away from here is that small dreams are grand schemes of thought that need to be nurtured to grow big enough to compel one to act. Every great thing started with one small idea. Take a moment to think about what I just said. EVERY GREAT THING STARTED WITH ONE SMALL IDEA. Ideas are one of the inevitable keys of personal success.

If you just had that “a-hah!” instant right now don’t waste any moment. Write it down this very second before it slips your mind later. Ideas are sometimes sneaky. They’d flash through like a slide show that you’d forget any detail of the picture you just saw. Here’s how you should nurture your dream.

1. If an idea, however small that may be, hits you and you feel that the idea is really something, think it through several times until you start to feel your heart racing at the thought of realizing that idea.
2. Write it down. I can’t emphasize enough the importance of having a pen and a small notebook handy.
3. Outline the tentative description of how you are going to attain this idea. At this point you don’t have to be very specific. You can write down the applicable steps of how to realize this idea after the next two steps.
4. Read out loud several times what you just wrote until it feels like a drum is forcing it to your brain. Let it stick. Let it catch fire inside your head.
5. Now go back to the mental exercise described in How To Make Desire Even More Powerful. Make the mental picture of your idea perfect. Make it three dimensional that you could almost touch it.
6. Write down the specific action plan to realize this goal and start right away. Remember the saying “Strike while the iron is hot”?
   
   

By doing these steps you are watering the seeds of greatness. As you can see I didn’t point out any specific “small” idea anywhere in this post as only you know that. And remember, just as a wildfire devouring acres and acres of land covered with dry grass and trees started with a small spark, so are our ideas.

Up next we’ll take a look at why people fail.

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Marry this with Desire to effectively make things go your way

Is your desire already white hot that you’re now ready to act towards achieving it? Is it already so vivid in your mind that you could almost touch it? Is your engine revving up to make you run towards it?

So you’ve already laid out your action plans. You’ve created visual images of the thing that you so desire and you regularly check on it mentally to keep your mind focused on it. Almost instantly you’d start to feel that you are eventually going to have it. You know it’s yours for the taking! Now that’s a firm conviction no one can take away from you. You now have belief. What is it? How essential is belief in achieving any goal?

Belief is a mental process which is synonymous to faith and expectation. Belief is an assumption of things as truth. With belief you expect the most likely thing to happen in the future as a result of your actions. You believe, for example, that you will get a better job when you graduate from college than when you don’t. So you go to college, expecting to achieve what you believe is true, that is, that you’re going to have a finer job at some corporation seeking the best university produce like the one you’re going to be. Of course, belief, as it is widely held today, is anchored on instances that have previously happened, as in the case of college graduates landing better careers than those who dropped out. Well, at least, that’s what our parents and teachers told us. (But then we saw what happened to Bill Gates when he dropped out – he built an empire. Now we start to believe in something else.)

While it is true that a college education is important as it shapes the world that we live in so we could have doctors, engineers, teachers and other professionals who make our world a better place to live in, it is not a pre-requisite to attaining success in whatever endeavor that we wish to succeed. Remember Mr. Barnes? He desired to work with Edison and he believed he could. And because he believed, he did eventually work with Edison.

Belief is so powerful that it empowers many people to make things happen, but also brings many people to a halt while on their way to attaining their goal. “Established” beliefs are turning many of us off to discontinue pursuing our dreams. Beliefs such as just because one is poor one can’t have the best things in life or just because one doesn’t have a college degree he can’t build an empire turns many average people off. These are socially-induced beliefs. But, however established those beliefs are, you have the power to change them.

Stop for a while and think about what I just said.

You have the power to change your belief. You have the power.

Just exercise that power enough and you’ll inevitably attain what you want. All you need to do is to learn how to program your mind to make it instantly believe that success will be yours.

The power of mental programming
When you have a goal, believe that you are going to achieve it. In fact, you must act as if you already own it. Remember, the brain works towards its most current dominant thought and “whatever the mind can conceive the body can achieve.”

Let’s take a look again at one of the examples that I previously gave about the sales manager who wanted to own a house at a posh neighborhood that he chose. He didn’t have that house yet at that time. He did not even have a car yet. Those were just figments of his mind. Yet he believed he could achieve his goal. He believed no one can ever stop him. He believed it so much that he carried himself as if he already had those things he so coveted. He would borrow his friend’s car and drive around that neighborhood and he would even enter into one of the open houses just to feel his goal. He did that regularly until he finally bought one of the posh houses…and his own car. He programmed his mind so that he believed that he already had his goals. Another thing to point out here is that he turned believing into a habit.

So each time you think about your goal, believe that you’ll have it by programming your mind to think as if you already have it. Here’s how:

1. Clear your mind before finally thinking about your goal.
2. Focus your mind on your goal, visualize and describe it in your mind clearly, define the shape and color, make it very clear that you can almost touch it.
3. Do some role playing if you have to like what that the sales manager did – he felt his goal.
4. See yourself as someone who already owns your goal. Think that you already achieved your goal. You already have it.
5. Do this everyday. I can’t emphasize this enough. Set a specific time for doing this each day. In fact, do this whenever you can. Make it a habit. MAKE BELIEVING A HABIT.

Each time you want something believe that you are going to have it. Train your mind to accept it as something that is already true. Carry yourself as if you already have it. Do this constantly. Make believing that you’re going to achieve what you want a habit. Remember that just like any other habits, good or bad, they are formed after a couple of days of being exercised. Why not make believing in attaining something that you want your best habit?

Belief is a very powerful mental process. Use it to become powerful. You want to become successful, don’t you? Ask those who already are. They’ve capitalized on it.

Up next, we’ll discuss why you shouldn’t let other people turn you off whenever an idea, however simple and small it may be, hits you.

How To Make Desire Even More Powerful

Do you ever wonder how incredibly successful people influence things that they inevitably go their way? Now that’s power! What is one of the many attributes that sets them apart from all the rest? Before these super success magnates achieved stellar status they were no different from all the rest, really. In fact, a lot of them started from nothing. Remember Mr. Barnes? All they invariably had was the persistent desire to achieve what they wanted and then turned their desire into something tangible. They made things happen. But were their desires ordinary desires at the beginning? Not at all! Their desires were huge desires. In fact, their desires have become their obsession. Their goals or desires were so exact and vivid in their heads that they could almost touch it. (From here on I will be using the terms desire and goal interchangeably.) These are the super successful people’s attributes that set them apart from people who merely dreamed – they had a definite and strong desire to reach their goals. The exactness and strength of any desire are what made people act. Just how exact and strong is your desire to compel you to really willfully act upon it?

The brain works towards its most current dominant thought

Just how exact and burning is your desire or your goal? Let’s take a look at a classic example based on the book The Silva Mind Control Method of Mental Dynamics by Jose Silva and Burt Goldman which I will recount here in my own terms.

Suppose it’s a hot summer afternoon and you’re thirsty but you are seated comfortably on your lazy boy and you’re in the middle of watching a very exciting game on TV. I’d bet you wouldn’t so much as move an inch to get a glass of cool, refreshing water from the fridge a couple of feet away from you. Now in this example the goal is pretty much clear – a glass of ice-cold water. But you put off taking one because a more urgent need is at hand – not wanting to miss a moment of the game you’ve been waiting. The latter desire is greater than the former. But suppose we intensify the desire by describing how bad your thirst for water was. Suppose it’s the same time of the day. You’re watching the same game. But your throat is so parched as if a pail of hot dry sand from the Sahara has been poured into your mouth. Now, that’s intense, isn’t it? Screw the game! This time I’d bet that because your thirst is so bad you’d crash trough walls to get that coveted glass of ice-cold refreshing water, right?

So, you see, a strong and urgent desire is key to action.

How do you blow up or strengthen your desire to motivate you to act?

Begin with the end in mind. That’s what Stephen Covey taught as one of the seven habits of highly effective people. I couldn’t agree more. Every action starts with a goal. So now you have a goal that you’d want to achieve, how do you strengthen your desire to motivate yourself to act? Here’s how.

• Above all, know specifically what you want. A few years back a friend of mine who sells life insurance told me that when he was just starting out his goal was to buy his first car out of selling life insurance in six months! Six months! He kept at it and in five months and 21 days he bought his first car.
• Write down your goal because you could sidetrack. If you want a car in six months, write it down and write down the model, make and color of the car. Write down specifically how your goal looks like.
• Create mental and visual pictures of your goal. Make it a perfect mental and visual picture. Another life insurance agent who, at her first year in selling life insurance, wanted to make it to the convention for top producing agents to be held in Las Vegas, Nevada, which was just a couple of months ahead. To keep her eyes on the goal, she downloaded pictures of Las Vegas and set them as wallpaper on her laptop. She stared at those pictures each day. Eventually, she made it to the convention. You could do this mentally as well. But first, write down on a piece of paper your goal. Each day for a couple of minutes (at least 10 minutes is best) go to your room, close your eyes and create mental pictures of, say for example again, a car. See yourself standing next to your coveted car. Imagine touching its shinning red hood. Imagine getting inside, feeling everything inside it. Make it vivid. Make it alive. (With this exercise I always experience my heart racing and my palms sweating in anticipation of achieving my goal. I suppose I’ve successfully created mental pictures that my body start to feel weird as if I am actually experiencing my goal.)
• Go out of your way and experience the actual goal. Here’s another story of a very successful sales manager. When he was just starting out all he wanted was to buy a nice house in a posh neighborhood. Once a week, he’d borrow a car from a friend, drive to his dream neighborhood with his wife and he would actually walk around the neighborhood and get inside one of the model houses. He actually experienced his goal. After closing several sales he got the coveted house in that same neighborhood and his own car.
• Write down your daily, weekly and monthly action plans to achieve your goal and keep at it! Write down a detailed plan of execution. For example, the only means by which you can achieve your goal is to sell more of whatever you are selling to buy your first car, plan how many, say for example, life insurance policies must you sell each day, each week, each month to earn the net commission you need to buy the car. Write down how many people you need to see in order to get the number of sales you need to close to attain your goal. Remember, not planning at all is planning to fail.
• Don’t procrastinate! Start right away! As soon as you have set down your plans execute them right away. The blacksmith does not strike the iron when it’s cold. You could loose your enthusiasm if you put off executing your plans. (More on enthusiasm later.) In the immortal words of Nike - “Just do it.” And do it now!
• Focus! Each day go back to your written plans, cut-out pictures and mental visions of your goal and contemplate about it at least twice a day to keep that flaming desire burning intensely. Think about it vividly at least 10 minutes a day. Dream about it. Always make your desire white hot! Don’t let it cool down!
  

I urge you to read again and again these very helpful tips on how to intensify any desire and put them to use right away. You can be an overnight sensation in your endeavor for all you know. If not, expect to become a hit within 100 days!

For more on intensifying and creating vivid mental pictures of your desires read The Silva Mind Control Method of Mental Dynamics by Jose Silva and Burt Goldman.

Up next, we’ll take a look at a mental state that if added to desire will turn you into a human dynamo ready to turn you into an overnight sensation.

Use This Power To Make Things Happen

Dream girl, dream boy, dream house, dream job, dream car, dream vacation, dream wedding…I can go on with a list of dreams forever. Whatever it is that we dream of and no matter how many or how little those dreams are the most pressing problem for almost everyone is how to achieve those dreams that they often times drop out at the third stride upon seeing how long and tedious the journey would be towards achieving them. “I can’t become a company president.” “I can’t get a job. I don’t have a college degree.” “I can’t swim.” “I can’t sell.” The world is full of it. Ironically, what these objections really mean are the opposite – “I want to become a company president.” “I want a good job.” “I want to swim the ocean.” “I want to sell something.” It’s so sad that just as our enthusiasm start to build up as we contemplate about our dreams or goals, potential hindrances get in the way almost instantly.

Yes, the desire to get what we want in life has always been there with us. But the question really is “Just how big and definite is that desire?” Is the desire huge and definite enough to influence us to really, really, really go for it despite the obstacles? Just how much do you want to translate your desire into reality?

To follow, without halt, one’s aim: There's the secret of success. - Ana Pavlova

Desire is the seat of all power. It’s the ultimate key to personal success. With desire

• wars were waged to conquer a coveted land or a coveted seat in the monarchy or government
• people set out to build empires
• successful people make things happen

To illustrate just how powerful desire is let me recount in my own words an inspiring story about a man who desired to work with Thomas Edison based on the book Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill.

Edwin C. Barnes was, in the words of Thomas Edison himself “…like an ordinary Tramp.” Barnes was a commoner with a common desire to work with a prominent person. But what set him apart from people who merely desired was that his desire was definite. It was clear to him what he wanted. He didn’t want to work for Edison – he wanted to work with him. But before he set out to achieve his goal two adversaries stood in his way. First, he did not know Edison nor did Edison know him. Second, Barnes did not have enough money to pay for the train that would take him to Orange, New Jersey where Edison was at the time. But did these difficulties discourage Barnes to carry out his desire? No. He did set out to meet Edison and worked with him, eventually. You see, at first, although Edison saw that Barnes had made up his mind to stand by until he succeeded and that he gave him the opportunity to get what he asked for, Barnes worked for Edison for a minimum wage. Yet, nothing stopped Barnes in achieving the coveted goal of working with Edison. He persisted until opportunity presented itself one day and Barnes, on the prowl, seized it instantaneously! After Edison perfected the Edison Dictating Machine, his salesmen did not warm up to it. Barnes saw gold when everyone else saw crap. He knew he could sell the machine. And sell he did with passion and great enthusiasm, keeping an eye on his goal. He sold it so successfully that Edison gave him a contract of distributorship with the entire US his for the taking! His business association with Edison not only made him wealthy, he inevitably achieved his goal of working with Edison.

With a clear and persistent desire Barnes got what he wanted despite the many hindrances that could have dispirited him at first step. He turned his desire into a reality. He made things happen! Do you think you could do the same? Don’t you dare think that Barnes’ success story is like nothing else. You know so well as much as I do that the world is full of such stories. Now, sit for a while and know exactly what you want. Make it clear and make it specific.

Strong desire is an essential motivation to all successful people. If desire makes things happen for many successful people why shouldn’t it make things happen for you? Because unlike Mr. Barnes, our desires most of the time are not definite and burning enough.

What is it that you really so strongly and definitely desire?

To learn more about how to realize your potential, I urge you to read Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. It’s one of the all-time best sellers out that there that has helped countless of super achievers make it to the top of the game.

Up next we’ll uncover how to blow up any desire and make it definite enough to launch a personal mission to even take on the world.

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Charlemagne's Main

About nine years ago (guess my age, but that’s not the point here) someone asked me about how I got my name. He asked me whether I knew its origin and its meaning. “Well, here we go again. Do I have to get this each time I introduce myself?” I thought with a little resentment. Of course I know everything about my name. With confidence I told him that I knew the origin of my name (that my dad just picked it up from a dictionary the night I was born because it sounded nice) and that I knew its meaning. I told him that Charlemagne means Charles the Great. Whereupon, he smiled and simply said that one statement that hit me like nothing else, “You should live up to your name.” What he said floored me. It struck me hard that since then I pondered upon it each time I remember those words. No one told me that before. It gets me each time. He sounded like he was commanding me to really “live up” to my name as if my life hinges on my name.

Ever since I can remember I’ve been asked about my name a million times before and have been even asked how to pronounce it. “That’s Shar-le-main, and, no, it’s not a girl’s name.” Darn! Until that time I was so proud of my name. I knew its meaning and even knew its proper pronunciation even before pre-school. But I never consciously knew what it really meant until that instance. But after that incident, I can honestly say that I wish I had a different name like Paul or James or John or any other common name not attributed to or that literally means greatness. Not that I hated my name. I love every letter of it. But I’m just a regular guy and now I’m not sure if I should still have this name. Since then I’ve introduced myself as just Charlie.

Yup, I’m just a regular guy. I’m not hugely successful (although I’ve had a taste of some modest successes). I’m a regular person who spends most of his day slaving away for someone else waiting for the 15th and the 30th, listens to regular pop music, watches regular primetime TV shows and regular movies that everyone else were watching and goes to Church regularly (if you count it as something a regular person does regularly). I’m just a regular person who owns a regular email account. Although it was 10 years ago today that I first used the Internet I remain oblivious to the many changes going on in it (not really). I could easily blend in on any crowd on any given occasion. But mostly, I’m introverted but not perverted. And like most regular guys, I’m someone who’s fascinated about many a great thing that I will accumulate into this single blog which I call Charlemagne’s Main.

So, if I’m just a regular guy, what’s the point of this blog?

I’m not hugely successful. That’s why if there’s anything that I like to talk and read about with awe, passion and enthusiasm, it’s about other people’s successes (and failures and missed opportunities for success). I am forever inspired to read and talk about people who built empires and amassed wealth like Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, Warren Buffet, Peter Lynch, Bill Gates, Frank Bettger, Ben Franklin, Robert Kyosaki and, yes, the Trump! And then some who established stellar fame like, John Lennon, Elvis Presley, Michael Jackson, J K Rowling and of course the immortal Fab Four commonly known as The Beatles. These names have become synonymous to legendary success that anyone who is familiar with them can’t help but reflect about these names with both awe and reverence or with hysterical response. Dare to challenge their historical significance and you’ll have to challenge inevitably the mountains of books written about them!

These men and women’s lives and other people’s success stories are the elusive Holy Grail to many people. But just as scores of unfortunate souls including me remain naïve of how these people became successful in their endeavor, thousands upon thousands have already uncovered and picked up their secrets, well on their way or are already enjoying success in all life’s facets. And because of this I am starting this blog to continuously learn more from these people as I read and write about them.

So, why care about my blog and about what I say?

It’s because this is OUR journey together. While I will not be trying to reinvent any wheel here or start a revolution or perhaps try to reform time-honored ideas, I am merely going to discuss about

• other people’s achievements
• some insights about topics like how to make money and anything about our jobs
• personal success and development
• motivation
• improving inter-personal relationships
• some of my two cents worth mainly based on time-tested success building concepts
• some current events perhaps
  

A word of caution here, though; don’t listen to me. I do not claim to be a success coach nor do I claim that the ideas and lessons underscored here are original. I may of course include some personal thoughts based on personal experiences and studies. But please, listen to the experts and learn from the stories that I’ll be quoting here! And this is not just about success with money, this is about success in all life’s aspects.

And since this is OUR journey together, I encourage you to participate, comment and share something of value to us and I promise you that we will learn together. I can think of this as my personal journal for reference on how to become successful or to keep abreast with the times OR you can think of this as your own.

To start our journey, in my next post we’ll discuss about the seat of all power. No, we are not going to be religious or sacrilegious about this one. We’ll simply discuss about that one thing to start this all.

Let the journey begin.