Author: Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen
Publisher: Berkley Trade
Year Published: 1995
Rating:
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In The Aladdin Factor, Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen of Chicken Soup for the Soul fame lay out a framework for asking for and receiving what you want. You may know Jack Canfield as one of the teachers of The Secret or the Law of Attraction. Unlike with The Secret, The Aladdin Factor isn’t concerned with the metaphysical (for instance, all you have to do is ask the Universe for what you want and wait for it to happen.) Rather, it takes the much more direct approach: become clear about what you want then ask people who have the means to help you to guide you towards your goals.

The book starts with a list of five reasons why people don’t get what they want.

1. Ignorance – Often, people don’t get what they want because they don’t know what to ask for. Perhaps this is due to lack of clarity about what they want, or perhaps they don’t know what’s possible or what resources are available.
2. Limiting beliefs – Our beliefs are a product of the experiences we’ve had with parents, teachers, peers, colleagues, social circles, and the media. In many cases, we hold inaccurate beliefs about what is actually possible based on our previous experiences.
3. Fear – We often let fear hold us back from asking for what we want. Types of fears include fear of rejection, being humiliated, feeling powerless, abandonment, looking like a fool, and so forth.
4. Low self-esteem – Sometimes, we feel unworthy of receiving what we are asking for.
5. Pride – We tend to not want to admit that we need help and support because asking makes us feel inadequate.

The authors offer several exercises to help you become clear about what you want and then have the courage to ask for help. The core foundations include: knowing what you really want, believing you are worthy of receiving what you want, being optimistic and passionate about your desires, taking action in the face of fear, and being persistent.

If you’ve been struggling with achieving your goals, The Aladdin Factor will give you the tools to successfully approach others for help, guidance, and mentorship. As the authors say, “What’s the worst that can happen?” If they say “no,” you are no worse off than when you started. But if they say “yes,” you’re one step closer to achieving your goals.

Financial independence is the American dream, yet for most people it remains elusive. In this 60-minute audio, Brian Tracy provides 21 laws of money that helped him and many of his students go from rags to riches.

Twenty-one laws are a lot to cover in an hour, so no one law is covered in depth. Tracy spends at most two to three minutes per law, gives brief examples of the law in action, and gives you a few tips on how to put these laws to work in your life. Here were my top six takeaways:

1. Decide to become wealthy – To become wealthy, you must overcome your limiting beliefs about money. People become wealthy when they decide to become wealthy – and then take the appropriate action steps. This isn’t merely about visualizing yourself with incredible riches, but deciding you won’t live as you currently are any longer and taking steps to change for the long term.
2. Find ways to create value – Money is the medium through which we exchange goods and services. We work for money, which we then use to purchase stuff. We negotiate the rate our labor is worth, and our customers and employers pay us based on their perceived value of how our work will benefit their companies or personal lives. What you are paid depends on the work you do, how well you do it, and how easy it would be to replace you. If you want to increase your wealth, you must increase the value you provide.
3. Never stop learning – Personal and professional development are critical to increasing your wealth because the more you know, the better you can do your job, the more valuable you become to your customers and employers, and the harder it would be to replace you.
4. Think long term – It is human nature to want instant gratification, but often our short-term objectives conflict with our long-term goals. Successful people are self-disciplined – they can make themselves do what they need to do whether they feel like it our not. They also prioritize focus on activities that will provide the biggest long-term rewards and put them closer to their goals.
5. Save and invest – It’s not how much you make, but how much you keep and what you do with that amount. Successful people live frugally, save at least 10 percent of their paychecks, and make sound investments that will grow and compound over time.
6. Success starts with baby steps – Accomplishing big goals starts with taking small steps each day. At first, getting into the habit of reducing debts, saving, and living frugally may be difficult, but as you make it a habit, it will become easier for you to continue.

The 21 Unbreakable Laws About Money offers a big-picture overview of how successful people look at money and wealth. This isn’t a step-by-step guide, though it is a nice introduction to wealth-building with practical advice that may change how you think about money. For those who want more hands-on training, Tracy pitches a more-expensive “Millionaire Maker” home study course at the end of the CD.

Get the Edge, one of Tony Robbins’ most popular self-help programs, claims to be a seven-day course on how to achieve the life you desire. (Personally, the program took me about 2 weeks to complete.) It is broken into seven daily lectures plus the first week of Robbins’ Personal Power program. You are supposed to listen to Day 1 first, followed by all seven Personal Power lectures, and then continue with Days 2-7. Most lectures run under an hour, but Days 2 and 3 are designed as longer workshops, so Robbins recommends you split them into two sessions each if you can’t spare longer than an hour per day.

Here’s what you can expect from the program:

Hour of Power

At the core of Get The Edge is your “Hour of Power,” an hour (or at least 30 minutes) you set aside each morning to specifically work toward your goals. The first 15 minutes is broken into three main sections: a breathing exercise Robbins teaches along with a series of finger tapping exercises, a period of time where you feel gratitude for what you have as well as visualize everything you desire as if you already have it, and a period of incantations where you tap into your emotional state and repeat specific beliefs (for instance “All I need is within me now.”). According to Robbins, these incantations are more than simply positive thinking – they are designed to be said with emotion so they form impressions on your subconscious mind and overcome the objections of your inner critic. Once you’ve finished the 15 minutes, you’re on your own to exercise for at least 15 minutes with the intention to work yourself up to 45 minutes.

Robbins expects you to make your “Hour of Power” a habit and continue to spend an hour each day reflecting on your life and goals first thing in the morning well after you’ve listened to the full program. He sees it as self coaching – time to reflect on everything you’ve accomplished, be grateful for what you have, and to focus on the baby steps you must do today to take massive action toward your goals.

I’ll be honest – since doing this program, I’ve improvised my Hour of Power. I find Robbins’ breathing/finger tapping exercises and incantations somewhat hokey. Instead, I spend my personal time journaling goals, to-dos and accomplishments, doing a yoga vinyasa, then spending 10-20 minutes meditating. I have made it a point to do this first thing in the morning, and I’m amazed at how much more productive I’ve become.

Seven Day Get the Edge Program

The main lectures of the Get The Edge program are designed to get you motivated to achieve your goals while giving you a crash course in Robbins’ life mastery philosophy. Along with the program, Robbins provides a 90-plus page notebook where you can jot down ideas, do the exercises in the lectures, formulate goals and create your action plan.

Day 1 – Day 1 is mostly a cheerleading lecture where Robbins congratulates you for starting the program and gives you a brief overview of what you’ll learn. The main focus is to figure out where the gaps lie between where you are and where you want to be. While Robbins remains positive throughout the lecture, he is also realistic about how achieving your goals isn’t an instantaneous process – it will take considerable time and effort – but if you identify what you want, review your goals each day, and take consistent action toward those goals, you’ll be well on your way to achieving what you want.

Day 2 – In Day 2, Robbins provides a framework and seven steps for conscious change. Most people never achieve their goals because they have things they “should” do rather than “must” do. Instead, they focus their time and attention on small things that have no bearing on their long-term success. The secret to achieving your goals is to make the decision to commit to achieving your goals, come up with an action plan, then spend time each day working toward your goals.

Day 3 - Robbins devotes Day 3 to relationships. This workshop covers what to do if you’re single and are looking for a mate as well as if you’re in a relationship but wish it could be different. Robbins offers candid advice for analyzing whether your current partner will make a good long-term mate and focuses on being true to yourself.

Skeptics may ask why they might listen to Robbins, a divorced man, on relationship advice. To be fair, Robbins actually addresses his own marital discord and divorce from his first wife, Becky; how he approached dating; and how he met his current wife, Sage, in the program and does so with sincerity. He admits from personal experience that sometimes working things out may prove impossible or may not be for each partner’s best interest, and if that’s the case, you owe it to both of you to move on. Personally, I thought this was one of the stronger discs.

Day 4 – I found Day 4 to be the weakest part of the program, as Robbins has a bizarre understanding of medicine. He rejects the traditional germ theory of disease (aka that tiny microbes cause disease, a theory made popular by Louis Pasteur, elaborated upon by microbiologist Richard Koch, and demonstrated in many peer reviewed scientific experiments since then) in favor of a theory that was popular in the late 1800s.

In other words, Robbins seems to believe you don’t get sick from microbes, you get sick because you overexert yourself, which depletes your body’s energy and therefore shuts down the body’s process of eliminating wastes and toxins. With all those toxins building up, your body goes into “fighting off toxin” mode, and the symptoms you experience are what we call “disease.” Robbins seems to claim that if you want to never experience disease/cancer/viruses/etc., all you need to do is create a healthy environment in your body by reducing stress, exercising and eating healthy. Anyone who has ever gotten food poisoning knows from experience this theory is bunk – it doesn’t matter how healthy you are, if you eat raw shrimp that has been sitting out too long (and therefore has a nice colony of microbes growing on it), you’re going to become violently ill.

Robbins also endorses a fad acid/alkaline diet. He claims by eating more alkaline foods and cutting back on acidic foods, you’ll have more energy. Despite the questionable science this diet is based upon (and the number of “non-accredited” degrees its founder has accumulated from diploma mills according to Wikipedia), the bottom line is that you should eat more vegetables, nuts, grains and seeds – something nutritionists have told us for years.

To be honest, I stopped halfway through this CD because I couldn’t take the BS once he started talking about measuring food energy in megahertz.

Day 5 – In Day 5, Robbins discusses the concept of emotional mastery – specifically, that once we recognize the emotions we are feeling, we can change them to more-positive emotions by changing our perception of the situation or by changing our behavior.

For instance, if we feel someone hurt us, we react in a certain way because we learned to do so through all our past experiences with hurt. We have our own coping and defense mechanisms that when triggered may mean we attack the other person as they’ve hurt us or we seek empathy from our friends who will commiserate about how bad the person who hurt us is.

Instead of running our familiar patterns, Robbins asks us to take a step back and analyze our emotions, because when we master our emotions, we can change our emotional state at will. We are choosing to assign this particular scenario a meaning, and we are choosing to react in the manner we do. But, it’s possible that the meaning we are assigning is incorrect – that person wasn’t trying to hurt us. (This lecture builds upon concepts described in Personal Power 2 and 3.)

Day 6 – Robbins spends Day 6 on creating financial abundance – specifically, how to increase your income by investing in assets that will compound over time. While much of this lecture is Robbins’ rags-to-riches story, the second half is quite useful. He’s a big proponent of saving 10 percent of your income each month, dividing it into three asset buckets: a security bucket that isn’t very risky (bonds, savings accounts, etc.), a growth bucket that is more risky (mutual funds, stocks, real estate), and a dream bucket made up of 1/3 of the profits from your growth assets that you can spend on big ticket items you want. Throughout this session, Robbins repeats his philosophy that wealth starts with emotional mastery and that money alone won’t give you happiness.

Day 7 – Finally, Day 7 is a workshop on finding your purpose in life. In this session, Robbins reminds us to enjoy the process of achieving our goals. Sometimes life events will happen that will be outside our control – what we have control over is how we react to such events. The lecture adds a nice closure to the full program and sends you off on a high note. Hopefully, if you’ve made it this far, you’ll continue working toward your success.

Personal Power Week 1

Included with Robbins’ Get the Edge program are his first seven Personal Power lectures that provide listeners with a crash course in Robbins’ life mastery philosophy. Robbins expects you to listen to all seven CDs after you listen to Day 1 of Get the Edge, and Days 2-7 build on the concepts you’ll learn during these sessions.

Personal Power 1 – In PP1, Robbins reviews the fundamental principles of how to achieve your goals. In it, he stresses that hope won’t change your life – desire, commitment and actions will. Robbins is a big believer of whatever you focus on and put 100 percent effort toward, you’ll improve. Unfortunately, most of us lose sight of our goals when we get caught up in the day-to-day experiences we have that really aren’t so important in the long term. To keep on track, Robbins offers a four-step success model: Decide and be clear on the outcome you’d like, take action to achieve your goals, find ways to measure your results so you notice how close you are to your intended outcome, and finally, if you see you aren’t getting closer to achieving your goals, try a new approach.

Personal Power 2 - In PP2, Robbins drills home the two factors that motivate us: the desire to avoid pain in our lives and the desire to feel pleasure. He offers numerous examples of how these two factors influence what we do each day, such as procrastinating important tasks or not exercising. With each example, Robbins points out how person after person broke with their limiting beliefs and have achieved their goals because they changed their perspective on what activities give them pain vs. pleasure.

Personal Power 3 – In PP2, Robbins talked about how we are either motivated by our desire to avoid pain or seek pleasure. In PP3, he discusses neuroassociations – the meaning we’ve associated with a person, place or event. Fear of pain is what stops most people from taking action, but in many cases, that fear is misplaced. Fear often arises because sometime in our life, we experienced great pain because something happened. Therefore, we’ve linked pain with what we believe caused it (even if that’s not true).

Robbins uses an example of a baby who repeatedly falls off a countertop onto green carpet. Because the baby sees green carpet and experiences pain, the baby may link green carpet to a feeling of pain rather than the act of falling from the countertop ledge.

Robbins suggests we do this with our own experiences (i.e. if a woman was in an abusive relationship, she may link up men = pain or relationships = pain) and offers ways to recognize and break free from false neuroassociations.

Personal Power 4 – Building upon the last 2 lectures, Robbins explains the role of neuroassociations in changing our behavior in PP4. In short, if we want to change, we have to determine what we currently associate with pain and change our perception so that we will enjoy the activities. For instance, if we see exercise as painful, time consuming, and embarrassing, we must find ways to make it fun, exciting and a priority in our daily routine. Like previous talks, Robbins offers numerous examples of people who recognized their limiting beliefs and changed them for the better.

Personal Power 5 – PP5 switches focus to goal setting and why people set goals but never follow through to achieve them. Like with previous talks, Robbins stresses that what we focus on, we will experience and manifest in our lives, but in this lecture he walks listeners through the steps to set goals in all areas of their lives. Once listeners have done the exercises, he helps them narrow their focus to nine that they are absolutely committed to achieving.

Personal Power 6 – PP6 is an introduction to the six human needs. Robbins believes all humans strive to fulfill six basic needs: certainty (to know they have a place to live, food, shelter, money to pay their bills, etc.), variety (things would be boring if you were certain about everything), significance (to feel like you’re special), love and connection, personal growth, and contribution (to family, friends and society). The first four needs can be fulfilled in positive or negative ways, and how we choose to fulfill all our needs directly affects our personal happiness.

Personal Power 7 – Finally, in PP7. Robbins discusses his time-management process, which he calls RPM for Results-focused, Purpose-driven, Massive action plan. Though we may have great intentions when we set goals, it’s easy to get derailed or overwhelmed with so many tasks on our daily to-do lists. Robbins discusses how to prioritize our daily actions so they move us closer to our goals through breaking large tasks into bite sized chunks, creating reasons why we absolutely “must” achieve those goals to keep ourselves motivated, and prioritizing our “musts” so we take some action (no matter how small) each day.

Concluding Thoughts

I found most of the program inspiring and thought provoking. Robbins’ strength is pumping you up and getting you excited to take action. It’s virtually impossible to listen to a lecture without feeling motivated to do something afterward – which is exactly what Robbins tries to drill home: You must take action immediately – not tomorrow, not next week, but right now – so you build momentum.That said, there are a couple of points where he pitches his own products (his coaching programs or live events) or promotes pseudoscience BS (virtually all of the Get the Edge Day 4 CD). I don’t mind the occasional plug of other products, but pitching outdated or fringe models of medicine to support other people’s questionable nutritional supplements seems somewhat shady to me.

For the most part, however, I found the program enjoyable. Before starting the program, I had already committed to a number of changes (exercising more, writing more, losing weight, etc.), so the program gave me that added motivation to make these activities “musts” instead of “shoulds.”

Get The Edge is probably best suited for people already committed to change no matter what it takes. If you only “wish” things could be different, but you don’t resolve to do something about that wish, it will never become reality. This isn’t a magic bullet or genie-in-the-lamp solution. In order to achieve your goals, you must be willing to put in the time and effort. In fact, Robbins is the first person to tell you that most people won’t achieve their goals because they won’t follow through. They’ll do just enough to eliminate some pain in their lives to make the situation tolerable or “just OK” and put up with that because they fear the alternatives that change brings or they feel they “should” rather than “must” change or they feel they can’t change for one reason or another. Rather than live a mediocre life, you are challenged by Robbins to take the necessary steps to create the life you want and live with passion.

Pass It On is a motivational video, in the same vein as The Secret, about manifesting what you want in life. Like The Secret, Pass It On delivers its message through sound bytes with “experts” in the life coaching and motivational speaking industry including Michael Beckwith and John Assaraf from The Secret as well as a host of others like Mark Victor Hansen, Brian Tracy, Lou Ferrigno (The Incredible Hulk), Howard Putnam (former CEO of Southwest Airlines), Denis Waitley, former Congressman Ed Foreman and many others.

When the video begins, we’re taken into the bank of “sustainable abundance” where the dvd’s host, David Corbin, gives us the tour of four vaults which hold the keys to fulfill our dreams. Those four areas are wealth, inspiration, success, and happiness (which cleverly make up the acronym “wish”). However, the experts make it quite clear we can’t “wish” our way to success – it takes hard work. Fortunately for us, they’re here to mentor us to get to where we want to be. Here’s a breakdown of the wisdom contained in the four vaults:

1. Wealth – Greg Reid, the “Millionaire Mentor,” guides us through the vault of wealth where we learn the 6 steps to obtaining wealth: set a goal and visualize what you want, create an action plan, take action, leverage your resources and build a team to help you, create residual income sources, and finally, if we help others get what they want first then we’ll be repaid with wealth and abundance.
2. Inspiration – Scott Evans, the “The Working Inventor,” offers us a process for pursuing a profitable business idea. Ideas start with catalysts or “ah ha” moments that can take place when we least expect it. Once an idea hits us, it’s time to conceptualize it – meaning figure out what you need to do from a marketing/legal/financial/etc perspective to turn it from an idea into reality. Next, you’ll need to commit fully to your dream – is it you’re willing to commit to 100% for the long term? If not, don’t bother starting. You’ll also need capital such as time, money, manpower, creativity, etc and the cooperation of a great team whose strengths and talents you can leverage for maximum results.
3. Success – Greg explains the formula for success, which is comprised of four parts: passion (you must love what you do), talents (you must be good at what you do), action (you must take steps each day towards achieving your goals) and association (you must find other successful people to keep you motivated to achieve).
4. Happiness – Finally, Scott walks us through the steps to living a happy lifestyle. These include being grateful for who you are and what you have, learning to forgive yourself and others, being of service to others, having a strategy for dealing with stress, creating personal time for yourself, and smiling.

Whereas The Secret was about mindset and the Law of Attraction, Pass It On is quite clear that while you do need to plan, set goals, and visualize, you need to take action to achieve what you want. They do mention the Law of Attraction, but the attraction comes when you commit fully to achieving your goal and decide you will do what it takes, no matter what, to get to where you want to be.

That said, many of the graphics and set design in Pass It On are a bit cheesy and low budget. You have the three tour guides standing in what is clearly a 3D graphical environment with cutesy pop up effects whenever they make mention of a bike or flyer or some other prop. Then the video cuts to a succession of experts who all give their 20-second sound byte on the topic with stock images, and occasionally, a video clip, display behind them. Since the speakers are obviously talking in front of a green screen, they will occasionally come across as overenthusiastic rather than conversational.

Is it worth it? I thought it was pretty good – it doesn’t have that much substance, but to be fair, I’ve been listening to a lot of Tony Robbins over the last few weeks and he crams a ton of information into his programs. This was much lighter – though still uplifting and inspirational. If you have something you’ve been putting off, it’s a 90 minute “go do it now” coaching session, if nothing else.

You can watch an 8 minute clip of the movie on their website, www.passitontoday.com, if you’re willing to provide them your name/email/phone number (I have no idea why they need that or if you can expect to receive a call). I’m not sure when the video launched – two dates are mentioned on their site: October 20, 2007 and January 2008 – but their community is pretty non-existent. There aren’t many blogs or forum posts and there doesn’t seem to be any scheduled upcoming events so it doesn’t look like their marketing campaign has been as successful as they probably hoped it would be.

Back from the Edge is part of the Tony Robbins Inner Strength Films with psychotherapist Cloe Madanes in which Tony coaches members of the audience to break free of their fears and take control of their lives. This particular film is also included in Tony Robbins’ Ultimate Relationship Program (which I have not seen).

During a conference of about 4000 participants, Paul stands up and reveals he’s thinking of leaving his wife, Jennifer, who is also an audience member. For the last two years, Paul has been threatening to leave Jennifer, a stay-at-home mom with a biting sense of humor and strong extended family support. Tony learns that Jen’s sister and brother-in-law, Janet and Brian, are also in the audience and asks them for insight into the couple’s problems.

From them, Tony learns that Paul and Jen often fight over finances. Paul feels insignificant because Jen often receives financial help from her family. Also, because Jen has such intense love for her kids and family, Paul feels he’s not her #1 priority to receive her love. To regain power in the relationship, Paul threatens to leave. Jen comforts herself by seeking support, love, and stability from her family, kids and food.

Tony works with Paul and Jennifer to uncover which of their 6 basic needs (certainty, variety, significance, connection/love, growth, and contribution) are not being met in their relationship, and specifically how the couple is meeting their top two needs outside of their relationship. Initially, Paul’s #1 need is significance while Jen’s is certainty. As Tony coaches the couple, he gives them new tools and strategies for laying down their weapons, reconnecting with one another, and allowing themselves to love one another again.

As Tony talks with the couple, Cloe summarizes the couple’s problems and communication patterns while offering questions and exercises for viewers to ask themselves about their own relationships. She focuses on how couples can better satisfy one another’s top human needs.

This video is a fantastic overview of how to create a loving, committed, sustainable relationship. Couples in any stage of their relationship can pick up strategies for deeper connection. The video will also help couples who are struggling to communicate with one another and wonder if they can ever reconnect again. When Paul first stood up, he seemed to be making one last ditch effort to save his doomed relationship. By realizing one another’s needs and learning new ways to communicate with one another, Paul and Jen were able work out their differences and make a renewed commitment to one another. In their 6 month follow up, Paul and Jen are incredibly happy together.

The 33 page downloadable workbook that accompanies the video offers a 3 step process for couples to meet one another’s needs. Specifically, they must:

1. Discover their partner’s top 3 needs in order of priority
2. Discover their partner’s rules for what has to happen in order for those needs to be met. In other words, how will they know if their needs are being met?
3. Give and evaluate. What does their partner look like when his or her needs are being met?

The workbook also offers exercises so couples can evaluate how their needs are being met when they are upset or angry with their partners and walks couples through conflict resolution strategies so they can commit more fully to one another.

Check out Anthony Robbins’ Inner Strength Films!

Negotiating Conflict is part of the Tony Robbins Inner Strength Films with psychotherapist Cloe Madanes in which Tony coaches members of the audience to break free of their fears and take control of their lives.

This particular film was especially powerful because it took place during a 2 day leadership conference in Hawaii on 9/11/2001. The conference brought together 2000 individuals from about 40 different countries (including 100 New Yorkers) and everyone had different reactions to what had happened around 3am Hawaii time. Some were crying. Some had lost loved ones or businesses in the attack. Some saw it as no big deal – as this type of thing happens in their country all the time. Some were celebrating, calling the attack “retribution”. Others were fighting amongst themselves.

Tony had considered canceling the day’s events but instead chose to support those who needed it while addressing different reactions and trying to defuse destructive emotions. He focused on the topic of emotional mastery and how each audience member had the ability to choose how they reacted to the day’s events – specifically, how they answered the following questions: Who needs help? What should be done right now? What’s in my control? What can I do right now?

Initially, Tony worked with the entire audience, asking members to share how they were feeling. One woman revealed how she had been uncertain about whether she wanted to marry her fiancé. After the first day at the conference, she left her fiancé a voicemail saying she was now committed to marrying him. He got the voicemail at work – on the 101 floor of one of the towers – and contacted her to say goodbye. Incredibly, though the woman was extremely sad, she learned how important it was to live life fully and offered a message of hope.

After hearing from various audience members, Tony turned his focus to a smaller group of New Yorkers and showed how their reaction to the day’s events mirrored how they reacted to other events in their lives. One woman ran a hospital department and was overcome with guilt that she wasn’t in NY helping out. Another woman who was filled with anger only saw a bleak future and couldn’t see how any good or hope could come out of it. A third woman could only mourn after she called everyone she knew to make sure they were safe. Tony showed how their reactions to this time of crisis mimic how they react to lesser events.

Finally, Tony worked one on one with two men: Asad, a Muslim, and Bernie, a NY Orthodox Jew. The process was designed to set up indirect negotiation between two people of opposing views, so as one would talk directly to Tony, the other would observe him and write down exactly what he said. Then, their roles were switched. Tony reframed their questions from how to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to internal questions they could control. He asked each why this issue was important to them and how they could resolve the conflict internally.

As Tony coached audience members through the difficult day, Cloe explained Tony’s intervention and negotiation methodologies and offered tips for how viewers could use these methodologies in their own lives.

This is a great video for leaders who find themselves in the middle of dueling world views or need to take a leadership role during a tragic event (ie a natural disaster) or shocking news (ie sudden death of a loved one, a business crisis). Tony’s strategies help individuals to defuse destructive emotions like blame, anger and hopelessness by focusing on the issues within their control – specifically, their emotional reactions, what the issue means to them, personally, and what they can do to make a difference. In Asad and Bernie’s case, the two created an organization to help Jews and Muslims understand one anther and make peace rather than violence.

The dvd comes with a downloadable 29 page workbook that serves as a reflection for how you’ve handled shocking news in the past and can act as an action plan for leaders in time of crisis or conflict.

Check out Anthony Robbins’ Inner Strength Films!

One of Tony Robbins’ lesser known projects is his powerful series of Inner Strength Films with psychotherapist Cloe Madanes. Each video was filmed during one of Tony Robbins’ conferences where a member of the audience stood up and revealed a major problem they were having. During the intervention, Tony uncovers the heart of the audience member’s problem and works with them to break free from their fears and limiting behaviors. Throughout the videos, Cloe provides voiceovers explaining why Tony uses the words and actions he does and offers advice to viewers about how they can put Tony’s suggestions into action in their own lives.

In Conquering Overwhelming Loss, Jim stands up and admits he’s thinking of suicide. Jim was a successful business man who lost everything in a matter of a few days because of a bad investment. To make things worse, he not only lost his own money, he lost a large amount of a dear friend’s life savings as well. Unable to live with his guilt, he set up his friend as the beneficiary of his life insurance policy and has been contemplating ways to kill himself so she will get her money back.

Tony’s first step is to get Jim to see that suicide is not the answer he’s been craving. When Tony first talks with him, he is extremely harsh – his only goal is to make Jim see that suicide is not the answer. Tony explains that if Jim kills himself, his life insurance company won’t pay, despite what he thinks. He then switches focus to the guilt his friend will feel if she knows Jim killed himself for her. He also brings up Jim’s mother and others in Jim’s life that value his life over his money and tries to show Jim that by killing himself, he’s not making a sacrifice but hurting those he loves.

Once Tony gets Jim to see that suicide isn’t an easy out, he digs deeper to uncover the psychological roots of Jim’s problem. Because of his business failure, Jim feels he’s lost his identity – his business and work had previously defined how he saw himself. Tony goes through the 6 human needs (certainty, variety, significance, connection/love, growth, and contribution) and points out that like many men, Jim’s primary need is for significance. He needs others to see him as a successful business man who makes great contributions to the world.

As Tony and Jim talk, Cloe explains the process for Tony’s intervention including the 7 steps Tony will address for Jim to create a compelling future. She also describes why Jim has been clinging to despair and that even though despair is destructive, it fills each of the 6 human needs so it’s difficult to break free from.

This is a fantastic video for anyone lost in despair or hopelessness – or for families of people trapped in despair. Jim’s raw emotion comes through as he first becomes mad at Tony, gradually starts to regain trust, sees that suicide is not the answer, and finally considers other options to take responsibility for his life, pay off his debts, and start a new business. At the end of the video, Tony sits down with Jim one year later, and Jim’s life has completely changed for the better.

The dvd comes with a downloadable 36 page workbook that offers cliff notes on Tony’s 6 human needs and how they affect relationships as well as exercises to put Tony’s steps for creating a compelling future into practice.

Check out Anthony Robbins’ Inner Strength Films!

Author: Joe Vitale
Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
Year Published: 2005
Rating:
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Joe Vitale is known as a pretty heavy hitter in copywriting and personal development circles. He’s written 17 books, including some on marketing for the American Management Association and the American Marketing Association, as well as a ton of ebooks. With those kind of credentials, you may be a bit surprised to hear that The Attractor Factor is not about direct response or marketing ROI or blogging or any other buzzword you’ve heard recently but on ‘spiritual marketing.’

Spiritual marketing focuses on you. It’s about taking responsibility for where you are at this stage of your life, clarifying what you want, and letting go of those negative beliefs that are holding you back. Know thyself and focus on the good, not the bad, and you’ll soon start seeing life in a much more positive and fulfilling way. That is, follow your passions and the money will follow.

To give you an example from the book, Scrully Blotnick conducted a study of 1500 people some years ago. Category A, made up of 1245 people, said they would pursue money first and then do what they wanted later. Category B, made up of 255 people, said they would seek their interests first and trust that money would follow. Twenty years later, there were 101 millionaires. 100 came from Category B and only 1 from Category A.

So where does spirituality come into play? Vitale takes an Eastern approach when he says

Spirituality is about taking full responsibility for whatever occurs in your life. Good or bad, it has all come to you from you. Joseph Murphy used to say your life is an out-picturing of your inner picture.

Before you write this off as just some new age mumbo jumbo that can’t possibly help you, think about it this way. Americans are starving for meaning in their lives. According to Daniel Pink’s book, A Whole New Mind, more than half of American medical schools now have courses in spirituality and health and the number of Americans that practice yoga has doubled to 15 million since 1999. People are starting to choose happiness over money. And that’s Vitale’s point. He says

the shortcut to creating the life the way you want it: Be happy now. That’s it. If you can be happy right now, in this moment, you will have achieved whatever you want. Why? Because underneath everything you say you want is the desire for happiness.

For those that need some hand holding to get to that point, Vitale offers a 5 step program, to which he devotes the bulk of the book. These steps are:

1. Know what you don’t want
2. Select what you do want
3. Clear all negative or limiting beliefs
4. Feel what it would be like to have, do, or be what you want
5. Let go as you act on your intuitive impulses and allow the results to manifest.

What you’re not doing is setting steadfast goals that you must attain no matter what. Instead, you replace goals with intentions – visions of where you’d like to be in the future – and let your unconscious mind guide you to your destination… or something better. This requires that you take the time to flesh out what exactly it is that you want and imagine yourself fully immersed in that lifestyle. The hardest part of the equation is that once you are clear on what you want, you need to detach yourself from the outcome.

I think of attachment in Buddhist terms. When you’re attached to something, your happiness depends on it (something or someone outside yourself that you have no control of) rather than on you (which you have complete control over). The key to being happy, though, is to just be happy – even if you don’t get what you want. Most likely, you’ll end up with something just as good, or better.

To put it differently, Stephen Shapiro, author of Goal Free Living, recently conducted a study of 1310 people. Of those that took the online survey 73% answered ‘strongly agree’ or ‘agree’ to the statement ‘I get disappointed when I am unsuccessful in achieving the result I pursue.’ Disappointment only leads to unhappiness, and then you’re right back to where you started – giving into all those negative thoughts again.

Vitale is a master storyteller, so much of the book consists of personal anecdotes – how he came to believe the way he does, what it has meant for him and those around him, and how others have responded to his philosophy. The stories sound sincere and quite motivational, although at the end, we learn that one major character lost his way and ended up spiraling out of control, destroying a few lives in the process. That was somewhat of a disappointment for me, given that he was painted in such a positive light throughout the book.

There is also an extensive reference section at the end of the book for those looking for additional resources and home study courses, many of which are authored or co-authored by Vitale.

I found the book to be a fast, inspiring read that I’d recommend to anyone who feels stuck and can’t quite leap over the barrier in front of them. It’s also great if you’re on the fence about making a major decision and aren’t sure which direction to go. By completing some of the exercises, you’ll learn a lot about yourself and by the end, you’ll be much clearer on what you want out of life.

Jon Gordon may not be one of the gurus in The Secret, but that hasn’t stopped him from writing this business parable about how one guy used the law of attraction to turn his life around.

George is downright miserable. His home life is in shambles. He’s got a major product launch in two weeks that must go well or he will lose his job. And to top it off, his car’s in the shop for the next two weeks, leaving George no other option but to take the bus to work each day. Could things get worse?

Luckily for George, the bus isn’t just any old bus. It’s driven by an upbeat lady named Joy and contains a colorful array of passengers determined to infuse positive optimism in George’s life. Each day, they impart a new rule to spark George’s passions and push him out of his funk. Each day, as George learns these new ways of thinking, he takes a step towards changing his beliefs – and his life.

The rules are simple yet are life altering. Rule #1 states

“Always remember that you are the driver of your bus. It’s the most important of the rules because if you don’t take responsibility for your life and control of your bus then you can’t take it where you want to go. If you’re not the driver, then you’ll always be at the whim of everyone else’s travel plans.”

The rest of the rules build upon this one.

The story is similar to Steve Farber’s The Radical Edge. It’s a quick, motivational read focused around getting you to think positively and use the law of attraction in your business life. Gordon provides an 11 step action plan to help you focus and offers bus tickets on his site TheEnergyBus.com to help you get others on board with your vision. You can even print out motivational posters to inspire you.

If you’re looking for a quick dose of inspiration, check it out. You’ll be smiling by the end. Buy from Amazon.com

Best known for his Chicken Soup for the Soul franchise of books, Jack Canfield is a well known motivational speaker and success coach. Most recently, he’s one of the official teachers of The Secret home study course.

In The Success Principles, Jack Canfield shifts from his “ask… believe… achieve” philosophy of The Secret to focus on taking action. He quotes motivational philosopher Jim Rohn and says

“You can’t hire someone else to do your push-ups for you.”" You must do them yourself if you are to get any value out of them. Whether it is exercising, stretching, meditating, reading, studying, learning a new language, creating a mastermind group, setting measurable goals, visualizing success, repeating affirmations, or practicing a new skill, you are going to have to do it. No one else can do these things for you. I will give you the road map, but you will have to drive the car. I will teach you the principles, but you will have to apply them. If you choose to put in the effort, I promise you the rewards will be will worth it.”

It’s nice to see Canfield shift from some of the fluff of The Secret and provide some hard, actionable advice. In fact, the title of chapter one explains that it’s up to you to take 100% responsibility for your life. You’re not entitled to a great life. It’s up to you to create the life you want – and that means taking responsibility for everything in your life from the quality of your relationships, your health, your finances and your feelings. Canfield even tells us “this is not easy” and “if you keep on doing what you’ve always done, you’ll keep on getting what you’ve always got.” If only that was mentioned in The Secret.

In the next few chapters, Canfield walks you through crafting a life’s purpose, becoming clear on what it is you want, believing in yourself, and learning to set goals. One of Canfield’s keys to success is visualization. He quotes a number of professional athletes who visualize their performance perfectly before they get out there and play. If you aren’t sure what to do, he provides clear instructions on adding sounds and feelings, using printed pictures, and using vision boards.

It’s not until Chapter 12 when Canfield first mentions the law of attraction – and even then, it’s a passing reference to explain how one must “act as if” it’s impossible to fail. Or in other words, have confidence and believe in yourself that you’ll make it. But in Chapter 13, he is quick to explain that “talk is cheap” and “nothing happens until you take action.”

Canfield’s book is divided into seven sections: The Fundamentals of Success, Transform Yourself for Success, Build Your Success Team, Create Successful Relationships, Success and Money, and Success Starts Now. The book is massive, coming in at around 450 pages and 64 chapters, but it is well worth reading. This is the missing manual to The Secret that discusses how to overcome your fears, being persistent – even in the face of failure, not denying bad situations, embracing change, and dealing with your inner critic.

Canfield is primarily a motivational coach, so this book is primarily concerned with mindset and how we hold ourselves back. As an executive coach once said to me, “The quickest way to learn about all your inner demons is to start your own business.” Any small business owner soon learns just how much they have to learn – and what weaknesses they have to face – in order just to stay afloat. It happened to me, and I see it with my own clients.

This book is a great overview of the soft skills involved in running a successful business or getting ahead in your career. This isn’t a how to on crafting a successful business plan or ways to market your business, but a primer on mastering yourself, mastering relationships you have with your team, your vendors, your mentors and our clients, and keeping control of your finances. Buy from Amazon.com