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The Magic of Thinking Big

Written by: Jamie Smart

Article Overview: Many people focus their attention in business on trying to avoid failure. They often manage this, but miss the opportunity to do something amazing in the process. This article explains why it is more fulfilling to focus on what's possible, and gives techniques for accomplishing this.

The Magic of Thinking Big

The other day, someone recommended a book to me by David Schwartz, called “The Magic of Thinking Big”. I loved the title, and immediately went out and bought it. I haven’t finished it yet, but its central message really resonates with me, and with something I once read by Michele Lisenbury Christensen. She said that one of her biggest mistakes in business was trying to avoid failure.

I could really identify with this, because when I first started Salad, I was terrified of making a mistake. It took a tremendous leap of faith to even use the name ‘Salad’ because it was so different to everything else out there. Almost without exception, whenever I’ve been having difficulties in my business, it’s been because I’ve been trying to avoid failure instead of go for what’s possible. Why is this?

Neurology is goal-seeking
Human neurology is goal-seeking, and negation is handled by the unconscious mind in a different way to how it’s handled in language. When someone says that they don’t want to fail in some way, we understand consciously what that means. But the message they are sending to their unconscious is still one of failure (to even understand the concept of failure a person has to make an internal representation of it, and this is what the unconscious then uses to organise around).

1) If there is something you’ve been trying to avoid (failure, rejection, poor results of some sort), re-state what you want as a positive.

From “I want to lose weight” to “I want to be slim”
From “I want to get out of debt” to “I want to be financially solvent”
From “I don’t want to lose this deal” to “I want to close this deal”

I know this is basic, but I’m still amazed at the number of NLP-trained people I hear saying what they don’t want instead of what they do.

When I first learned this, it was a real a-ha moment, and I shifted all my goals from being stated in the negative to being stated in the positive. So far so good, and on one level this made a really big difference. But on another level, I was still trying to avoid failure, and had just found a different way of talking about it.

See, my ‘positive’ goals had still been defined in relation to what I didn’t want.

The conscious mind is comfortable with the concept and the energy of avoiding failure. In business, I spent lots of energy getting people booked on trainings because I was afraid of running a training with not enough people on it. In my personal life, I focused on sorting out my finances because I was afraid of being in debt.

Fear can be a useful motivator (often referred to as an ‘away-from’ strategy), but it is not a useful focus for one’s life. Some of the wealthiest people I know, people who have vast personal fortunes, live in fear of poverty. Their happiness is index-linked!

The way to get out of this trap is to set a goal that is much bigger than avoiding failure; to create a vision that is so inspiring that, even if it seems impossible, it still lights your fire.

To achieve a goal like this, you need to let go of conscious control and trust your unconscious.

I once heard Tom Peters (business guru) say “One of my favourite quotes is by Mario Andretti who said “If you feel like you’re in control, you’re not going fast enough””.

This also applies to business and life. If you orient around avoiding failure, you’re conscious mind gets to feel like it’s in control, but the results are typically uninspiring. To quote Michele “The instant we set our intention on what could be instead of what we want to avoid, we embark on a spiritual adventure”.

For me, the spiritual adventure means trusting your unconscious. Check these out:

From “I want to lose weight” to “I want to be slim, fit & vibrantly healthy. I want to look great naked, and feel fantastic, full of energy and life.”

From “I want to get out of debt” to “I want to be fabulously wealthy, with an abundance of all the good things in life, and making enormous contributions to the world.”

From “I don’t want to lose this deal” to “I want to create amazing business relationships that create genuine value for my delighted clients, and be handsomely rewarded for it.”

2) If there’s an area of life where you’ve been trying to avoid failure, stop and ask yourself “What could be? What would inspire me? What would make me excited, take my breath away, and get me to jump out of bed in the morning?

When I first learned about goal-setting, I was told that they have to be realistic. I disagree. I insist that the big goals in my life be unrealistic. That makes it so much more enjoyable when they show up!

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Related Forum Posts
Re: What is one of your favorite sales and marketing book? - Great post. I love biographies. My favorite book is The Magic of Thinking Big. It's such a quick, easy read. But the big take away message is you should dream big because most people don't bother to dream big and actually try big. The book cites the example of a job posting for an executive position gets far fewer responses than a job for a mid level manager or a mailroom clerk. So Dream Big & Do Big because most people won't. Off to get the Zappos book.
Re: Entrepreneur Heroes Trading Cards - How is this project going? If you could turn the cards into a game like Magic-The Gathering you might hit the jackpot!
Re: Marketing blog - designing logos, brands etc - This is an excellent thread. I appreciate the helpful links. I particularly enjoyed the link to Vector Magic.
Re: Apologizing for my absence, and an update... - Apology accepted and thank once again for reviewing my copy of [i:3v8lr26m]Offline Cash Magic[/i:3v8lr26m] report
Update on profiles to come - Here is a list of the upcoming entrepreneurs that we will be featuring. Thank you Kevin for the feedback! Vera Wang Magic Johnson Joyce Hall Wayne Huizenga Martin Lindstrom (Toblerone) Peter van Stolk (Jones Soda)


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