Making of a Jedi Warrior

this is the second agreement
dont take anything personally

14 minutes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aFQ5LIOnH4



The third agreement is don't make assumptions.

http://www.universe-people.com/english/svetelna_knihovna/htm/en/en_kniha_the_four_agreements.htm

"We have the tendency to make assumptions about everything. The problem with making assumptions is that we believe they are the truth. We could swear they are real. We make assumptions about what others are doing or thinking — we take it personally — then we blame them and react by sending emotional poison with our word. That is why whenever we make assumptions, we're asking for problems. We make an assumption, we misunderstand, we take it personally, and we end up creating a whole big drama for nothing.

All the sadness and drama you have lived in your life was rooted in making assumptions and taking things personally. Take a moment to consider the truth of this statement. The whole world of control between humans is about making assumptions and taking things personally. Our whole dream of hell is based on that.

We create a lot of emotional poison just by making assumptions and taking it personally, because usually we start gossiping about our assumptions. Remember, gossiping is the way we communicate to each other in the dream of hell and transfer poison to one another. Because we are afraid to ask for clarification, we make assumptions, and believe we are right about the assumptions; then we defend our assumptions and try to make someone else wrong.

It is always better to ask questions than to make an assumption, because assumptions set us up for suffering.

The big mitote in the human mind creates a lot of chaos which causes us to misinterpret everything and misunderstand everything. We only see what we want to see and hear what we want to hear. We don't perceive things the way they are. We have the habit of dreaming with no basis in reality. We literally dream things up in our imaginations. Because we don't understand something, we make an assumption about the meaning, and when the truth comes out, the bubble of our dream pops and we find out it was not what we thought it was at all.

An example: You are walking in the mall, and you see a person you like. That person turns to you and smiles, and then walks away. You can make a lot of assumptions just because of this one experience. With these assumptions you can create a whole fantasy. And you really want to believe this fantasy and make it real. A whole dream begins to form just from your assumptions, and you can believe, "Oh, this person really likes me." In your mind a whole relationship begins from that. Maybe you even get married in this fantasyland. But the fantasy is in your mind, in your personal dream.

Making assumptions in our relationships is really asking for problems. Often we make the assumption that our partners know what we think and that we don't have to say what we want. We assume they are going to do what we want, because they know us so well. If they don't do what we assume they should do, we feel so hurt and say, "You should have known."

Another example: You decide to get married, and you make the assumption that your partner sees marriage the same way that you do. Then you live together and you find out this is not true. This creates a lot of conflict, but you still don't try to clarify your feelings about marriage. The husband comes home from work and the wife is mad, and the husband doesn't know why. Maybe it's because the wife made an assumption. Without telling him what she wants, she makes an assumption that he knows her so well, that he knows what she wants, as if he can read her mind. She gets so upset because he fails to meet her expectations. Making assumptions in relationships leads to a lot of fights, a lot of difficulties, a lot of misunderstandings with people we supposedly love.

In any kind of relationship we can make the assumption that others know what we think, and we don't have to say what we want. They are going to do what we want because they know us so well. If they don't do what we want, what we assume they should do, we feel hurt and think, "How could you do that ? You should know." Again, we make the assumption that the other person knows what we want. A whole drama is created because we make this assumption and then put more assumptions on top of it.

It is very interesting how the human mind works. We have the need to justify everything, to explain and understand everything, in order to feel safe. We have millions of questions that need answers because there are so many things that the reasoning mind cannot explain. It is not important if the answer is correct; just the answer itself makes us feel safe. This is why we make assumptions.

If others tell us something, we make assumptions, and if they don't tell us something we make assumptions to fulfill our need to know and to replace the need to communicate. Even if we hear something and we don't understand, we make assumptions about what it means and then believe the assumptions. We make all sorts of assumptions because we don't have the courage to ask questions. These assumptions are made so fast and unconsciously most of the time because we have agreements to communicate this way. We have agreed that it is not safe to ask questions; we have agreed that if people love us, they should know what we want or how we feel. When we believe something we assume we are right about it to the point that we will destroy relationships in order to defend our position.

We make the assumption that everyone sees life the way we do. We assume that others think the way we think, feel the way we feel, judge the way we judge, and abuse the way we abuse. This is the biggest assumption that humans make. And this is why we have a fear of being ourselves around others. Because we think everyone else will judge us, victimize us, abuse us, and blame us as we do ourselves. So even before others have a chance to reject us, we have already rejected ourselves. That is the way the human mind works.

We also make assumptions about ourselves, and this creates a lot of inner conflict. "I think I am able to do this." You make this assumption, for instance, then you discover you aren't able to do it. You overestimate or underestimate yourself because you haven't taken the time to ask yourself questions and to answer them. Perhaps you need to gather more facts about a particular situation. Or maybe you need to stop lying to yourself about what you truly want.

Often when you go into a relationship with someone you like, you have to justify why you like that person. You only see what you want to see and you deny there are things you don't like about that person. You lie to yourself just to make yourself right. Then you make assumptions, and one of the assumptions is "My love will change this person." But this is not true. Your love will not change anybody. If others change, it's because they want to change, not because you can change them. Then something happens between the two of you, and you get hurt. Suddenly you see what you didn't want to see before, only now it is amplified by your emotional poison. Now you have to justify your emotional pain and blame them for your choices.

We don't need to justify love; it is there or not there. Real love is accepting other people the way they are without trying to change them. If we try to change them, this means we don't really like them. Of course, if you decide to live with someone, if you make that agreement, it is always better to make that agreement with someone who is exactly the way you want him or her to be. Find someone whom you don't have to change at all. It is much easier to find someone who is already the way you want him or her to be, instead of trying to change that person. Also, that person must love you just the way you are, so he or she doesn't have to change you at all. If others feel they have to change you, that means they really don't love you just the way you are. So why be with someone if you're not the way he or she wants you to be ?

We have to be what we are, so we don't have to present a false image. If you love me the way I am, "Okay, take me." If you don't love me the way I am, "Okay, bye-bye. Find someone else." It may sound harsh, but this kind of communication means the personal agreements we make with others are clear and impeccable.

Just imagine the day that you stop making assumptions with your partner and eventually with everyone else in your life. Your way of communicating will change completely, and your relationships will no longer suffer from conflicts created by mistaken assumptions.

The way to keep yourself from making assumptions is to ask questions. Make sure the communication is clear. If you don't understand, ask. Have the courage to ask questions until you are clear as you can be, and even then do not assume you know all there is to know about a given situation. Once you hear the answer, you will not have to make assumptions because you will know the truth.

Also, find your voice to ask for what you want. Everybody has the right to tell you no or yes, but you always have the right to ask. Likewise, everybody has the right to ask you, and you have the right to say yes or no.

If you don't understand something, it is better for you to ask and be clear, instead of making an assumption. The day you stop making assumptions you will communicate cleanly and clearly, free of emotional poison. Without making assumptions your word becomes impeccable.

With clear communication, all of your relationships will change, not only with your partner, but with everyone else. You won't need to make assumptions because everything becomes so clear. This is what I want; this is what you want. If we communicate in this way, our word becomes impeccable. If all humans could communicate in this way, with impeccability of the word, there would be no wars, no violence, no misunderstandings. All human problems would be resolved if we could just have good, clear communication.

This, then, is the Third Agreement: Don't make assumptions. Just saying this sounds easy, but I understand that it is difficult to do. It is difficult because we so often do exactly the opposite. We have all these habits and routines that we are not even aware of. Becoming aware of these habits and understanding the importance of this agreement is the first step. But understanding its importance is not enough. Information or an idea is merely the seed in your mind. What will really make the difference is action.

Taking the action over and over again strengthens your will, nurtures the seed, and establishes a solid foundation for the new habit to grow. After many repetitions these new agreements will become second nature, and you will see how the magic of your word transforms you from a black magician into a white magician.

A white magician uses the word for creation, giving, sharing, and loving. By making this one agreement a habit, your whole life will be completely transformed.

When you transform your whole dream, magic just happens in your life. What you need comes to you easily because spirit moves freely through you. This is the mastery of intent, the mastery of the spirit, the mastery of love, the mastery of gratitude, and the mastery of life. This is the goal of the Toltec. This is the path to personal freedom."

THE FOURTH AGREEMENT
Always Do Your Best


There is just one more agreement, but it's the one that allows the other three to become deeply ingrained habits. The fourth agreement is about the action of the first three: Always do your best.

Under any circumstance, always do your best, no more and no less. But keep in mind that your best is never going to be the same from one moment to the next. Everything is alive and changing all the time, so your best will sometimes be high quality, and other times it will not be as good. When you wake up refreshed and energized in the morning, your best will be better than when you are tired at night. Your best will be different when you are healthy as opposed to sick, or sober as opposed to drunk. Your best will depend on whether you are feeling wonderful and happy, or upset, angry, or jealous.

In your everyday moods your best can change from one moment to another, from one hour to the next, from one day to another. Your best will also change over time. As you build the habit of the four new agreements, your best will become better than it used to be.

Regardless of the quality, keep doing your best — no more and no less than your best. If you try too hard to do more than your best, you will spend more energy than is needed and in the end your best will not be enough. When you overdo, you deplete your body and go against yourself, and it will take you longer to accomplish your goal. But if you do less than your best, you subject yourself to frustrations, self-judgment, guilt, and regrets.

Just do your best — in any circumstance in your life. It doesn't matter if you are sick or tired, if you always do your best there is no way you can judge yourself. And if you don't judge yourself there is no way you are going to suffer from guilt, blame, and self-punishment. By always doing your best, you will break a big spell that you have been under.

There was a man who wanted to transcend his suffering so he went to a Buddhist temple to find a Master to help him. He went to the Master and asked, "Master, if I meditate four hours a day, how long will it take me to transcend ?"

The Master looked at him and said, "If you meditate four hours a day, perhaps you will transcend in ten years."

Thinking he could do better the man then said, "Oh, Master, what if I meditated eight hours a day, how long will it take me to transcend ?"

The Master looked at him and said, "If you meditate eight hours a day, perhaps you will transcend in twenty years."

"But why will it take me longer if I meditate more ?" the man asked.

The Master replied, "You are not here to sacrifice your joy or your life. You are here to live, to be happy, and to love. If you can do your best in two hours of meditation, but you spend eight hours instead, you will only grow tired, miss the point, and you won't enjoy your life. Do your best, and perhaps you will learn that no matter how long you meditate, you can live, love, and be happy."

Doing your best, you are going to live your life intensely. You are going to be productive, you are going to be good to yourself, because you will be giving yourself to your family, to your community, to everything. But it is the action that is going to make you feel intensely happy. When you always do your best, you take action. Doing your best is taking the action because you love it, not because you're expecting a reward. Most people do exactly the opposite: They only take action when they expect a reward, and they don't enjoy the action. And that's the reason why they don't do their best.

For example, most people go to work every day just thinking of payday, and the money they will get from the work they are doing. They can hardly wait for Friday or Saturday, whatever day they receive their money and can take time off. They are working for the reward, and as a result they resist work. They try to avoid the action and it becomes more difficult, and they don't do their best.

They work so hard all week long, suffering the work, suffering the action, not because they like to, but because they feel they have to. They have to work because they have to pay the rent, because they have to support their family. They have all that frustration, and when they do receive their money they are unhappy. They have two days to rest, to do what they want to do, and what do they do ? They try to escape. They get drunk because they don't like themselves. They don't like their life. There are many ways that we hurt ourselves when we don't like who we are.

On the other hand, if you take action just for the sake of doing it, without expecting a reward, you will find that you enjoy every action you do. Rewards will come, but you are not attached to the reward. You can even get more than you would have imagined for yourself without expecting a reward. If we like what we do, if we always do our best, then we are really enjoying life. We are having fun, we don't get bored, we don't have frustrations.

When you do your best, you don't give the Judge the opportunity to find you guilty or to blame you. If you have done your best and the Judge tries to judge you according to your Book of Laws, you've got the answer: "I did my best." There are no regrets. That is why we always do our best. It is not an easy agreement to keep, but this agreement is really going to set you free.

When you do your best you learn to accept yourself. But you have to be aware and learn from your mistakes. Learning from your mistakes means you practice, look honestly at the results, and keep practicing. This increases your awareness.

Doing your best really doesn't feel like work because you enjoy whatever you are doing. You know you're doing your best when you are enjoying the action or doing it in a way that will not have negative repercussions for you. You do your best because you want to do it, not because you have to do it, not because you are trying to please the Judge, and not because you are trying to please other people.

If you take action because you have to, then there is no way you are going to do your best. Then it is better not to do it. No, you do your best because doing your best all the time makes you so happy. When you are doing your best just for the pleasure of doing it, you are taking action because you enjoy the action.

Action is about living fully. Inaction is the way that we deny life. Inaction is sitting in front of the television every day for years because you are afraid to be alive and to take the risk of expressing what you are. Expressing what you are is taking action. You can have many great ideas in your head, but what makes the difference is the action. Without action upon an idea, there will be no manifestation, no results, and no reward.

A good example of this comes from the story about Forrest Gump. He didn't have great ideas, but he took action. He was happy because he always did his best at whatever he did. He was richly rewarded without expecting any reward at all. Taking action is being alive. It's taking the risk to go out and express your dream. This is different than imposing your dream on someone else, because everyone has the right to express his or her dream.

Doing your best is a great habit to have. I do my best in everything I do and feel. Doing my best has become a ritual in my life because I made the choice to make it a ritual. It's a belief like any other belief that I choose. I make everything a ritual, and I always do my best. Taking a shower is a ritual for me, and with that action I tell my body how much I love it. I feel and enjoy the water on my body. I do my best to fulfill the needs of my body. I do my best to give to my body and to receive what my body gives to me.

In India they perform a ritual called puja. In this ritual, they take idols that represent God in many different forms and bathe them, feed them, and give their love to them. They even chant mantras to these idols. The idol itself is not important. What is important is the way they perform the ritual, the way they say, "I love you, God."

God is life. God is life in action. The best way to say, "I love you, God," is to live your life doing your best. The best way to say, "Thank you, God," is by letting go of the past and living in the present moment, right here and now. Whatever life takes away from you, let it go. When you surrender and let go of the past, you allow yourself to be fully alive in the moment. Letting go of the past means you can enjoy the dream that is happening right now.

If you live in a past dream, you don't enjoy what is happening right now because you will always wish it to be different than it is. There is no time to miss anyone or anything because you are alive. Not enjoying what is happening right now is living in the past and being only half alive. This leads to self-pity, suffering, and tears.

You were born with the right to be happy. You were born with the right to love, to enjoy and to share your love. You are alive, so take your life and enjoy it. Don't resist life passing through you, because that is God passing through you. Just your existence proves the existence of God. Your existence proves the existence of life and energy.

We don't need to know or prove anything. Just to be, to take a risk and enjoy your life, is all that matters. Say no when you want to say no, and yes when you want to say yes. You have the right to be you. You can only be you when you do your best. When you don't do your best you are denying yourself the right to be you. That's a seed that you should really nurture in your mind. You don't need knowledge or great philosophical concepts. You don't need the acceptance of others. You express your own divinity by being alive and by loving yourself and others. It is an expression of God to say, "Hey, I love you."

The first three agreements will only work if you do your best. Don't expect that you will always be able to be impeccable with your word. Your routine habits are too strong and firmly rooted in your mind. But you can do your best. Don't expect that you will never take anything personally; just do your best. Don't expect that you will never make another assumption, but you can certainly do your best.

By doing your best, the habits of misusing your word, taking things personally, and making assumptions will become weaker and less frequent with time. You don't need to judge yourself, feel guilty, or punish yourself if you cannot keep these agreements. If you're doing your best, you will feel good about yourself even if you still make assumptions, still take things personally, and still are not impeccable with your word.

If you do your best always, over and over again, you will become a master of transformation. Practice makes the master. By doing your best you become a master. Everything you have ever learned, you learned through repetition. You learned to write, to drive, and even to walk by repetition. You are a master of speaking your language because you practiced. Action is what makes the difference.

If you do your best in the search for personal freedom, in the search for self-love, you will discover that it's just a matter of time before you find what you are looking for. It's not about daydreaming or sitting for hours dreaming in meditation. You have to stand up and be a human. You have to honor the man or woman that you are. Respect your body, enjoy your body, love your body, feed, clean, and heal your body. Exercise and do what makes your body feel good. This is a puja to your body, and that is a communion between you and God.

You don't need to worship idols of the Virgin Mary, the Christ, or the Buddha. You can if you want to; if it feels good, do it. Your own body is a manifestation of God, and if you honor your body everything will change for you. When you practice giving love to every part of your body, you plant seeds of love in your mind, and when they grow, you will love, honor, and respect your body immensely.

Every action then becomes a ritual in which you are honoring God. After that, the next step is honoring God with every thought, every emotion, every belief, even what is "right" or "wrong." Every thought becomes a communion with God, and you will live a dream without judgments, victimization, and free of the need to gossip and abuse yourself.

When you honor these four agreements together, there is no way that you will live in hell.

There is no way. If you are impeccable with your word, if you don't take anything personally, if you don't make assumptions, if you always do your best, then you are going to have a beautiful life. You are going to control your life one hundred percent.

The Four Agreements are a summary of the mastery of transformation, one of the masteries of the Toltec. You transform hell into heaven. The dream of the planet is transformed into your personal dream of heaven. The knowledge is there; it's just waiting for you to use it. The Four Agreements are there; you just need to adopt these agreements and respect their meaning and power.

Just do your best to honor these agreements. You can make this agreement today: I choose to honor the Four Agreements. It's so simple and logical that even a child can understand them. But, you must have a very strong will, a very strong will to keep these agreements. Why ? Because wherever we go we find that our path is full of obstacles. Everyone tries to sabotage our commitment to these new agreements, and everything around us is a setup for us to break them. The problem is all the other agreements that are a part of the dream of the planet. They are alive, and they are very strong.

That's why you need to be a great hunter, a great warrior, who can defend these Four Agreements with your life. Your happiness, your freedom, your entire way of living depends on it. The warrior's goal is to transcend this world, to escape from this hell, and never come back. As the Toltecs teach us, the reward is to transcend the human experience of suffering, to become the embodiment of God. That is the reward.

We really need to use every bit of power we have to succeed in keeping these agreements. I didn't expect that I could do it at first. I have fallen many times, but I stood up and kept going. And I fell again, and I kept going. I didn't feel sorry for myself. There was no way that I felt sorry for myself. I said, "If I fall, I am strong enough, I'm intelligent enough, I can do it !" I stood up and kept going. I fell and I kept going and going, and each time it became easier and easier. Yet, in the beginning it was so hard, so difficult.

So if you fall, do not judge. Do not give your Judge the satisfaction of turning you into a victim. No, be tough with yourself. Stand up and make the agreement again. "Okay, I broke my agreement to be impeccable with my word. I will start all over again. I am going to keep the Four Agreements just for today. Today I will be impeccable with my word, I will not take anything personally, I will not make any assumptions, and I am going to do my best."

If you break an agreement, begin again tomorrow, and again the next day. It will be difficult at first, but each day will become easier and easier, until someday you will discover that you are ruling your life with these Four Agreements. And, you will be surprised at the way your life has been transformed.

You don't need to be religious or go to church every day. Your love and self-respect are growing and growing. You can do it. If I did it, you can do it also.

Do not be concerned about the future; keep your attention on today, and stay in the present moment. Just live one day at a time. Always do your best to keep these agreements, and soon it will be easy for you. Today is the beginning of a new dream.

http://www.universe-people.com/english/svetelna_knihovna/htm/en/en_kniha_the_four_agreements.htm

i want to finish with this part of the four agreements and encourage anyone who hasnt read it to click the link and finish the book
theres not a lot more to read

i meant what i said about this book changing my life
no matter if you agree with the description he gives, the functionality of the ideas is very real and very much a part of developing the warrior archetype

"Breaking Old Agreements

Everyone talks about freedom. All around the world different people, different races, different countries are fighting for freedom. But what is freedom ? In America we speak of living in a free country. But are we really free ? Are we free to be who we really are ? The answer is no, we are not free. True freedom has to do with the human spirit — it is the freedom to be who we really are.

Who stops us from being free ? We blame the government, we blame the weather, we blame our parents, we blame religion, we blame God. Who really stops us from being free ? We stop ourselves. What does it really mean to be free ? Sometimes we get married and we say that we lose our freedom, then we get divorced and we are still not free. What stops us ? Why can't we be ourselves ?

We have memories of long ago, when we used to be free and we loved being free, but we have forgotten what freedom really means.

If we see a child who is two or three, perhaps four years old, we find a free human. Why is this human free ? Because this human does whatever he or she wants to do. The human is completely wild. Just like a flower, a tree, or an animal that has not been domesticated — wild ! And if we observe humans who are two years old, we find that most of the time these humans have a big smile on their face and they're having fun. They are exploring the world. They are not afraid to play. They are afraid when they are hurt, when they are hungry, when some of their needs are not met, but they don't worry about the past, don't care about the future, and only live in the present moment.

Very young children are not afraid to express what they feel. They are so loving that if they perceive love, they melt into love. They are not afraid to love at all. That is the description of a normal human being. As children we are not afraid of the future or ashamed of the past. Our normal human tendency is to enjoy life, to play, to explore, to be happy, and to love.

But, what has happened with the adult human ? Why are we so different ? Why are we not wild ? From the point of view of the Victim we can say that something sad happened to us, and from the point of view of the warrior we can say that what happened to us is normal. What has happened is that we have the Book of Law, the big Judge and the Victim who rule our lives. We are no longer free because the Judge, the Victim, and the belief system don't allow us to be who we really are. Once our minds have been programmed with all that garbage, we are no longer happy.

This chain of training from human to human, from generation to generation, is perfectly normal in human society. You don't need to blame your parents for teaching you to be like them. What else could they teach you but what they know ? They did the best they could, and if they abused you, it was due to their own domestication, their own fears, their own beliefs. They had no control over the programming they received, so they couldn't have behaved any differently.

There is no need to blame your parents or anyone who abused you in your life, including yourself. But it is time to stop the abuse. It is time to free yourself of the tyranny of the Judge by changing the foundation of your own agreements. It is time to be free from the role of the Victim.

The real you is still a little child who never grew up. Sometimes that little child comes out when you are having fun or playing, when you feel happy, when you are painting, or writing poetry, or playing the piano, or expressing yourself in some way. These are the happiest moments of your life — when the real you comes out, when you don't care about the past and you don't worry about the future. You are childlike.

But there is something that changes all that: We call them responsibilities. The Judge says, "Wait a second, you are responsible, you have things to do, you have to work, you have to go to school, you have to earn a living." All these responsibilities come to mind. Our face changes and becomes serious again. If you watch children when they are playing adults, you will see their little faces change. "Let's pretend I'm a lawyer," and right away their faces change; the adult face takes over. We go to court and that is the face we see — and that is what we are. We are still children, but we have lost our freedom.

The freedom we are looking for is the freedom to be ourselves, to express ourselves. But if we look at our lives we will see that most of the time we do things just to please others, just to be accepted by others, rather than living our lives to please ourselves. That is what has happened to our freedom. And we see in our society and all the societies around the world, that for every thousand people, nine hundred and ninety-nine are completely domesticated.

The worst part is that most of us are not even aware that we are not free. There is something inside that whispers to us that we are not free, but we do not understand what it is, and why we are not free.

The problem with most people is that they live their lives and never discover that the Judge and the Victim rule their mind, and therefore they don't have a chance to be free. The first step toward personal freedom is awareness. We need to be aware that we are not free in order to be free. We need to be aware of what the problem is in order to solve the problem.

Awareness is always the first step because if you are not aware, there is nothing you can change. If you are not aware that your mind is full of wounds and emotional poison, you cannot begin to clean and heal the wounds and you will continue to suffer.

There is no reason to suffer. With awareness you can rebel and say, "This is enough !" You can look for a way to heal and transform your personal dream. The dream of the planet is just a dream. It is not even real. If you go into the dream and start challenging your beliefs, you will find that most of the beliefs that guided you into the wounded mind are not even true. You will find that you suffered all those years of drama for nothing. Why ? Because the belief system that was put inside your mind is based on lies.

That is why it is important for you to master your own dream; that is why the Toltecs became dream masters. Your life is the manifestation of your dream; it is an art. And you can change your life anytime if you aren't enjoying the dream. Dream masters create a masterpiece of life; they control the dream by making choices. Everything has consequences and a dream master is aware of the consequences.

To be Toltec is a way of life. It is a way of life where there are no leaders and no followers, where you have your own truth and live your own truth. A Toltec becomes wise, becomes wild, and becomes free again.

There are three masteries that lead people to become Toltecs. First is the Mastery of Awareness. This is to be aware of who we really are, with all the possibilities. The second is the Mastery of Transformation — how to change, how to be free of domestication. The third is the Mastery of Intent. Intent from the Toltec point of view is that part of life that makes transformation of energy possible; it is the one living being that seemlessly encompasses all energy, or what we call "God." Intent is life itself; it is unconditional love. The Mastery of Intent is therefore the Mastery of Love.

When we talk about the Toltec path to freedom, we find that they have an entire map for breaking free of domestication. They compare the Judge, the Victim, and the belief system to a parasite that invades the human mind. From the Toltec point of view, all humans who are domesticated are sick. They are sick because there is a parasite that controls the mind and controls the brain. The food for the parasite are the negative emotions that come from fear.

If we look at the description of a parasite, we find that a parasite is a living being who lives off of other living beings, sucking their energy without any useful contribution in return, and hurting their host little by little. The Judge, the Victim, and the belief system fit this description very well. Together they comprise a living being made of psychic or emotional energy, and that energy is alive. Of course it is not material energy, but neither are emotions material energy. Our dreams are not material energy either, but we know they exist.

One function of the brain is to transform material energy into emotional energy. Our brain is the factory of the emotions. And we have said that the main function of the mind is to dream. The Toltecs believe that the parasite — the Judge, the Victim, and the belief system — has control of your mind; it controls your personal dream. The parasite dreams through your mind and lives its life through your body. It survives on the emotions that come from fear, and thrives on drama and suffering.

The freedom we seek is to use our own mind and body, to live our own life, instead of the life of the belief system. When we discover that the mind is controlled by the Judge and the Victim and the real "us" is in the corner, we have just two choices. One choice is to keep living the way we are, to surrender to the Judge and the Victim, to keep living in the dream of the planet. The second choice is to do what we do as children when parents try to domesticate us. We can rebel and say "No !" We can declare a war against the parasite, a war against the Judge and the Victim, a war for our independence, a war for the right to use our own mind and our own brain.

That is why in all the shamanic traditions in America, from Canada to Argentina, people call themselves warriors, because they are in a war against the parasite in the mind. That is the real meaning of a warrior. The warrior is one who rebels against the invasion of the parasite. The warrior rebels and declares a war. But to be a warrior doesn't mean we always win the war; we may win or we may lose, but we always do our best and at least we have a chance to be free again. Choosing this path gives us, at the very least, the dignity of rebellion, and ensures that we will not be the helpless victim of our own whimsical emotions or the poisonous emotions of others. Even if we succumb to the enemy — the parasite — we will not be among those victims who would not fight back.

At best, being a warrior gives us an opportunity to transcend the dream of the planet, and to change our personal dream to a dream that we call heaven. Just like hell, heaven is a place that exists within our mind. It is a place of joy, a place where we are happy, where we are free to love and to be who we really are. We can reach heaven while we are alive; we don't have to wait until we die. God is always present and the kingdom of heaven is everywhere, but first we need to have the eyes and ears to see and hear that truth. We need to be free of the parasite.

The parasite can be compared to a monster with a thousand heads. Every head of the parasite is one of the fears that we have. If we want to be free, we have to destroy the parasite. One solution is to attack the parasite head by head, which means we face each of our fears, one by one. This is a slow process, but it works. Every time we face one of the fears we are a little more free.

A second approach is to stop feeding the parasite. If we don't give the parasite any food, we kill the parasite by starvation. To do this we have to gain control of our emotions, we have to refrain from fueling the emotions that come from fear. This is easy to say, but it is very difficult to do. It is difficult because the Judge and the Victim control our mind.

A third solution is called the initiation of the dead. The initiation of the dead is found in many traditions and esoteric schools around the world. We find it in Egypt, India, Greece, and America. This is a symbolic death which kills the parasite without harming our physical body. When we "die" symbolically the parasite has to die. This is faster than the first two solutions, but it is even more difficult to do. We need a great deal of courage to face the angel of death. We need to be very strong.

Let's take a closer look at each of these solutions.

THE ART OF TRANSFORMATION:
THE DREAM OF THE SECOND ATTENTION

We have learned that the dream you are living now is the result of the outside dream hooking your attention and feeding you all of your beliefs. The process of domestication can be called the dream of the first attention because it was how your attention was used for the first time to create the first dream of your life.

One way to change your beliefs is to focus your attention on all those agreements and beliefs, and change the agreements with yourself. In doing this you are using your attention for the second time, thus creating the dream of the second attention or the new dream.

The difference is that you are no longer innocent. When you were a child this was not true; you didn't have a choice. But you are no longer a child. Now it's up to you to choose what to believe and what not to believe. You can choose to believe in anything, and that includes believing in yourself.

The first step is to become aware of the fog that is in your mind. You must become aware that you are dreaming all the time. Only with awareness do you have the possibility of transforming your dream. If you have the awareness that the whole drama of your life is the result of what you believe, and what you believe is not real, then you can begin to change it. However, to really change your beliefs you need to focus your attention on what it is that you want to change. You have to know which agreements you want to change before you can change them.

So the next step is to develop awareness of all the self-limiting, fear-based beliefs that make you unhappy. You take an inventory of all that you believe, all your agreements, and through this process you begin the transformation. The Toltecs called this the Art of Transformation, and it's a whole mastery. You achieve the Mastery of Transformation by changing the fear-based agreements that make you suffer and reprogramming your own mind, in your own way. One of the ways to do this is to explore and adopt alternative beliefs such as the Four Agreements.

The decision to adopt the Four Agreements is a declaration of war to regain your freedom from the parasite. The Four Agreements offer the possibility of ending the emotional pain, which can open the door for you to enjoy your life and begin a new dream. It's up to you to explore the possibilities of your dream, if you are interested. The Four Agreements were created to assist you in the Art of Transformation, to help you break the limiting agreements, gain more personal power, and become stronger. The stronger you get, the more agreements you can break until the moment comes when you make it to the core of all of those agreements.

Going to the core of those agreements is what I call going into the desert. When you go into the desert you meet your demons face-to-face. After coming out of the desert, all those demons become angels.

Practicing the four new agreements is a big act of power. Breaking the spell of black magic in your mind requires great personal power. Every time you break an agreement, you gain extra power. You start by breaking agreements that are very small and require less power. As those smaller agreements are broken, your personal power will increase until you reach a point when you can finally face the big demons in your mind.

For example, the little girl who was told not to sing is now twenty years old and she still does not sing. One way she can overcome the belief that her voice is ugly is to say, "Okay, I will try to sing, even if I do sing badly." Then she can pretend that someone is clapping and telling her, "Oh ! That was beautiful." This may break the agreement a teeny, tiny bit, but it will still be there. However, now she has a little more power and courage to try again and again until finally she breaks the agreement.

That's one way out of the dream of hell. But for every agreement you break that makes you suffer, you will need to replace it with a new agreement that makes you happy. This will keep the old agreement from coming back. If you occupy the same space with a new agreement, then the old agreement is gone forever and in its place is the new agreement.

There are many strong beliefs in the mind that can make this process look hopeless. This is why you need to go step-by-step and be patient with yourself because this is a slow process. The way you are living now is the result of many years of domestication. You cannot expect to break the domestication in one day. Breaking agreements is very difficult because we put the power of the word (which is the power of our will) into every agreement we have made.

We need the same amount of power to change an agreement. We cannot change an agreement with less power than we used to make the agreement, and almost all our personal power is invested in keeping the agreements we have with ourselves. That's because our agreements are actually like a strong addiction. We are addicted to being the way we are. We are addicted to anger, jealousy, and self-pity. We are addicted to the beliefs that tell us, "I'm not good enough, I'm not intelligent enough. Why even try ? Other people will do it because they're better than me."

All of these old agreements which rule our dream of life are the result of repeating them over and over again. Therefore, to adopt the Four Agreements, you need to put repetition in action. Practicing the new agreements in your life is how your best becomes better. Repetition makes the master.

THE DISCIPLINE OF THE WARRIOR:
CONTROLLING YOUR OWN BEHAVIOR

Imagine that you awake early one morning overflowing with enthusiasm for the day. You feel good. You are happy and have plenty of energy to face the day. Then at breakfast, you have a big fight with your spouse, and a flood of emotion comes out. You get mad, and in the emotion of anger you spend a lot of personal power. After the fight, you feel drained, and you just want to go and cry. In fact, you feel so tired that you go to your room, collapse, and try to recover. You spend the day wrapped up in your emotions. You have no energy to keep going, and you just want to walk away from everything.

Every day we awake with a certain amount of mental, emotional, and physical energy that we spend throughout the day. If we allow our emotions to deplete our energy, we have no energy to change our life or to give to others.

The way you see the world will depend upon the emotions you are feeling. When you are angry, everything around you is wrong, nothing is right. You blame everything including the weather; whether it's raining or the sun is shining, nothing pleases you. When you are sad, everything around you is sad and makes you cry. You see the trees and you feel sad; you see the ram and everything looks so sad. Perhaps you feel vulnerable and have a need to protect yourself because you don't know in what moment someone will attack you. You do not trust anything or anyone around you. This is because you see the world with the eyes of fear !

Imagine that the human mind is the same as your skin. You can touch healthy skin and it feels wonderful. Your skin is made for perception and the sensation of touch is wonderful. Now imagine you have an injury and the skin gets cut and infected. If you touch the infected skin, it is going to hurt, so you try to cover and protect the skin. You will not enjoy being touched because it hurts.

Now imagine that all humans have this skin disease. Nobody can touch each other because it is going to hurt. Everyone has wounds on their skin, so the infection is seen as normal, the pain is also considered normal; we believe we are supposed to be that way.

Can you imagine how we would behave with each other if all the humans in the world had this skin disease ? Of course we would hardly ever hug each other because it would be too painful. So we would need to create a lot of distance between us.

The human mind is exactly like this description of infected skin. Every human has an emotional body completely covered with infected wounds. Each wound is infected with emotional poison — the poison of all the emotions that makes us suffer, such as hate, anger, envy, and sadness. An action of injustice opens a wound in the mind and we react with emotional poison because of the concepts and beliefs we have about injustice and what is fair. The mind is so wounded and full of poison by the process of domestication, that everyone describes the wounded mind as normal. This is considered normal, but I can tell you it is not normal.

We have a dysfunctional dream of the planet, and humans are mentally sick with a disease called fear. The symptoms of the disease are all the emotions that make humans suffer: anger, hate, sadness, envy, and betrayal. When the fear is too great, the reasoning mind begins to fail, and we call this mental illness. Psychotic behavior occurs when the mind is so frightened and the wounds so painful, that it seems better to break contact with the outside world.

If we can see our state of mind as a disease, we find there is a cure. We don't have to suffer any longer. First we need the truth to open the emotional wounds, take the poison out, and heal the wounds completely. How do we do this ? We must forgive those we feel have wronged us, not because they deserve to be forgiven, but because we love our-self so much we don't want to keep paying for the injustice.

Forgiveness is the only way to heal. We can choose to forgive because we feel compassion for ourselves. We can let go of the resentment and declare, "That's enough ! I will no longer be the big Judge that goes against myself. I will no longer beat myself up and abuse myself. I will no longer be the Victim." First, we need to forgive our parents, our brothers, our sisters, our friends, and God. Once you forgive God, you can finally forgive yourself. Once you forgive yourself, the self-rejection in your mind is over. Self-acceptance begins, and the self-love will grow so strong that you will finally accept yourself just the way you are. That's the beginning of the free human. Forgiveness is the key.

You will know you have forgiven someone when you see them and you no longer have an emotional reaction. You will hear the name of the person and you will have no emotional reaction. When someone can touch what used to be a wound and it no longer hurts you, then you know you have truly forgiven.

The truth is like a scalpel. The truth is painful, because it opens all of the wounds which are covered by lies so that we can be healed. These lies are what we call the denial system. It's a good thing we have the denial system, because it allows us to cover our wounds and still function. But once we no longer have any wounds or any poison, we don't need to lie anymore. We don't need the denial system, because a healthy mind, like healthy skin, can be touched without hurting. It's pleasurable for the mind to be touched when it is clean.

The problem with most people is that they lose control of their emotions. It is the emotions that control the behavior of the human, not the human who controls the emotions. When we lose control we say things that we don't want to say, and do things that we don't want to do. That is why it is so important to be impeccable with our word and to become a spiritual warrior. We must learn to control the emotions so we have enough personal power to change our fear-based agreements, escape from hell, and create our own personal heaven.

How are we to become a warrior ? There are certain characteristics of the warrior that are nearly the same around the world. The warrior has awareness. That's very important. We are aware that we are at war, and the war in our minds requires discipline. Not the discipline of a soldier, but the discipline of a warrior. Not the discipline from the outside to tell us what to do and what not to do, but the discipline to be ourselves, no matter what.

The warrior has control. Not control over another human, but control over one's own emotions, control over one's own self. It is when we lose control that we repress the emotions, not when we are in control. The big difference between a warrior and a victim is that the victim represses, and the warrior refrains. Victims repress because they are afraid to show the emotions, afraid to say what they want to say. To refrain is not the same thing as repression. To refrain is to hold the emotions and to express them in the right moment, not before, not later. That is why warriors are impeccable. They have complete control over their own emotions and therefore over their own behavior."

http://www.universe-people.com/english/svetelna_knihovna/htm/en/en_kniha_the_four_agreements.htm

5 minutes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RilT3VDEDo

if you could take a census of all the corpses that pass through the coroners office im guessing that about 70 percent of them would tell you they woke up this morning expecting to fall asleep in their bed later tonight

even people who are not police officers or military

soccer moms and school teachers and graphic designers and bank tellers and accountants

in my personal observation of death i can say that, generally speaking, the only times people really see it coming is when the process lingers so cruelly that the death itself is a release from pain

there is nowhere to run from this reality

step by step as each one is ready, imo and in the opinion of a many other much greater than myself warriors and leaders and philosophers
it is mandatory that we condition ourselves to the reality that we will have the death experience no mater what
and that there really is no way to know when

and in this the idea is to prepare ourselves to face that experience with courage and with dignity

awake
alert
with self control and deliberateness

this is a core pillar of budo

at this point i think ive done what i set out to do with this thread

it was begun with the idea that people who have a dojo or a gym or are a part of the military or the leo community already have a context for learning these things and dont precisely need the topic

i know i went really quickly and thats probably off putting

if theres anything i have missed please feel free to add as you see fit

to anyone who is still reading, thanks!
youre who i was posting for

also i learned a lot in finding these videos and links

i considered this thread to be my means of contribution to totjo and it turned out that i was personally enriched by the experience, and for that i am sincerely grateful

forgot about this

amazing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YT6kSm2hua4

"All the world's roads lead to the heart of the warrior; he plunges unhesitatingly
into the river of passions always flowing through his life.
The warrior knows that he is free to choose his desires, and he makes these
decisions with courage, detachment and - sometimes - with just a touch of madness.
He embraces his passions and enjoys them intensely. He knows that there is no
need to renounce the pleasures of conquest; they are part of life and bring joy to all
those who participate in them.
But he never loses sight of those things that last or of the strong bonds that are
forged over time.

A warrior can distinguish between the transient and the enduring.

A warrior is never predictable.
He might dance down the street on his way to work, gaze into the eyes of a
complete stranger and speak of love at first sight, or else defend an apparently absurd
idea. Warriors allow themselves days like these.
He is not afraid to weep over ancient sorrows or to feel joy at new discoveries.
When he feels that the moment has arrived, he drops everything and goes off on some
long-dreamed-of adventure. When he realises that he can do no more, he abandons the
fight, but never blames himself for having committed a few unexpected acts of folly.
A warrior does not spend his days trying to play the role that others have
chosen for him.

Warriors always keep a certain gleam in their eyes.
They are of this world, they are part of the lives of other people and they set
out on their journey with no saddlebags and no sandals. They are often cowardly.
They do not always make the right decisions.
They suffer over the most trivial things, they have mean thoughts and
sometimes believe they are incapable of growing. They frequently deem themselves
unworthy of any blessing or miracle.
They are not always quite sure what they are doing here. They spend many
sleepless nights, believing that their lives have no meaning

The warrior does not worry that, to others, his behaviour might seem
quite mad.
He talks out loud to himself when he is alone. Someone told him that this is
the best way of communicating with the angels, and so he takes a chance and tries to
make contact.

In the intervals between battles, the warrior rests.
Often he spends whole days doing nothing, because that is what his heart
demands; but his intuition remains alert. He does not commit the capital sin of Sloth,
because he knows where that can lead - to the warm monotony of Sunday afternoons
when time simply passes.
The warrior calls this 'the peace of the cemetery'. He remembers a passage
from Revelation: 'I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot... So then
because thou art lukewarm and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my
mouth.'
A warrior rests and laughs. But he is always alert.

The warrior knows that everyone is afraid of everyone else.
This fear generally manifests itself in two ways: through aggression or through
submission. They are two facets of the same problem.
That is why, whenever he finds himself before someone who fills him with
fear, the warrior reminds himself that the other person has the same insecurities as he
has. He has surmounted similar obstacles and experienced the same problems.
But he knows how to deal with the situation better. Why? Because he uses fear
as an engine, not as a brake.

For the warrior there is no such thing as an impossible love.
He is not intimidated by silence, indifference or rejection. He knows that,
behind the mask of ice that people wear, there beats a heart of fire.
This is why the warrior takes more risks than other people. He is constantly
seeking the love of someone, even if that means often having to hear the word 'No',
returning home defeated and feeling rejected in body and soul.
A warrior never gives in to fear when he is searching for what he needs.
Without love, he is nothing.

The warrior recognises the silence that precedes an important battle.
And that silence seems to be saying: 'Things have stopped. Why not forget
about fighting and enjoy yourself a little.' Inexperienced combatants lay down their
arms at this point and complain that they are bored.
The warrior listens intently to that silence; somewhere something is
happening. He knows that devastating earthquakes arrive without warning. He has
walked through forests at night and knows that it is precisely when the animals are
silent that danger is near.
While the others talk, the warrior trains himself in the use of the sword and
keeps his eye on the horizon.

A warrior of light accepts his Personal Legend completely.
His companions say: 'He has remarkable faith!'
For a moment, the warrior feels proud, then immediately feels ashamed of
what he has heard because he does not have as much faith as he appears to have.
At that moment, his angel whispers: 'You are only an instrument of the light.
There is no reason to feel proud or to feel guilty, there are only reasons to feel happy.'
And the warrior of light, aware now that he is but an instrument, feels calmer
and more secure.

'Hitler may have lost the war on the battlefield, but he ended up winning
something too,' says M. Halter, 'because man in the twentieth century created the
concentration camp and revived torture and taught his fellow men that it is possible to
close their eyes to the misfortunes of others.'
Perhaps he is right: there are abandoned children, massacred civilians,
innocent people imprisoned, lonely old people, drunks in the gutter, madmen in
power.
But perhaps he isn't right at all, for there are also warriors of light.
And warriors of light never accept what is unacceptable.

Injustices happen. Everyone finds themselves in situations they do not
deserve, usually when they are unable to defend themselves. Defeat often knocks at
the warrior's door.
At such times, he remains silent. He does not waste energy on words, because
they can do nothing; it is best to use his strength to resist and have patience, knowing
that Someone is watching, Someone who saw the unnecessary suffering and who will
not accept it.
That Someone gives him what he most needs: time. Sooner or later, everything
will once more work in his favor.

The friends of the warrior ask him where he draws his energy from.
He says: 'From the hidden enemy.'
His friends ask who that is.
The warrior responds: 'Someone we can no longer hurt.'
It might be a boy who beat him in a childhood scrap, the girlfriend who left
him when he was eleven, the teacher who said he was stupid. When he is tired, the
warrior reminds himself that these enemies have still not seen his courage.
He does not consider revenge, because the hidden enemy is no longer part of
his story. He thinks only of improving his skills so that his deeds will be known
throughout the world and reach the ears of those who have hurt him in the past.
Yesterday's pain is the warrior strength.

The Breviary of Medieval Knights says:
'The spiritual energy of the Path uses justice and patience to prepare your
spirit.
This is the Path of the Knight: a path that is at once easy and difficult, because
it forces one to set aside trivial things and chance friendships. That is why, at first,
many hesitate to follow it.
This is the first teaching of the Knights: you will erase everything you had
written in the book of your life up until now: restlessness, uncertainty, lies. And in the
place of all this you will write the word courage. By beginning the journey with that
word and continuing with faith in God, you will arrive wherever you need to arrive.'

I repeat:
You can recognize a warrior by the look in his eye. Warriors are in the world, they form part of the world,
and they were sent into the world
without saddlebags or sandals. They are often cowardly. They do not always act
correctly.
Warriors of light are wounded by the most foolish things, they worry about
trivialities, they believe themselves incapable of growing. Warriors of light sometimes
believe themselves unworthy of any blessing or miracle.
Warriors often ask themselves what they are doing here. Often they
find their lives meaningless.
That is why they are warriors of light. Because they fail. Because they ask
questions. Because they keep looking for a meaning. And, in the end, they will find it.

The warrior is now waking from his dream.
He thinks: 'I do not know how to deal with this light that is making me grow.'
The light, however, does not disappear.
The warrior thinks: 'Changes must be made that I do not feel like making.'
The light remains, because 'feel' is a word full of traps.
Then the eyes and heart of the warrior begin to grow accustomed to the light.
It no longer frightens him and he finally accepts his own Legend, even if this means
running risks.
The warrior has been asleep for a long time. It is only natural that he should
wake up very gradually.

The warrior must always remember the five rules of combat, set down
by Chuan Tzu three thousand years ago:
Faith Before going into battle, you must believe in the reasons for the fight.
Companions Choose your allies and learn to fight in company, for no one
ever won a war single-handed.
Time A battle in winter is different from a battle in summer; a good warrior
is careful to select the right moment to begin a fight.
Space One does not fight in the same way in a mountain pass as one would
on a plain. Think about your surroundings and how best to move around in them.
Strategy The best warrior is the one who plans his fight.

The warrior is wary of people who think they know the path.
They are always so confident of their own ability to make decisions that they
do not notice the irony with which destiny writes each life, and they always complain
when the inevitable knocks at the door.

The warrior studies the two columns on either side of the door he is
trying to open.
One is called Fear and the other is called Desire. The warrior looks at the
column of Fear and on it is written: 'You are entering a dangerous, unfamiliar world
where everything you have learned up until now will prove useless.'
The warrior looks at the column of Desire and on it is written: 'You are about
to leave a familiar world wherein are stored all the things you ever wanted and for
which you struggled long and hard.'
The warrior smiles because nothing frightens him and nothing holds him. With
the confidence of one who knows what he wants, he opens the door."

https://zelalemkibret.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/warrior_of-the-light-a-manual.pdf

9 minutes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4uvqEYMOTl4


9 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FllkTdBqRJY

im going to talk about losing and about failure

these are my words from my life

i dont know how much of what i say really right even for me much less how much is right for anyone else but this is the understanding i have so far and its one that comes from experience

losing is hard to handle

especially in situations where the loss is something in every day life

losing a fight to some stranger on the street - as long as no ones really hurt or in prison i consider that sort of thing as an odd sort of gift if it doesnt happen very often

it keeps a person humble but also gives an excellent lesson in what needs to be improved

losing to someone you have to deal with on an evey day basis is more difficult

its not easy to hold your head up when your eye is swollen shut and every part of your body hurts and nothing hurts more than your pride

but that is the fight you need to win the most

the fight to hold your head up and look the other in the eyes without fear and if possible without resentment and still stand in your own worth and your own truth

and even be willing to do it again if thats what it is

i have to make it clear that a warrior should always take a loss as undeniable proof that they are doing something wrong

and so defeat, if you survive, should always lead to a proccess of review to figure out exactly what that is

and sometimes this means rethinking almost everything about your entire life - thats how deeply losing can affect us, depending on the circumstances

we have some tools which help to prepare us to face up to that kind of encounter but some of them have to already be in place to be effective

the first one is maybe the most immediately important and it also doesnt necesarily take any preperation but it helps to have already laid the psychological groundwork because building the life raft is always more difficult when the waves are crashing down on your head

many animals lose their hair or manes after losing a fight

the nervous system suffers a crash
in the wild this can even lead to death if the fight and the loss were severe even if the wounds were not fatal in and of themselves

the crash that the system undergoes is seriously taxing

the immune system weakens
the motivational drives weaken
anxiety fear and shame become a cloud that blankets over the veiw of the self and the entire world and this darkness ultimately leads to death

it is true for lions and it is true for humans

NOT GOING TO HAPPEN!

the first thing is the deternination to overcome this loss

understand that this is an experience that can lead to growth and learning

but growth and learning come later

right now the resolution to win - EVEN THOUGH YOU LOST is the only thing that matters

the real battle is how you react to losing
the measure of a persons character is evident in their reactions to winning and losing

so when you lose, lose like a warrior

we all lose sometimes
warriors train to win and to succeed and we do win and we do succeed but it is not possible to succeed in the long run of a lifetime without being able to handle the experience of losing

it might be that the very determination to win even when you lose is what makes you a warrior

losing hurts - the more it hurts the stronger it will make you if you keep your resolve

it helps to do this if you have already devoted yourself to principles you belive in

it helps to have a plan with your life that you feel is meaningful

it helps to already be personally commited to being of whole hearted service to others

knowing that you represent something meaningful and that you use your influence and your energy to affect the world in a way that promotes the things that really benefit people and that youre using your time to build or strenghten the foundation from which you can do even more in the future offer concrete evidence of your worth

life is short - maybe its meaningless to the sun if i win or lose a fight or if i help someone face the difficulties of their life, but its not meaningless to ME

its not meaningless to someone who i help

it wont be meaningless to the ones who come next

thats my understanding on how a warrior reacts to losing

http://www.frumi.com/images/uploads/leadershipfromtheinsideout.pdf

from the book "leadership from the inside out" by kevin cashman 1998

when i found the PDF it explained itself as a summary but as i read i felt "distillation" was a more appropriate word

its a bit of a read but very much worth it as it is quite excellent and relevant to the spirit of the thread

---

The Beginning of the Journey
Leadership is not just something we do. It comes from somewhere inside us.
Leadership is a process, an intimate expression of who we are. It is our being in action.
As we grow so shall we lead.
Our definitions of leadership tend to be externalized. Most descriptions of leadership (i.e.
vision, judgment, creativity, charisma, drive, etc.), do not get to the essence of leadership itself.
According to the author Leadership is authentic self-expression that creates value. Anyone
who is authentically self-expressing and adding value in an organization is leading. Some may
self-express and create value through ideas, others through systems, others through people,
but the essence is the same.
The purpose of this book is to guide the reader down seven pathways to the mastery of
leadership from within.
There are a few essential themes presented:
o As the person grows, the leader grows. The missing element in most leadership
development programs is growing the person to grow the leader.


Most definitions of leadership need to be turned inside out, moving from viewing
leadership only in terms of its external manifestations to seeing it from its internal
source.
o Helping leaders to connect with their essence, their character, is central to effective
executive development. Leaders who learn to bring their purpose to conscious
awareness experience dramatic, quantum increases in energy, effectiveness, and
fulfillment.
o Leaders who integrate personal power and results power with synergy power accelerate
their leadership effectiveness.
o Leaders who work on achieving center-life balance are not only healthier, but more
effective.
o Transforming leadership development programs from a series of fragmented, contentdriven
events to an integrated, inside-out growth process greatly enhances personal,
professional, and organizational excellence.
Leadership from the Inside Out involves awakening our inner identity, purpose, and vision so
that our lives thereafter are dedicated to a conscious intentional manner of living. This inner
mastery focuses our diverse intentions and aspirations into a purposeful flow where increased
effectiveness is a natural result.
Many of us are in slumber. Rarely questioning where we are going and why, we go about our
business and relationships day after day. Unfortunately, it often takes a divorce, a disease or a
crisis, to bring us out of the depths of our slumber. But why wait for a shocking awakening?
Why not choose to wake up gently now?


Pathway One: Personal Mastery
Leading through Authentic Self-Expression
Personal mastery is the ongoing commitment to unfolding and authentically expressing who we
are.
Learning to listen to the voice of Personal Mastery is a lifelong development challenge.
Each of us is challenged to master our own unique circumstances. Each of us is being called to
lead authentically connecting our own life experiences to the special circumstances we face.
Our ability to rise to the challenge depends on our understanding of our own life experiences
and how that have prepared us for our journey,
Personal Mastery is about growth toward wholeness. It is about appreciating our gifts while
unfolding underdeveloped or hidden sides of ourselves. Personal Mastery involves appreciating
the rich mixture of our life experiences and how they dynamically form our unique existence.
One of the most effective ways to take this journey to a more integrated, complete
understanding of ourselves is to explore deeply our personal belief system. Beliefs literally
create our reality; they are the lenses through which we interpret the world. Every belief we
have transforms our life in either a life-enriching or life-limiting way. Two distinct types of belief
systems operate in people. Conscious Beliefs and Shadow Beliefs.
Conscious Beliefs are the explicit, known beliefs we have. Although we can access these beliefs
on a conscious level, this does not mean we are always aware of them.


Shadow beliefs are subtler and more challenging to uncover. Doing so is crucial to high
performance. Shadow Beliefs are those beliefs which are manifestations of hidden, unexplored,
or unresolved psychological dynamics. A Shadow Belief is cast when we don’t want to deal with
something. These beliefs have some value – for example if you have high standards for yourself.
”I’m never quite good enough” will allow you to be driven to achieve. Shedding light on these
beliefs minimize their limiting effect.
Transforming Shadow Beliefs to Conscious Beliefs is crucial to Personal Mastery. If we don’t
deal with these beliefs we pay a high price. Addictive behaviors, difficulty in relationships,
imbalanced lifestyles, and health problems can be the costs associated with not dealing with
them.
Leaders either shed light or cast shadows on everything they do. The more conscious the selfawareness,
the more light leaders bring. The more limited the self-understanding, the more
shadows leaders cast.
The authors have developed seven clues to indicate if a shadow may be operating:
1. If other people often give us feedback inconsistent with how we see ourselves, a shadow is
present.
2. When we feel stuck or blocked with a real loss as to what to do next, a shadow is holding us
back.
3. As strengths become counterproductive, some hidden dynamics need to surface.
4. When we are not open to new information, new learning, or other people’s views, a
shadow is limiting us.
5. If we react to circumstances with emotional responses disproportionate to the situation, we
are right over the target of a Shadow Belief.
6. When we find ourselves forcefully reacting to the limitations of others in a critical,
judgmental way, we are often projecting our unresolved shadow issues onto others.
7. If we often experience pain, trauma or discomfort in our body, a shadow is attempting to
rise to the surface to seek reconciliation.
Authenticity requires a lifelong commitment to self discovery and self-observation.
Character is the essence, the being of the leaders, which is deeper and broader than any action
or achievement. It is the essential nature of the person. The purpose of character is to
transform and to open up possibilities and potentialities. Qualities of character include
authenticity, purpose, openness, trust, congruence, compassion, and creating value. When we
are In-Character, we transform circumstances and open up possibilities and potentialities.
Persona is the personality or “mask” we wear to cope with our life experiences. The purpose of
persona is to “protect us” and help us cope. Qualities of the persona include image, safety,
security, comfort, control, fear, and winning at all costs. When we are In-persona we seek to
cope with circumstances.

As leaders it is essential to learn how to build our awareness of when we are being guided by
character and when we are being guided by persona. For example, if we are guided by image
rather than authenticity we are In-Persona. If our actions are principally guided by safety,
security and comfort rather than purpose, we are In- persona. If our life energies are absorbed
in control rather than openness, we are In-Persona. These are only three examples. In life, any
number or combination of persona qualities could be impacting one or any combination of
character qualities. When we are In-Persona we tend to see the problems of life as existing
outside of ourselves. Lasting solutions involve dealing with our internal situation in order to
transform the external circumstance.
It’s important to note that personal mastery is not about eliminating persona. It is about
increasing character to such a degree that character is primary and persona is secondary.
Persona exists for a reason, to protect and cope, so we really don’t want to eliminate it
completely. It serves a purpose. But we do want to unfold character so that this essence of life
flows through us as our principal guiding force. To have character supporting persona, the inner
supporting the outer, is the goal of Personal Mastery.
PERSONAL MASTERY SUMMARY
Take Total Responsibility: No one else can validate your value. It is for you to give yourself.
Leaders can effectively validate and support others only if they have validated themselves first.
Practice Personal Mastery with Others: Risk sharing your genuine thoughts and feelings with
others. Avoid "creating others" in your image or being "created by others" in their image. Lead
with your own original voice.
Bring Beliefs to Conscious Awareness: Clarify Conscious Beliefs and uncover Shadow Beliefs.
Practice reinforcing the ones that open up possibilities and setting aside the ones that limit you.
As you believe, so shall you lead.
Develop Awareness of Character and Persona: Commit to being guided by the qualities of
character. Character transforms, persona copes. Transform how you lead and how you live by
making character primary and persona secondary.
Listen to Feedback: Sometimes other people hold keys to unlocking self-knowledge. Rather than
spending energy resisting feedback, look for the seeds of learning contained in people's
perceptions. Leaders grow proportionally to their openness to input.
Consider Finding a Coaching Process: Seek objective coaching support to accelerate your
growth as a leader. Willingly partner with an expert in personal growth much as you partner
with experts regarding business issues.
Be Flexible: Overdeveloped strengths may work against you as things change. Be prepared to
take a fresh approach. Be open to drawing out new personal potentialities to prepare for future
leadership challenges.

Pathway two: Purpose Mastery
Leading by expressing our Gifts to Create Value
Purpose Mastery is the ongoing discovery of how we express our gifts to add life-enriching
value to the world.
“Why” is one of the most powerful words in our language. It is the question that directs us onto
the path of purpose.
The “How” question can reveal purpose. How is the internal process of purpose.
If leadership is authentic self-expression that creates value, then purpose is how we express
ourselves to add value.

The real question is, “How do you express your gifts to make a difference in all parts of your
life?”
Purpose is present in how we show up in whatever activity we engage in.
To define the thread of purpose, ask “Why do I pursue the work-life I do?” and “How do I show
up during the most fulfilling, energetic times in my life/”
Purpose gives meaning and direction to all life. It is the context that frames all of our life
experiences into a meaningful whole. If we have it, all the challenging experiences of life serve
to forge our identity and character.
Purpose may be the most practical, useful connection to an effective life. It is bigger and deeper
than our goals. It is life flowing through us. Purpose releases energy. The higher the purpose,
the greater the energy. Purpose also frees us. The more profound the purpose, the greater the
sense of freedom. Purpose opens up possibilities.
Often the most crucial variable in personal and leadership effectiveness is purpose. Because
purpose is transformational, it converts average-performing organizations, families, or
relationships into highly effective ones. It transforms employees, spouses, and friends into copartners.
With purpose, managers become leaders.
Purpose is not a goal to be set. It is not something you create. It is something you discover. It
calls you.
The implications of discovering purpose go far beyond our profession or our career. It is the
broad context that integrates all of our life experiences. It is the defining thread that runs
through and connects life’s divergent experiences.
When we are certain of our meaning and purpose, it is very difficult to keep us from achieving
our objectives. Achievements come as natural by-products of our connection to our purpose.
PURPOSE MASTERY SUMMARY
There are eight points of awareness for leading by expressing our gifts.
Focus on How to Make a Difference: Connect with purpose by understanding how your gifts can
be of service to the world. Leadership is expressing your talents in the service of others.
Get in Touch with Your Values: Values will guide you to your purpose. Pay attention to what
interests, energizes, and excites you. The language of leadership is expressed through our
values; leaders remind people which values are important.
Act "On-Purpose": Dream it and then do it! Doubt your doubts and remember your dreams.
Courageous leaders are centered in purpose.
Be Purposeful in All Domains: Understand your purpose gaps - those parts of your life lacking
expression of purpose. Expand your purpose into all areas of your life.
Encourage Others to Find Purpose: Be a true leader by helping others connect with what is
meaningful to them
Seek the Goal: be careful not to mistake the path for the goal. Seek your own unique purpose.
The philosophies, techniques, or views of others are your tools, not your goal. Express your own
leadership voice.
Learn from "Failure": Be open to the purposeful learning contained in unexpected or
unintended life experiences. The truest test of your character as a leader is the manner in which you deal with failure.
Be Flexible: Even though your essential purpose will be a constant throughout your life, how
you express it will change as you evolve through various stages.

Pathway Three: Change Mastery
Leading in the flow
Change mastery involves embracing the purposeful learning contained in the unending,
creative flow of life.
Change is part of the price of admission to life. Every moment our atoms are changing; our
thoughts are changing; our emotions are changing; our relationships, our finances – change is
endless and constant. We have no choice in the matter except for one aspect of change –
mastering our ability to adapt to change.
Learning to be open to the purposeful learning contained in all change is no small task. Change
is dramatic and lasting when it is a purposeful growth toward who we really are.
Positive change requires letting go of old patterns and taking a fresh approach. It demands
going beyond our preconceived ideas.
Change in always our teacher, pointing new directions, suggesting new options, testing our
potentialities. Change challenges our current reality by allowing a new reality to rush in.
We fear change because it always involves both creation and destruction. Usually it is only after
change is thrust upon us that we accept it because we often realize our lives actually will be
better.
Even though the only “place” we can handle change is in the present, most of us live our lives in
the past or the future. Until we learn to live our lives in the flow of the present, we can never
really deal with change effectively. As we build our focus in the present, we begin to gain
confidence that we can handle the endless chain of present moments throughout our lives.
Change Mastery is about developing an unshakable inner confidence that we can handle
change and can learn from whatever comes our way.
Being able to maintain a sharp focus and broad comprehension simultaneously is one of the
most important qualities for both leadership effectiveness and dealing with change. Our
purpose and values are the rudders which help us to navigate through the raging whitewater of
change. Sometimes all we can do is learn to trust ourselves amid dynamic change.
Leadership development is measured by our ability to adapt. Our personal and professional
effectiveness is in direct proportion to our ability to adapt to change.
The Tao Te Ching captured the essence of Change mastery: “Whatever is flexible and flowing
will tend to grow; whatever is rigid and blocked will whither and die.” Getting the flow going in
an organizational level is a very challenging proposition. Individuals can wake up to their
potential rapidly; organizations awaken more slowly. While some organizations simply are
rearranging the deck chairs on the titanic, others are genuinely re-thinking the concept of “the
ship” together.

Organizations that are looking at process improvement, reengineering, and quality as a total
organizational and human development system will thrive in change. The courage to reengineer
the total organization (human and systemic) comes from the belief that people really are the
capital that drives performance.

All significant change comes with self-change. Moving our concept of change from an outside-in
paradigm to an inside-out paradigm has profound implications. From this perspective, change is
an internal dynamic – an internal process of learning and development.
The authors have observed Five Change Mastery shifts to enhance performance:
1. From problem focus to opportunity focus
2. From short-term focus to long-term focus.
3. From circumstance focus to purpose focus. Effective leaders maintain a clear purpose
regardless of immediate circumstances.
4. From control focus to adaptability focus. Effective leaders understand constant control is
not possible, but adaptability allows them to flow with change.
5. From doubt to trust focus. Effective leaders are more secure in themselves; they possess a
sense that they can handle whatever may come their way.

CHANGE MASTERY SUMMARY
Seven points of awareness for leading in the flow of change:
1. Be Open to Learning: Instead of spending your energy resisting change, look for the growth
and learning contained within the flow of change. The learning leader outperforms the
learned leader every time.
2. Practice Present-Moment Awareness: Success can be created only in the present. Learn to
focus deeply in the present moment to weave a series of present-moment successes into a
lifetime of achievement. Leaders balance their vision with an acute awareness of the
opportunities and learning available in the present.
3. Integrate Immediate Focus and Broad Awareness: Bridge the paradox of being fully present
without losing your broader purpose and vision. Leadership requires a localized focus
painted onto a broader, meaningful canvas.
4. Trust Yourself: As the pace of change intensifies, your inner sense of trust may be the only
bridge you have to straddle the leadership gulf between the known and unknown. Trust
bridges the leader to his or her vision.
5. Develop Resiliency Through Mental-Emotional Stretching: Your life expands or contracts in
relation to your personal flexibility. Stretching yourself in mundane circumstances builds up
your elasticity to handle major life and leadership challenges.
6. Practice the Change Mastery Shifts: Build awareness of the Change Mastery Shifts to move
from being a persona-driven leader to being a character-driven leader.
7. Take the Leap: In those fortunate moments of being able to choose change, step back; if the
choice connects to your values and purpose, take the leap. Leadership is the purposeful
leap into the future.

Pathway Four: Interpersonal Mastery
Leading through Synergy
Interpersonal Mastery is the dynamic blending of personal power with synergy power to create
value and contribution.

In a recent study of 6,403 middle and upper managers conducted by the Foundation for Future
leadership, men and women received their highest evaluations for their intellectual
competencies. Both groups also received their lowest marks for their interpersonal
competencies. This study validates that leaders must expand their competencies from simply
getting results to adding value through synergy.
Relationships are the bridges that connect authentic self-expression to creating value.
Leadership does not exist in a vacuum; it always operates in contest, in relationships.
All too often, successful, achievement oriented people mistakenly believe they are the prime
movers, the origin of accomplishments in their groups or organizations. Many driven leaders fail
to comprehend how nothing is accomplished without engaging people in relationships and
appreciating the unique contribution of many people.
One of the most crucial development challenges for most leaders is learning how to
authentically self-express in a manner that creates value. What is missing are results that are
adding value and contribution at the same time. Leaders need to make this crucial development
shift by balancing their personal power (authentic self-expression) with synergy power and
contribution power (creating value).
An organic approach to business sees people are the source of creativity and dynamism. In this
type of organization, personal power supports synergy power, which in turn creates valueadded
contribution to customers, employees, and the environment. This inside-out model of
organizations creates a purposeful culture where people are constantly thinking “How can I
make more of a contribution?” It’s a purposeful, dynamic approach to organizational leadership
that values and leverages the power of human capital.
The second step for leaders is to realize that we often lack full awareness of our impact on
others. We take for granted that others are receiving precisely our intended meaning. We
express ourselves, and then we are shocked when our messages are misunderstood. Becoming
skilled at receiving feedback from others becomes crucial to ensure that our self-expression is
adding value. Effective leadership requires us to constantly reduce the gap between intended
and perceived communication.
The tool most organizations use to help leaders deal with the intention-perception gap is
360degree feedback. With such programs, leaders are given feedback from multiple sources on
their behavior skills, and leadership approaches.
360 degree feedback in the absence of new-self-knowledge often has two limitations.
It can create a defensive reaction, and therefore no growth takes place.
It encourages people to simply deliver the desired behaviors without giving them the personal
insight to grow.
Personal Mastery and Interpersonal Mastery are intimately connected. As we grow as people,
we grow in relationship. As we grow in relationship, we grow as people. The intervening
dynamic between ourselves and others is our structure of interpretation – our unique set of
beliefs, fears, and personal constructs through which we process or filter our world. If we want
to become more effective in relationships, we need to become more aware of how we are interpreting these interactions.
Assuming the person you are relating to has positive or neutral intentions, if your behavior
opens up possibilities then you are probably In-Character and your interaction will lead you to
openness, compassion, inclusion, and win-win outcomes. If, on the other hand, your behavior is
shutting down possibilities, you are probably In-Persona and your relationships will be guided
by image, control, anger, conflict, restriction, and self-interest.
The most crucial quality of character in a leader is openness – openness to new possibilities in
the marketplace, openness to new approaches and strategies, openness to relationships,
openness to new ways of doing things, openness to letting people express themselves. Leaders
open up or shut down opportunities in direct proportion to how open or shut down they are to
themselves.
The goal of Interpersonal Mastery is to shift our focus from self-fulfillment to one of servicefulfillment.
It is centered in purpose – how we can serve others to make a difference in the
world.
Authenticity is the core of relationships around which synergy and trust grow. Authenticity is
the true voice of the leader as it touches other people’s hearts. There are Five Touchstones of
Authentic Leadership which are crucial to building the interpersonal bridge from authentic selfexpression
to creating value:
1. Know yourself authentically – if we want to be more effective with others, we first need
to become more effective with ourselves. Commit to getting to know your total self
authentically through Personal Mastery.
2. Listen authentically. Authentic listening is not a technique. It is centered in compassion
and in a concern for the other person which goes beyond our self-centered needs. It places the
other person’s self-expression as primary at that moment. Authentic listening is about being
open to the purpose and learning coming o us through the other person. Authentic listening
creates the platform for true synergy and team effectiveness. Being open to valuing and
attending to different perspectives from diverse sources results in a more complete
understanding of issues and more effective decisions. Authentic listening is the soul of synergy.
3. Express authentically. Integrity means total congruence between who we are and what
we do. Authentic expression is the true voice of the leader. We speak from our character, and it
creates trust, synergy, and connection with everyone around us. Expressing authentically is
about straight talk that creates value. It is sharing your real thoughts and feelings in a manner
which opens up possibilities. Expressing authentically is what Gus Blanchard, CEO of Deluxe
Corporation, calls “caring confrontation” – the unique blending of straight talk with a genuine
concern for people.
4. Appreciate authentically. Appreciation is one type of self-expression that creates value.
It energizes people and makes people want to exceed their goals and perceived limits. Criticism
is one type of self-expression that usually does not add value. What it does is add fear and
insecurity. Criticism may get short-term results, but it does not add long-term value. Acknowledge effort and intention even if the results are occasionally lacking. Trust that your
appreciation will energize people.
5. Serve authentically. Ultimately a leader is not judged so much by ho well he or she
leads, but by how well he or she serves. Leadership is a continuum of service. We serve our
organization. We serve our people. We serve our customers. We serve our marketplace, our
community, our family and our relationships.

INTERPERSONAL MASTERY SUMMARY
Build Relationship Bridges: Relationships are the bridges between authentic self-expression and
creating value. Leaders lead by virtue of who they are, but create value by virtue of their
relationships.
Balance Personal Power with Synergy Power and Contribution Power: Using your personal
power to get results is not enough. Balancing your personal power with synergy power to make
a life enriching contribution is the key to authentic leadership.
Build Awareness of Intention-Perception Gap: We often are not fully aware of our total impact
on others. Commit yourself to 720. Feedback to grow as a leader.
Personal Mastery and Interpersonal Mastery are Intimately Connected: As we grow as a person,
our relationships grow. As our relationships grow, we grow as a person. As both grow, we lead
more effectively.
Become Aware of Your Structure of Interpretation: Commit yourself to the endless discovery of
how you process your world. We lead and relate based on how we interpret our life
experiences through the lens of our personal beliefs.
Practice the Five Touchstones to Authentic Leadership: Know yourself authentically, listen
authentically, express authentically, appreciate authentically, and serve authentically.
Pathway Five: Being Mastery
Leading Through Being
Being Mastery is connecting with the silence and peace of the innermost depth of one’s
character to support more dynamism, effectiveness, and contribution.
Being is our true nature, our core, our source, our inner Self. Being is the essence at the
deepest level of our character supporting all action and achievement.
Exploring Being is an ongoing journey that is particularly helpful to leading from within.
Connecting with our inner Being to comprehend all sorts of life situations is so natural a
process, we may not even be aware of it.
Mastery of Being is about learning to transform our state of awareness to greater happiness
and satisfaction by ourselves. To be alive, to be effective, to be fulfilled, first requires a state of
Being. Being is consciousness in its pure form, the source of thought.
Being is the transformational journey from here to there. We open our awareness to our true
potentiality. Being is the awareness of the eternally present moment at the basis of our
experience. Most of us would agree that successful action is based on effective thinking. If our
thoughts are clear and focused, then our actions will be precise and effective. On the days we
do not feel well, our thoughts are less effective and our actions less successful. So feeling is
more fundamental then thinking; feeling gives rise to thinking, which gives rise to action.
To feel, to think, to act, we first must Be. The more we awaken our true nature – Being – the
more effective our feeling, thinking, and action. It is the foundation, the platform for a more
masterful life. Being is a state of alertness where the mind is fully awake in its own nature and
the body is deeply rested, even more profoundly than during deep sleep. As we stretch the
mind and the body to experience broader ranges of their potentialities, we eventually acquire
the natural experience of Being or pure Consciousness permeating the other three states of
consciousness. As a result, we truly begin to live life from the inside out. Every experience we
have is from the context of our awakened inner nature.
To arrive at a pure state of being, we want to learn to go beyond our thoughts – to transcend
meditation. Meditation is a technique for helping us arrive at this state naturally. The practical
value of meditation can best be understood in terms of its profound rest. We maintain our
awareness as we experience inordinately deep rest. We experience a state of restful alertness
where the mind is alert but settled, and the body is deeply rested, even more completely rested
than during sleep. Although meditation is a great way to connect with our inner potentiality, it
is not the only way. Others are through nature, music, present-moment awareness, love,
inspirational reading and traumatic events.
BEING MASTERY SUMMARY
Four points of awareness for leading from Being:
1. Take Your Own Journey into Being: Getting on the path to self-discovery is your own very
personal journey. Only you can decide what "vehicles" to take on your travels and how you
want to get there. Start walking and enjoy both the process and the goal. If you want to achieve
more as a leader, you first need to be more as a person.
2. Resolve Life Challenges by Going to a Deeper Level: Problems are just opportunities seen from a
limited vantage point. Learn to dive deeply within yourself to view your leadership and life
challenges from a more comprehensive perspective. Leaders navigate from the depths of their
Being; Managers tend to cope with the waves on the surface
3. Consider Learning to Meditate: Learning to revitalize your mind and body is the inner basis for
outer effectiveness. If you have a difficult time even considering the idea of learning some form
of meditation practice, then remember the equation for personal and leadership development:
resistance = need.
4. Integrate More Reflection into Your Life: Taking the time to reduce the noise in your life allows
you to hear and express the music in your soul. Profound insights and breakthrough ideas
usually arise from the stillness of the leader's Being.

Pathway Six: Balance Mastery
Leading by Centering our Life
Balance Mastery is the dynamic centering of our life to build resilience to enhance effectiveness
and fulfillment.
92% of the 53 CEOs Cashman interviewed selected Balance Mastery as the most challenging
personally.
Balance Mastery is an ongoing challenge. It’s a dynamic process. Once we are certain we have
mastered it, the change in our life accelerates, and the process may need to be deepened once
again.
Personal balance is a critical part of long-term effectiveness. Many executives minimize the
value of balancing their lifestyle to enhance leadership performance.
A five year study of productive 100-year olds found that they had mastered four common
characteristics:
1. Optimism –they tended to have a positive view of the past and the future.
2. Engagement – they were actively involved in life.
3. Mobility - they were physically active
4. Adaptability – they had an extraordinary ability to stay balanced by adapting to and
accepting change and loss.
Mastery of Balance is about finding ways to connect with our center so we can deal with all the
dynamics outside.
Most imbalances in our society come from two major sources. We tend to overdo our activity
and to underdo our rest.
Cashman has found ten points of balance Mastery that can help center our lives in an
integrated, holistic way:
1. Be on purpose, but be aware. As our passionate purpose burns strongly, our devotion to it
also can cause us to throw ourselves out of balance. Purpose is the balance point that
allows us to achieve multiple goals with ease.
2. Learning to exercise with ease – activities you enjoy bring balance. Activities you dislike
create imbalance.
3. Deal with life-damaging habits.
4. Avoid taking yourself so seriously. Humor and lightheartedness balance mind, body, and
spirit.
5. Develop mind-body awareness. Our body reflects everything that is going on in our lives. It
is the primary feedback mechanism to reveal the positive or negative impact of our
thoughts, emotions, or choices.
6. Manage stress more effectively.
7. Nurture your close relationships
8. Simplify your life. The underlying principles for simplifying life are to sort out needs versus
wants and connect with your purpose. Begin to simplify your life by making more choices that support the vision of the life you really want to live.
9. Take real vacations.
10. Integrate more reflection and introspection into your life.
BALANCE MASTERY SUMMARY
Choose Wisely: Every lifestyle choice adds or depletes energy from you as a leader. Replacing
life-damaging habits with life-giving ones provides the resilience needed to help you lead more
effectively.
Be On-Purpose: Connecting with your purpose can center and balance you as a leader.
However, be careful-single-minded career passion can throw you out of balance in other parts
of your life.
Rest and Reflect More: Balance your dynamic leadership demands with more rest and
reflection. If you want to do more, then you need to be more.
Exercise for Enjoyment: Find activities you love and learn to appreciate the effortless joy of
movement. Adopt a "No Joy, No Gain" exercise mentality. Build your fitness level to support
your stamina as a leader.
Simplify Your Life: Evaluate what is essential in the context of your values, purpose, and
character. Ask yourself, "Are these choices adding to my purpose? Are these choices characterdriven
or persona-driven?"
Loosen Up: Play creates balance. Stop taking yourself so seriously. Nothing is more uninspiring
than a. boring, rigid leader. Leaders who are fun, playful, and joyful tend to attract and retain
committed, motivated, energetic people.
Pathway Seven: Action Mastery
Leading as a Whole Person
Action Mastery is the ongoing commitment to creating value through enhanced authenticity
and self-expression.
Leading as a whole person means integrating and focusing the diverse learnings gained in each
mastery area, deepening authenticity, brightening self-expression, and increasing the value you
can add as a leader.
The three core principles underlying Action mastery are:
1. Authenticity: Authenticity is the foundation, the platform, for leadership from the inside out.
Action without authenticity can actually create more problems for a leader than doing nothing
at all. The need for leaders to face honestly all aspects of themselves is crucial. This is the basis
for others to trust us as authentic people and leaders. In every moment we are leading, life is
attempting to teach us. The principle variable is how open or closed we are. Shifting our
awareness from one of knowing to one of learning is the receptiveness required for
authenticity.
2. Self Expression: It’s possible to be authentic, but if we don’t express it, nothing happens.
Learning to risk sharing our gifts is central to Action Mastery. As leaders, we create the future
through action. Sometimes we self-express through our mere presence, but most often it is because we take the risk and do something. Most leaders need to work on two crucial elements
to express themselves more effectively:
I. Broadening the range of self-expression we will risk: One leader may risk getting things
done but avoid the risk of emotional intimacy. Another may build relationships but not
risk tough decisions.
II. Deepening our understanding of the inner dynamics supporting our outer actions: many
leaders will express themselves but without purpose.
3. Creating Value: Many leaders get results; fewer leaders create value. Creating value involves
broadening our range of interest. Creating value seeks to reconcile self-interest with the
common interest. To lead from the inside out we need to consider shifting our focus from
short-term, self-interested perspectives to longer-term, common interest perspectives.
Creating value versus achieving results requires that we ask ourselves in every moment of
leadership, “are we enriching life, or are we depleting life?”
Action Mastery is 75% preparation and 25% performance. Just like an athlete we need to go
into training” to strengthen our inner resources relating to self-knowledge, purpose,
relationships, balance, being, and change. If we build inner excellence, success will be
experienced in both the process and in the results.
To go “into training” to lead from within, start with these Action Mastery steps:
o Outline your growth commitments – identify five things you want to work on.
o Build your awareness and act on your growth commitments.
Seven points of awareness for leading as a whole person:
1. Seek the most essential first. Go deeply into your purpose and being.
2. Approach growth and development as a lifelong process. Dedicate yourself to personal
awakening leading to transformation instead of focusing on process leading to change.
3. Take total responsibility: Inside-Out success is a total paradigm shift. We accept
responsibility for our inner satisfaction and our outer circumstances. We are responsible for
the life we have created, and we are responsible for how we deal with every situation that
crosses our path.
4. Value consistency over intensity: leadership from the inside out works; but you have to
work it consistently, every day.
5. Set aside worry, doubts, and negativity. When we worry we are rehearsing our failure over
and over.
6. Don’t just walk the talk, become the talk. Leadership from the Inside Out is about
consistent, integrated, lifelong growth.
7. Build awareness through inside out journaling.
Reviewer's recommendation: Cashman’s book is an important wake-up call for those who are ready to
embrace authentic leadership. This book is a reflective, interactive journey with real tools for personal
and leadership transformation.

this conversation took place on the Wall;

Locksley: The most desirable outcome of any street fight is that it never happens.

OB1Shinobi: i appreciate the sentiment for peace - imo the most desirable outcome of any kind of fight is that one acts according to ones principles and does not lose ones mindfulness to fear or to bad temper

PaintedWarrior: Sometimes there is a need for violence to achieve Peace. However, this can only be achieved when the defender can realise when the line has been reached to sufficiency, and does not cross the line and become the aggressor.

Locksley Choosing to defend is a worthy cause, but a risky one, especially in the complex world we live in today. At what point is that line crossed? How will the defender know when he has crossed it? Will his superiors tell him? Will he tell himself? Defense can be altered to mean "strike first", but is striking first really defense? Is it sticking to the letter of the law, versus the spirit of the law?

Perhaps someone should create a thread to discuss this - it's interesting

---

so the basic issue is "when is it appropriate to fight?" and "what are the boundaries?"

im going on the following presuppositions

1) there is a part of our psyches which has developed specifically to be a hunter and a fighter.
the process of this development began whenever life began / in other words there is a part of us that is very, very old

2) most people have no form of prey except for other humans; as a result we turn this part of ourselves against our own species in various ways

3) it is not appropriate - generally speaking - to hunt other humans as prey

4) it is not appropriate to allow other humans to make us into prey

5) the dominance impulse and the predatory impulse can be separated as topics; certain things can be easily seen to fall into instances of ego battles or "pissing contests" on the one hand, and into deliberate predatory attacks on the other

6) the easiest way to understand the difference between them is that someone in predator mode is basically determined to impose their will upon their target, whatever that may be, without any sort of compromise being an option

whereas ego battles are actually more about NOT LOSING

when youre dealing with someone in predator mode there are only a few ways the situation can go

they get what they want
they curb their predatory impulse
they lose

one of those things is going to happen
exactly how any of them happen is situational

starting with ego

imo it is not necessary to "lose in order to win" in an ego situation
make it clear that you are not going to be dominated or pushed around but do it in a way that allows the other person to save face and not look bad and you will be fine

people defending their egos dont really want to fight - that is the defining characteristic of an ego confrontation
they dont want to be pushed around and they dont want to look like a weakling or a coward, and thats pretty much the extent of their psychological commitment

predators dont want to fight either but the predator is convinced he has a definitive advantage (and as a general rule he does) even if that is simply that he is sure that he can beat you if it comes to a fight

someone who really wants to fight is rare - most dont want the risk of a real fight, they just want to win, or to get something specific

anyone who is looking to take something from you - whether its your pride or your wallet/purse or your life - is considered a predator

the boundaries of how to respond to a predator are going to depend on what they want and what methods they use to get it

imo the first thing to do when you feel like a situation is dangerous, regardless of what that is, is to breath

sounds funny maybe - but everything begins with the breath, and how you breath is going to determine the way your system responds to the stress of the moment and that is a physiological fact, so BREATH

the next thing to do is to analyse

these rules apply to any situation that represents danger
when this means dealing with a person, look at them, judge them, appraise what state they are in and what they really want, not by what they say but by what you see

a big thing that people do when they get afraid is they cant bring themselves to really look at what theyre afraid of

no matter what the situation is, you have much more to fear from being too afraid to look closely at whats going on

you have to keep your mind in a state of ACTivity instead of REACTivity, and that starts with breath and then analysis

if you decide to fight against a predator my suggestion is that rather than seeing it as "fighting back" or "standing up for yourself" you view it as you being the predator and making them into a prey species

in most cases the situation wouldnt be happening if you had a fair chance to "win" so you need to get your head in the gear of how to really just straight out end their ability to hurt you in a quick and decisive way

if its ok to run away and you belive that you can outrun them then go for it if you get the chance

as far as the bounds of what level of force is appropriate, my advice is that you should allow ego battlers a way out without losing face and youll be fine

you should treat predators as being dangerous

if all they want is to humiliate you then you may be able to get them out of predator mode by making it very clear that you will be more trouble than its worth to them

if you have the ability to show them that you are a predator yourself then possibly you can get them to switch from predator brain to ego brain, or from the "im dangerous" feeling to the "im in danger" feeling

things that know they are in legitimate danger would rather compromise a truce than battle it out

if they want something material then its usually the smart thing to just give them what they want

imo its just as ok to give a mugger your wallet or a bully your pride as it is to put him into a coma; whichever you think is appropriate and you think you can do

some people are sad enough that i would rather give them my wallet than hurt them
some are mean enough that i would feel better knowing they were in a coma
some i wouldnt have a choice about either way because theyre just out of my league

youve got to make the determination of how to respond based on the person and the moment

what i hope all of us will always be able to do when we deal with people under any circumstance is to make our decisions based on what we calculate as being appropriate to the moment, rather than on the impulses of fear or rage
if you can keep to that principle then you should be ok

most places have "self defense" laws which allow you to protect yourself so long as you dont chase someone down and hurt them
or attack them from behind (if you shoot someone in the back as they run for instance)
and you dont use a weapon against a weaponless person unless they have you trapped
and you dont beat them too much after they are helpless

i suggest doing a web search or asking a LEO in your area to find out the specifics

the guard

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKxD5kdOkk0


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uzbie1JeYQE


those first two are kind of introductory
this next video is like 3 hours long, but it is worth it
as a general rule, i dont recommend taking a self defense situation to the ground if there is a choice about it
its easy to stab someone to death when youre wrestling on the ground and it can be hard to get out of that situation if someone latches on to you

also it leaves you vulnerable to being attacked by their friends

but things happen

fights do go to the ground and its important to be able to handle yourself there

sometimes even a rudimentary knowledge of ground fighting is all it takes to handle someone who has a huge physical advantage over you in a striking exchange

also the ability to simply restrain someone may be useful at some time in your experience

obviously, youtube videos are not the same as formal instruction

simply understanding the fundamental concepts of the positions (staring with guard) and knowing even just a couple of techniques from each of them to better your position or to get up or to score a submission hold (break) put you way WAY ahead of anyone who doesnt have that knowledge

ive never had any formal instruction in bjj and im not in any way claiming to know bjj, but simply knowing about the positions and especially understanding hooks and sweeps and a couple of submissions has helped me in the past and i recommend AT LEAST that much to anyone who is interested in MA and SD

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxW6vZUbWWY

triangle choke from guard

2 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMfDjnetoLI


2 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vr730pBy1tg


6 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80mqoNPw3Ko


6 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qyc9HdQz0Ps

2 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U537uIY6i8c


same technique in the next vid but the effect is much much quicker
he actually locks it on right at 1:04/1:05 and ref calls OUT by 1:13

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHvwiXOHp7E


2 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CxPV5VmPko


2 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1fQSjqEPx8w

3 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MersUxFbTSg

arm bar from guard


2 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khyJc2ktabY


2 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AV9NorNMWl4


5 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqrtPTGm_Q8

this is also known as the wrist lock or double wrist lock in catch wrestling and its emphasized as a break on the forearm and not the shoulder
i think thats better if you get it but its good to train the full spectrum of what the technique can do

this is one of the best submission techniques

3 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uB00NBErEyw


4 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2FajIE2gHI


5 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SnLuzJi23MA


also, this is kimura the person. its a quick read and very cool imo

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masahiko_Kimura

kimura from guard

2 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ziOZjzUhKjE


8 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqSdVL82QVk


6 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_p63AI8gww

i had meant to put this with the standing triangle

theres not a lot of standing darce vids out there


1 min

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DpkPPmeCERQ


3 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9aKVC1Wd8Q


2 mins

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Wz62NL2JtM