I don’t know if this happens to you at all or if I’m the only one.

I take risks. I believe that in order to truly live my dream I have to put new ideas and tools into action. Sometimes it works out right away. Other times things take a lot longer than it looked like it was going to take. This is NOT failure. It is feedback.

For example: When I finished my NLP trainers training in the Summer of 2003 I thought that I would be teaching my first NLP practitioner course the following month.

It took me something like 5 years to achieve that goal.

Not because I was sitting around watching TV and wasting my time, but because there seemed to be some higher, wiser plan in effect. In order for me to be a congruent trainer, I had to first get some real life experience working with clients of all kinds. Perfect (in retrospect).

But to the people in my life at the time, my lack of earning power IMMEDIATELY after the big training was proof that I was a fool. NLP was supposed to suddenly enable me to start making big bucks right away. And I have seen people’s incomes skyrocket right after an NLP session or a training.

But for me, for my particular life’s purpose of integrating my music and my personal development work, it wasn’t an instant catapault to fame and riches.

Somehow I managed to make it through those first lean months and began to build a practice.

There was so much I didn’t know about marketing, and business. So much I had to learn “on the job”. Because I was so focused on building my practice, I didn’t do as much to get Music/Storytelling gigs that year… so my income actually went down even though I was feeling like I was on track with implementing my goals.

Working towards living my dreams.

Well, as the old saying goes, “Success is Messy”

In the last year or so as I’ve been putting new ways of doing business into practice, getting the word out on the Web. It’s been a huge learning curve, one that has often required 100% of my attention and energy.

If anyone looked in at certain points along this path it might seem to an outside that I was chasing after some “pie in the sky” dream. I am chasing a dream. But it’s not “pie in the sky”.

My dream is to create steady and increasing income from the many areas I’m interested in and passionate about in a way that contributes positively to the lives of others.

NLP, Sales training, storytelling, music, hypnosis, art, personal development, healing, creativity, education, leadership, motivation, Time Line therapy techniques ™ relationships, transformation and on and on. It’s a multi-dimensional approach that sometimes defies “branding”.

I once had a conversation with a business man who had been very successful as a mortgage broker. At some point he had decided to build a company with other mortgage reps working for him. At first, his income went down because he was no longer writing deals. Eventually as he brought more and more mortgage reps on board and he earned a percentage of each rep’s volume, his income soared.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that in any endeavor that is true and congruent for you, there will be times when your family members or friends will try to give you advice. Unfortunately their advice will come from their model of the world which may be an old framwork for you that you are letting go of.

You must acknowledge their loving intention and appreciate it. However, you must also ignore their advice and continue to move beyond it. Even if it causes a temporary rift in the relationship.

Dreams are fragile at certain stages of their fulfillment. Stay with it. Keep doing what you know is right and true. Turn down the noise and the distractions around you and burn the boats. There is no returning to the way you used to be. Sometimes it takes longer to get to where you want to be. So what?

Every outcome that does not look like success is an opportunity to put another piece of the puzzle into place. Eventually it will come together.

Am I saying ignore solid, advice from people who truly know what they’re talking about in fields that are similar or related to what you are trying to accomplish? No. Other entrepreneurs or other people in your field who have done what you are attempting to do, have earned the right to give you guidance. I am only talking about people who have been employees all their life giving an entrepreneur advice about how to run his business.

Just like I know very little about ice skating and would never dream to give an ice skater advice about how to do a leap or a spin, people who trade hours for dollars or who are not able to tolerate the uncertainty of being in business (or sales) haven’t earned the right to give advice in this area. Are they bad people. No! Their intention is one of love and care and concern. It can still wreak havoc with your self confidence if you are going through some tough challenges.

What you do freaks them out and scares the hell out of them. That’s why they are chained to a steady paycheck. Sometimes in the entrepreneurial or artistic journey there are times when the cash flow just isn’t there. Those are moments of your greatest opportunity.

Worrying about someone based upon the false belief that imagining the worst and trying to protect your loved ones from their mistakes is the worst kind of projection.

For 40 years I’ve been pursuing a dream of using my music to positively impact the world. That journey has led me in a lot of different directions, first working on my self and my internal blocks and next learning how to reach out to other people in ways that may be non-traditional. The learning curve has been steep and at times breathtakingly difficult. Every step of the way, no matter how challenging, has been perfect and exactly what I was ready to tackle next.

• 75,000 people have watched my “How To Stop Anxiety” video series on YouTube.

• More than 25,000 people all over the globe have watched the video of my song “Together We Can Change The World” sung by Rilee O’Neill..

• The songs I wrote for Letters To Daddy have been enjoyed by several hundred audience members as the play was performed this past Spring by two different theater companies.

• 5,000 people follow me on twitter. http://www.twitter.com/markshepard

• Several dozen people have enrolled in the Modern Jedi NLP Practitioner Trainings I’ve taught

• Over 6,000 people have seen my Motivation Song on YouTube (see it at the end of this post).

Step by step. Goal by goal. Putting my plan into action.

Have those accomplishments resulted in a steady stream of income? Not yet. Have they touched lives in a postive way? Yes.

Am I on track? Yes. Am I as much a household name as Tony Robbins? Net yet. Do I always know how I’m going to pay this month’s bills? Nope.

Necessity is the mother of invention. Our backs are to the sea, the boats have been burned. There is nowhere to go but forward into the unknown.

So dare to dream folks. Dare to take action to fulfill your dream. Dare to find mentors to model yourself after. Dare to lovingly ignore the advice of parents, relatives, friends or anyone else who doesn’t “get” what you are all about.

Dare to believe in yourself even when outside events seem to conspire to get you to doubt.

Feed the Faith. Starve the Doubt. You gotta have some trust that it all works out…(better than you can possibly imagine)

Just in case you need a little motivation…

Please leave a comment below or share this with someone who many need your support today!

- Mark

Hi mark I am wondering before you do swish patterns and other NLP techniques, don’t we really have to clear our fears with the Timeline Therapy Techniques™?

When we worked together 1:1 and I was able to allow joy to come in my life for the first time, it was a good start but my other issues about living life and business issues are still coming up.

When a fear comes up should I do Timeline on myself with the issue to get it clear first?  In other words what is the checklist to follow for tools to use when a fear arises that is holding me back?  I feel at this point I  should be able to use the tools I am learning in your course and what I picked up at our breakthrough session .

I really understand that we are the only ones that can cure ourselves.  Thanks so much.

-Name Witheld

Here’s my response:

An important Key to NLP Success: As long as we’re alive stuff will come up. It’s like your Unconscious Mind  “gets” that it can release stuff now and so it keeps offering up new “layers” to be addressed. I also want to remind us all that when we do make a major shift to not discount it or negate it just because there is still more work to do. There will always be more to shift. That why it’s so cool to have a wide choice of NLP tools to choose from.

I find that when I clear something with timeline it typically stays cleared if I have gotten the root cause event. Sometimes, I’ve had to go back and clear a slightly different limiting decision that seemed to have the same root cause.

I prefer to do time line therapy techniques ® to clear the limiting decision and chain of negative emotions first. Then I’ll use the swish pattern to “program” the new response I want into my neurology. If you do a Swish pattern enough times it’s cool because the old negative “knee-jerk” trigger will now bring up the desired state or picture.

It’s hard to give a “check-list” of first do a. then b. then c. I tend to follow my intuition with what to do when.

What I love about NLP, Hypnosis, Time Line and EFT is that I can do a lot of things on my own to clear stuff that comes up at the moment it gets in my face. That’s one reason I truly believe in teaching my clients how to take charge of their own change rather than see me as the “curer” or “healer”.  That said, sometimes though we just can’t get enough leverage on our selves to shift something.  At those moments it can save a lot of time and angst to get help from a trained practitioner of NLP.

In those cases, I find it a lot easier to have someone else do it with me. That’s yet another benefit of the NLP Training because you not only learn how to do the NLP techniques on your own for yourself and for other people, but you actually get to take turns with the other students in being the “client” in our 4 day bootcamp. So you can clear a lot of your own stuff in the process of learning NLP. You also make friends with other people who “get” you and who are interested in clearing their own issues and blocks. So it makes a lot of sense to come to the training and then do trades afterward with the students you meet.

If I’m in a moment of  “challenge” and I just need to shift something immediately, I  use EFT.  I tap and speak the “set up phrase” LOUDLY! It seems the more emotion I have towards clearing something the more powerful EFT tapping is. If you’d like to learn more about EFT click here:  Get a free EFT Starter package

Here’s an example:

“Even though I thought I’d cleared this @#^&*$%!@$*%$!@# problem, I deeply and completely accept myself!”
I do a couple rounds unashamedly focusing on the problem and wallowing loudly in the whiny victim mode as much as I want while tapping the EFT acupressure points. I have so much fun with this that often that’s enough to snap me out of my funk!

Then I start feeding in positive how and why questions like:
“Even though I haven’t yet found and released the root cause event of this challenge, why do I deeply and completely accept myself?”

Finally I just tap on

“Why do I deeply and completely accept myself and why does it work out better than I can possibly imagine?”
“Why do I love myself? Why do I attract all the resources and assistance I need to clear this once and for all?”
Why do I resolve this in a way that’s even better than I can possibly imagine?”
etc.
Usually EFT clears  pretty much everything from headaches to limiting beliefs.

If it doesn’t do the job for a particular issue I will next use swish patterns and other NLP submodalities techniques to get relief.

If I’m still not shifting the issue, then I will call one of my students/colleagues and get them to do Time Line Therapy with me. Sometimes I can do Time line by myself but I tend to space out and drift off unless someone is there keeping me on track.

Depending upon the issue, when I can’t get enough leverage on my “stuff” by myself, I call Joann Dunsing or Joe Schroder or Kathy McAfee or Kim Kasperian.

Remember that Tiger Woods has a coach and Michael Jordan had a coach. One of my greatest and most humbling lessons is that sometimes it saves a lot of time and money to get with someone who can get you the results you can’t always get on your own.

I have even just handed the Time Line Therapy™ script to someone who knew nothing about it and just had them read the damn thing. It worked like a charm because it kept me on task. The script doesn’t do the clearing, we do. So as you learn various techniques approach using them on your own issues or “stuff” with an attitude of wanton curiosity and playfulness.

I hope that answered the question and was helpful for those of you who are working to “Defeat The Dark Side In Your Personal And Professional Life. Master Your Mind For A Change with NLP!” )

Why does it work out better than you can possibly imagine?

-Mark Shepard, NLPT
Certified Master Practitioner and Trainer of NLP, Hypnosis & Time Line Therapy™

p.s. Any questions or comments? Leave them below. Please pass this post along on Twitter, or Facebook or StumbleUpon etc.