Reason Treason
Reason Treason
When you know one of the most powerful reasons for failure you’ll never fail again.
Let me explain with this true story. During 2005 on February 27th at 6:30 am I climbed out of bed with the excitement of a child getting up on Christmas morning. The reason was I was going to Australia for the very first time. The trip itself was with Emirates Airlines. I was to get a plane from Manchester down to Heathrow London. From There I would then fly over to Dubai, then to Singapore and finally into Brisbane Australia. The total travel time would be about 34 hours. I knew I would be shattered but I hoped my adrenaline would infuse me with the extra kick I would need at the end of the trip. It did help that I flew business class. That was very cool. Those were the days I was still drinking alcohol. So the flight was all about, movie after movie, drink after drink, good food after good food and service that frankly at that time blew me away. So suddenly I am in Australia, the land of the Kangaroo and other marsupials that are difficult to pronounce.
My reason for going was one only. I had been invited to speak in front of an audience of 500 for a now very good pal of mine, Brett Mc Fall at his large (now the worlds biggest) training event. I would be invited to talk about marketing a business on the web. Anyway, have you had the really jetlagged feeling? It’s horrible. When I arrived I felt really exhausted but at the same time I felt excited about being on the other side of the planet. A weird thing happened when I arrived. My plane landed around 6:00 am so by the time I got to my hotel it was still very early. Hence the room wasn’t ready! I decided like a fool to open my suitcase in the lobby and before I know it the marble floor is covered in my underpants for all to see. Anyway I went to the pool and sat and watched as a duck happily went back and to on it’s newly discovered chlorine filled nirvana.
Then a weird thing happened. A golf buggy went past and I heard this voice shout my name… “ALAN” in a distinctive very south America screech. It was Marlon Sanders the king of internet marketing. He was sitting on the back of this Golf buggy letting his feet touch the floor as the buggy went along at around 4-5 miles per hour. Now if you know nothing about this guy… Marlon … you have to know he is probably the most brilliantly eccentric thinker I have ever met. The guy is so deep I doubt anyone could go right to his inner depths and understand him. Yet he is eclectically funny to a ridiculous degree. For example, I went to this shopping mall with him. This place was huge, on the Gold Coast in Australia. Now when Marlon speaks you can hear him around 50 yards away so when you walk along everyone in front for some distance turns around to look at this accent. To top it, he is very tall so hard to disguise! Marlon has this weird thing. He is a coffee house fan. A huge fan. So whenever he walks past a coffee bar he insists on having his photo taken by the sign. Imagine this. Marlon asks me to take his photograph in this coffee shop. However, the sign is at around 8 feet high. Now Marlon like his photo taken next to the sign. The sign is in the middle of the tables. The café is packed. Marlon walks into the middle of everyone, as people shuffle out of the way he gets a chair stands on it with his head nearer the 8 foot level and is shouting at me across the heads of dozens of Australians … “Alan take the god dam picture before I fall”… well you can imagine.
Anyway, what I really wanted to get to was this big reason for failure. You see during this time in Australia I met a guy who’s name was David. David is a regular guy. He is a regular guy with dreams. His dream was to free up his time enough to enjoy his life and give more back to the World. David was around 45-50 years old. He has been in the same life-sucking job all of that time apart from one changes due to a promotion. He was lifeless but a nice average guy. He looked like he had just had enough of everything. Anyway … He stopped me to talk. He told me his family were originally from Scotland and then went on to share some of his own personal history and his life in Australia. David loves (as most Aussies do) being an Australian. Yet he was finding the grind of his life really tough, very hard. We talked, he said he was looking forward to hearing me present, we parted and I did my presentation. It’s now 2008. It’s March and I have just finished a brand new presentation In Sydney Australia. A guy walks up to me. His name is David. Being an ex-hairdresser I am very good at remembering faces but not that hot on names. It’s David. Now I remember the last time we spoke. I remembered what we talked about. I also remember this guy saying what he had learnt in 2005 was going to change the way he lived forever. He seemed convincing then that this was the force for change he needed. You know what. David was in the same job. David still hated his life. David still got paid the same cash. David’s life was still under the control of an external force (his job masters) So we spoke. He asked if I remember him. I replied “of course”. Before I asked he then gave me several REASONS … why he had made no real changes in his life. They went a little like this. Reason one: Not enough time in the day. Reason two: Too busy. Reason three: still trying to learn html And more. This got my brain thinking. What actually does the word REASON mean because these reasons are actually controlling our life? Webster’s dictionary gives this explanation … “to think or argue in a logical manner … to form conclusions, judgments … to urge reasons which should determine beliefs” So David’s internal logic led him to a conclusion that determines his beliefs. David believed that he didn’t have enough time in the day, yet David has 24 hours like everyman on the planet. David’s logic kept telling him he can’t do this stuff, it’s impossible. David’s internal belief is that he is who he is and that’ll never change. Did he say this outright? No. It’s just that David’s actions spoke louder than any words he could ever say. So the conclusion I arrived at was that unless a person is willing to re-arranged, re-organize and shift his internal belief systems … he/she cannot change their life forever. You use change always begins with YOU … not your job, not your routine, not your car, not your life but YOU. And that’s a pill most people don’t like. Their internal systems have been tuned into the fact they HAVE TO depend on external forces for their lives to be successful. Actually… that’s a lie that isn’t true. And only when you realize and accept that will your life change. David’s life is the same. He holds on passionately to his old beliefs that he cannot do things without help, without the need of others.
How about you? Let’s take the same word REASON and put ‘T’ at the beginning. Reason now becomes TREASON. Treason now means “the act to overthrow one’s government or sovereign” In other words any reason you give for your own lack of success has become your treason.
Your treason is a self inflicted attack on yourself, your governing thoughts created by life long beliefs that are deep inside yourself. You can change that. You can be a success at anything. Reasons are simply excuses. Reasons are TREASON. Can you change? Do you want to change?
I hope this helps you.
Regards, Alan Forrest Smith
