Dean Graziosi on reframing obstacles as preparation for bigger goals. He shares what happened after attending Date with Destiny, explains the thermostat versus thermometer difference, and pushes for incremental growth through the holidays and into the new year.
Hey, everybody. Dean Graziosi, welcome to the Weekly Wisdom. First off, I hope you had an incredibly merry Christmas. And for those of you who don't celebrate Christmas, I hope your holiday is going amazing in this holiday season. You know what I want to share today is if you watched my weekly Wisdom of a couple weeks ago, I went down to Date with Destiny with some really good friends. We spent six days there, got to spend time with Tony and just getting me sharpened up on my life skills, right? I always come away with something good. I originally went there just for friends and I realized I. I was there because I was supposed to be there. So I went and did Date with Destiny. It was incredible. And then when I came back home, more than normal, we're all busy and I got so much going on just like you do. We don't have extra time for anything. But I got home to just a pile of crap, for lack of a better word, over and above normal. Just like stuff that shouldn't have happened, things that were going wrong one after another. And then two days later, I got the flu. I don't think I've had the flu since I was 12. Like the flu that puts you on your back 102 fever and just felt horrible. I couldn't move, right? And while I'm on my back, while I had a whole bunch of stuff go wrong and the previous week I was away for a week, so I was really far behind. I was starting to get overwhelmed and falling back on limiting beliefs and telling myself really bad stories. And then I realized something I wanted to share with you guys. When you want more out of life than just status quo, than just being the thermometer, right? If the temperature goes up, you go up. If it's down, it's down. If everybody else is happy or does something, you feel good. If things are bad, you feel bad. If the economy is good, you feel good. You know the difference between a thermometer and a thermostat, right? But if you want more out of life, if you don't want to be the status quo, if you don't want to live a roller coaster of emotions, if you want to make more money, whether it's real estate or anything you're passionate about, whether you want to have more passion or intimacy in your personal life, what you want to be in better shape, you want to live with more smiles, right? Kids smile 400 times a day. Adults smile 20 times a day. If you want to live that, then you have to take problems head on. And here's what I've decided when I got back and that was a pile on it was God or the universe testing me. Because if the more we want to achieve, the higher our goals, the better life we want to live, guess what? Our obstacles are going to match. They're going to be just as high. And what we have to realize is when you start this evolution, or if you're on this evolution to a greater life, obstacles don't go away. You just figure out more efficient, better ways to go through the wall or over the wall, under the wall or around it or knock it down those walls of obstacles. And when you realize those obstacles are nothing more than a challenge that are there to sharpen your stone, to polish your diamond so you could be crisper and ready for that next level of life, then problems become obstacles and become challenges. And you stop saying like I did for a couple days. Oh, I came home from Tony. I was in such a good mood. Why did all this happen? And why did I get sick? No, it was just I had to figure a way to get those problems done quick and off my plate and behind me. Figure out a way to, yeah, I was sick. Maybe I was supposed to be down so I could be home. And I was watching my kids because they were off. And I got to watch them play and I got to read a little bit. I got to watch some cool documentaries on tv. Maybe all that was supposed to be life happened exactly the way it was supposed to be and meant to be. My whole point is this. During the holiday season, I know sometimes it can mess with your head. Maybe you don't have the greatest memories. Maybe you have perfect memories. God bless you for that. Right? But the holidays can be a little crazy and we start taking on that this went wrong, why is this wrong? And it gets heavy or it could get heavy. So I want to encourage you this holiday season, especially heading towards the new year, to realize that obstacles are just challenges. To polish that diamond, to sharpen that stone so we can live the life we all want. And the only reason I can talk this way to you watching is because you wouldn't be watching me week after week. Or maybe this is your first time to. You wouldn't be watching me if you weren't ready for that next level life. And I want to prepare you. And letting you know the obstacles don't go away. They just convert to really cool challenges that make us better and better people on our journey to the absolute life we deserve. That fulfilled life, that conscious life, living in that place, living in the now. And living the person you were made to be. So that's my message. I hope you have an incredible holiday season. We're heading into the New Year. This is the week New Year is coming. So start getting ready. And I'm not talking about the New Year's resolutions where you make hundreds of them and then they all fall all. Let's start. Kaizen, One step at a time. January 1st, this is your year. 2015 is the year that's going to be the one you remember for the rest of your life as that massive turning point. So let's get ready and do it. If you haven't downloaded my free book, my Totally Fulfilled, which was my first New York Times best seller and my latest real estate book, they're both free. You can go to deansfreebook.com that's deansfreebook.com or if you're@deangradsusc.com, you go right up there and grab them. I'll talk to you next week. Happy New Year.
