What is your recipe for success?

People are always looking for the next, best recipe for success. Whether it’s “7 Habits of…” or “21 Pillars for…,” a lot of people want to be told how to “get rich quick” and they want a system that has worked for other people that they can replicate. That may work for some, but oftentimes people bump into a problem with creating success using that recipe, or they may even believe it works but never try it because they don’t believe it will work for them. Here is why…

 

In a seminar, when I ask everybody, “Raise your hand if you’re a good cook,” about half the room will raise their hand. And I’ll say, “Okay, the other half – you didn’t raise your hand. You guys are terrible cooks, right? Well, I’m not talking to you. Don’t listen to me. Now for you good cooks, keep your hands up. I want you to keep your hand up if you’re now a great cook.” And a lot of hands go down. .. “I want you to keep your hand up, if you’re an extraordinary cook.” … More hands go down…  Till I arrive at the point that I will ask for “How many people out there are a magical, amazing, extraordinary chef?” And even if there’s one there, they’ll look around like “I’m not raising my hand. He’s probably going to call on me, or something bad is going to happen to me.” So even if you believe it, even if you think it, you will not raise your hand.

 

But, regardless, I’ll tell the story. In New York, right now, there is an incredible chef, an amazing, magical extraordinary chef. He makes this incredible chocolate dessert, one of the most amazing chocolate desserts on the planet and people come from all over to experience this. He’s ready to retire, and he wants to pass this recipe on, but he doesn’t have any kids. And when you’re an extraordinary, amazing, magical chef, you don’t really have a recipe. Now, you might measure a cup of flour, or measure some things, but in reality, the recipe is in your head, it’s in your body. And so anytime you go into the kitchen, you begin to cook, and you produce this incredible dessert. So he needs to create the magical recipe that’s going to support the dessert.

 

So let’s say we call in Myth Busters to help create the recipe. (Have you ever seen that TV show? I love it. It’s got so much fun science and analysis in terms of whether something is science or myth.) So Myth Busters is there and they’ve got high-speed cameras all about the kitchen. They’ve got scientific equipment everywhere. The chef begins to make this magical dessert and when he reaches into the little ramekin, not only do we know that he’s got .8 mgs of cinnamon in his fingers – we know the speed his arm’s moving, we know the angle of his elbow and we know the release velocity of his fingers when he puts it into the mixing bowl.

 

If we now took this incredible recipe, in detail, and we gave it not to just the magical chefs in the room, but to everybody in this seminar, and said, “Okay, if you follow this recipe, what are you going to make?” what do you think most people would say? Here’s the sad truth: most of the room – it’s not some, it’s most – most of the room would say “Well, I’d probably find a way to screw it up. I could have an incredible recipe but I’m not a good cook.”

 

But the reality is, when you follow the recipe, you will make that incredible dessert, every time. It’s a law, it’s a recipe.

 

And if I’m doing a seminar for four-year-olds, I could ask them the same question, and I could give them the recipe, and not a single one of them would say “I’d screw it up.” Every one of them would say “Woo-hoo! I’m going to make this incredible dessert!” Because when you’re four, you believe in your power. You believe in your inevitability, and you would make an incredible dessert, and you’d feel great about it.

 

But when you’re older, and you’ve struggled with life, and you’ve been challenged at times, and you have trauma, and you have scars, and you even have some wounds that are still wounds and just have deep scabs on them, you doubt yourself. And once in a while in an argument with an old family member, or someone from a former part of your life, the scab gets picked; and even in that place, the wound becomes fresh again.

 

The reality is when you change the cookbook that you’re using, when you change the neural programs, strategies, and patterns that you’re using to create your life, the inevitable you will come forth. The inevitable life that you were meant to have will come forth.

 

So while the illusion was that you’re a bad cook, or a so-so cook, and it is revealed to you now that you just have to follow the right recipe – are you a phenomenal cook and you’ve just been using a bad cookbook? Now you get to say, “I’m a great cook, and that recipe I am using is bad.”

 

Some of you will say that’s disingenuous, and I say, you’ve already been doing that. To blame the cook for a bad meal, and reward the cook book for a good meal, is upside down– switch it. Blame the cookbook when the meal is bad – reward the cook when the meal is good. How can that be disingenuous? That’s what successful people do. That’s what power looks and feels like. You’ve been doing it, just upside down. Do it right side up – you are a great cook! And now you will find more, great cookbooks to use!