Tough question, which I think is “how do you know what stops you from moving towards some place new, or away from where you are?” Well everytime we do “anything”, we do it because we have made a decision, and that decision is the one with the most positive intention given the information to hand at that point.

So when you consider what keeps you in place, I wonder what decision process you went through to stay there… what was the positive intention behind it. Those that come to mind for me could include:

It’s safe
I like the familiar
I’m good at what I do

And whatever they are, they aren’t wrong, they are the best choices to make at the time given the information you have to hand. And by information I mean beliefs, past experiences, values, attitudes and emotional state.

We tend to make decisions “now” based on what happened in the “past”, and as the stockmarket often says, past performance is no indication of future returns!

So to consider what holds you back you need to consider where you want to go. So perhaps you might find it useful to write down your answers to the following questions (in order):

1. What do you want in life (be specific)
2. How will you know when you have got that \ them \ there? What will you see, hear and feel?
3. Imagine yourself at that time, seeing through your future eyes, look back from then to now and note what you had to change to get there - what were the key hurdles in your life that used to stop you from achieving your dreams?

Taking that new position should help you see your blockages from a new perspective, and hence the payoffs that kept them in place.

I hope this helps, if you want to talk about it more drop me an email. I’ll have a look around for a forum on the subject for you.

Matt

I have a question for you though. Question 1 for example asks me to list all the payoffs that I get from staying stuck in some aspect of my life. Now my interpretation of a payoff is something that holds you back because it is comfortable to you, ie I don’t want to change my job because the travelling is easy etc.

Now this is fine, and I could probably think up at least two items here that are obvious to me. Now this may not make sense, and I am struggling to put it in a way that seems right. But what about the things that are not so obvious? What would you suggest would be the best way of finding out what those payoffs are? What I mean by this is that I may have areas that I need to look at but I don’t actually see them as an issue, because I may have lived with them so long it just feel “natural” to have it. does that make sense?

Do you know of any online forums or discussion groups around this book/subject that might help?