Once They're Willing to Listen, They're only Informed About It. Part 2 of the 5 Steps to Mastery

You've seen that the first step to mastery is to be willing to listen to the information. Without taking advantage of other people's expertise, you would have to rediscover their insights for yourself. Education is one of the secrets of success, it can be seen as the process of listening and learning from others.

How much Energy have You Given It?
Once you've listened, you're only informed about the subject. That's all. There's an enormous difference between being informed about the information and the next step to mastery: understanding. The difference is the energy you've invested.

To be informed about something, you listen to an explanation, you watch someone doing it, or you can read about it.

Yet when someone else is explaining something, and you're listening to them, who's putting in the most energy? They are, your effort is minimal.

When someone else is demonstrating something, and you're watching them, who's putting in the most energy? They are, your effort is minimal.

When someone else has taken the time to write something down, and you just read their words, who has put in the most energy? They have, compared to them, your effort is minimal.

Part of this step to mastery is to realize that, when you're just informed about it, your effort has been minimal, considerably less than theirs. You can't act effectively because there's very little inner power in just being informed.

Have you really Got It?
Yet if your mind is quick, you may think that you automatically get it as soon as you've listened. Not so! That thought is pure self sabotage. The distinction you're missing here is that they might be wise, but listening to someone else does not make you wise.

Wisdom is personal, it can't be given or learned, and that which is given is never wisdom.

Once you assume you've got it, it becomes your opinion. Your opinion carries weight with you because it's your opinion, which makes it more attractive than just reason, logic or facts. So you may insist it's right whether it makes sense, or no sense (sometimes written as one word: nonsense.)

Do you Procrastinate?
Your self sabotage mechanism hates being wrong, so rather than accept that you do not know, it'll persuade you that the time is wrong, and you'll do it tomorrow. Tomorrow won't be the right time either, nor will the following day. Tomorrow never comes.

Yet when you're angry you express that anger immediately. You know if you postpone, it will never be done. When the time comes for anything, unless you do it immediately, it soon vanishes in the busy-ness of life.

One secret of success is to abolish thoughts of procrastination, either decide to do it, or not to do it, but don't pretend you will do it later. Rather face the truth. You'll change your life by doing it when you see it is right, and dropping it once you get that it's wrong. Actually once you see it is wrong there is no need to drop it, it'll drop by itself.

Are you Only Informed About It?
How do you know when you do know? You do it! Without action when needed, although you may think you know, you can only know about it, only have the information. You'll change your life once you see that your actions contain your truth. You'll continue deceiving yourself until you make a commitment to the first stage of honesty: to tell yourself the truth.

How do you move up from just being informed about it to the next step of understanding? Good question, that's the next step to mastery.

© Copyright worldwide Cris Baker, www.LifeStrategies.net All rights reserved. Republishing welcomed under Creative Commons noncommercial no derivatives license preserving all links intact, so please +1 and share this widely!

Food for Thought
"We now accept the fact that learning is a lifelong process of keeping abreast of change. And the most pressing task is to teach people how to learn."

- Peter F. Drucker, 1909-2005, American management consultant, businessman, author