“Make your move!”  Tony bellows and instructs me and 6,000 of my new friends from the stage. “Say YES!” “Make the sound of unstoppable intensity!” ARRRRRRRRHH! The roar is immense. The energy in the room beyond palpable. To say this is a unique event is a vast understatement. It’s far more then a seminar, and move of an experience that must be seen to be truly believed.

I proceeded to lose my voice the first day of the 4 day seminar. What I did find were some of the things that were mentally holding me back, and a fantastic community of those trying to change their lives and live them to the full.

The 4-day event revolved around key tenets of Tony’s teachings, first that we can change our emotions and “state” using our physiology.  Secondly, all humans have 6 core “needs” and that we mentally and emotionally need fill these needs, sometimes in unhealthy ways. Thirdly, we all hold “limiting beliefs” that may have served us, or met our needs at one point, but are now holding us back. Fourthly, we can remove the fear associated with these limiting beliefs by changing what we associate with them, including our “state.”

The FireWalk

The famous, to almost parody levels, firewalk came on the evening of the first day. At no other event will you see several thousand people walk barefoot through the Dallas Convention Center en masse. I’ll admit I was a little apprehensive, since I’ve heard of this going wrong before, and people being burned. Seriously, do a quick search, and you can find articles on the internet about it going awry. With 6,000 people doing this in a parking lot, it wasn’t as intimate as it could have been, for something as powerful as it could be. Nonetheless, it was a great and powerful experience, that we can do more than we think we can. It also comes with a cool nickname, Firewalker, if not least  a cool bar story. “I walked on fire last weekend, what did you do?” sounds SO much more interesting than “You got sloppy in Uptown and took Lyft home? Cool story bro”

Losing Your Limiting Beliefs

If anyone’s taken more than a passing glance at psychology, they’ve heard about Pavlov’s famous conditioning experiment about his dog salivating at associating a bell sound with food. Oddly enough, humans arent that different. Really. Various things have happened to us in our lifetimes, that we have come to associate fear with. Some of these make sense, like stepping in front of a bus. Some don’t. Not asking for that raise that you deserve, showing interest in that single guy you’re crushing on, or not starting a side project you’re passionate about, hold us back from living a live of joy and fulfillment.

I’ll share two of the old limiting beliefs I’d struggled with for YEARS, and have banished from my head and heart. The first was that of a scarcity mindset. I’ve been through some tough times since moving to Texas in 2005. The year 2007 was a particularly tough year which saw me lose my Nissan, drop out of grad school, lose most of my faith in God, and go flat broke. These things carry scars and pain. I’m sure everyone has their own version of a story, when you were blindsided by life, and didn’t know which way was up. This left me with an understandable “scarcity mindset.” This meaning that I would struggle to get by in all areas in life, with “just enough to get by” and never have more than enough. Abundance is all areas is a great goal that few achieve. I thought it was out of the cards for me. I was wrong.

The second thing I’ll share banished from my head and heart was the idea that “I’m not worthy. A great many people struggle with the idea of deservedness, or being worthy of the best life has to offer. For the longest time, I wanted those things, but thought they wern’t for me. They were for some other guy, who was smarter, harder working, model-handsome, or ……..something. That thought is a total load of male cow manure. Theres no inherent labeling of folks as worthy or unworthy of most of the things in life. Unless I have the dream to play in the NBA. As a 5’9  guy, thats likely not gonna happen, Unless your J.J Barrea. He’s listed at 6’0, but that’s a bit of a stretch. Other dreams, if I’m willing to hustle and learn, are eminently within reach. The power comes from knowing you deserve it when you get there.

Transformation Day

The third day of the seminar was dubbed “Transformation Day.” This was the day we changed our fears and limiting beliefs out for new empowering ones. The most  powerful exercise we did that day was to visualize our lives 5, 10 and 20 years into the future if things went the way they were currently going, with our current “limits” in place. As you can imagine, this exercise dredged up a lot of pain, and hurts. That was the design. The catharsis was imaging live without the current limiting beliefs in place, and having those things we wanted, but we’re to scared to go after. In psychology terms, we learned to associate limits with pain, and being free from limits with pleasure. It worked on me.

Unleash YOUR Power Within

I honestly can’t commend this event enough. I really can’t. If you’re thinking it’s just a seminar, you’d be very, very wrong.  I’d heard a lot about Tony’s live events, and absolutely wanted to be here, to deal with the above mentioned things in my life. I don’t know your personal “why” but we all have things holding us back. An immersive long weekend can get you well on your way to removing the lid that’s been holding you back.

The tag line of “One Weekend Can Change Everything” isn’t pure media puffery. The next event is in March in New York. If you can find a way to go, make it a MUST to be there.

(Full disclosure, I asked for and received a free General Admission pass the the event. No other compensation has been received)