Mindset: Asking Yourself The Right Question

If you are guilty of asking how questions often, such as How do I start a business, How to get clients, how to attract men/women, How to lose weight, I will describe the problem of the question. I will also explain what kind of question you should replace it with and what is going on in your subconscious mind.

The problem of “How”

“How…” questions are very popular and I noticed many people ask them.  No wonder! We all want to know how. Go on the Internet, go through some articles and you will see at least every other article with a headline consisting of “How to…”.

Here is the problem however. If you are just reading articles with any intention of taking any action, no one cares. But I find that majority of people who want to take steps to improve their life or an area of their life, do exactly the same thing. They search on the Internet “How to start a business”, how to lose weight and how to attract the opposite gender.

That typically leads to low quality, quick-fix information, which is the problem number one. What is worse, that person then reads another article, then another, then watches a video or two, or ten. All of that leads you to getting stuck in gathering information or analysis paralysis.

And information products gets sold that way. It is (no) secret that success of information products stand on this very principle. I know, marketers know, people who create the information products know that people want to know “How.”.

The real issue is left behind

All that while the real issue is left behind, unnoticed. Gathering information is an action in itself. People are afraid or uncomfortable to take action that would lead them to their desired results, but that requires action. You know that. But then, to feel good about ourselves, to get a feeling of progress, growth and even achievement, we take at least some kind of action – gathering information.

It is a way for us how to numb our feelings of guilt that we did not take action that would have moved us in the desired direction.

But guess who never sleeps and always pays attention? Your subconsciousness. You might fool yourself, but you will not fool your subconscious self. If you try to do that regularly, you need to stop at some point and start taking action or it will lead to gradually lowering your self-perceived worth / self-esteem.

The second reason why we don’t take real, valuable action and keep looking for how to guides, is that we are not aware of our emotions (By the way, getting aware of your emotional state is about 80% of my coaching.). When we are not aware of our emotions, feelings and why we do what we do, we do what is familiar. But to create something new, to start a business, to lose weight, to become an attractive person, we need to do the exact opposite – break the habit.

The third reason is perfection. If you try to be so perfect  that there is no space for action, re-think your way of doing things. Things will never get perfect. Getting ready to get ready will not lead you to get new customers nor a perfect website will. a perfect diet plan does not exist, there is only perfect diet plan for you and to find it you need to experiment, not read books and forums and articles and watch youtube videos. Nobody will ever say “Look how attractive that man behind a computer reading about how to be confident is.”.

I was guilty of all the three things. I tried to be perfect to some extend. I wanted my website to be perfect before publishing it but realizing that a perfect thing that nobody knows about is simply a waste of time.

The real value hidden in why?

Instead of asking how questions over and over again, you should focus on you why.

If you don’t know why you do what you do, i.e. you don’t have a compelling reason, you will not do what is needed to be done. If you don’t know how and know why, you will find a way regardless. – Daniel Weiss

You might argue that knowledge is the power. Tony Robbins mentioned this in one of the first self-development material I have ever heard. He said that we think that knowledge is power. But many people go to university, study, have a lot of knowledge and it does not help them. Application of knowledge is power!

Nowadays, you can go on the Internet and search and find out good answers on any subject within minutes. For example a very popular topic is weight loss. I think you already know how to lose weight, if you wanted to lose it. But we tend to search for the perfect way how to do it, before we even move. And then you might even feel guilty and eat some deep fried ice cream to numb the subconscious and your feelings of guilt, shame or not being enough.

Find you why and everything will line up. Search how to after you have already started or you will figure it out yourself.