Quick question before anything else. When was the last time you were really tested at something? Tested to the point where you had to know the material, not just consciously, but unconsciously?
You've heard me say ‘knowing and not doing is the same as not knowing’ and one of the reasons most people don't act on what they know is because they only know it at the level of ‘conscious competence’, meaning they have to think about it, rather than ‘unconscious competence’, meaning they do it automatically.
Well, for me, that test took place a few days ago in a room in Delemont, Switzerland. I promised last Sunday I would tell you about that trip, so here it is.
The Level 5 Test 🇨🇭 For the past several weeks I have been studying hard for an exam. Not a typical exam, but something with far more implications for the direction of travel for the life we live.
As many of you know apart from running the Sage Academy with now over 80,000 students globally, I'm also a member and faculty member of the Global Information Network (GIN) which is run by my good friend Kevin Trudeau.
GIN progresses in levels, and to pass Level Five there is a test. A serious test. Over 1000 fill-in-the-blank questions across a variety of topics including: Specific success principles. Tests across 15 of the classic success books, some well known, others not so much. A written vocabulary test. An etiquette test. A verbal test, and more. It lasts for up to seven hours under full exam conditions (and yes that includes no electronics of any kind.) The pass rate?
Ninety percent. That’s a high bar, and the only way to do it in the time allowed is to know the material so well you don’t have to think about it. So think about this. You’ve probably invested hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars in your own personal development. But how well do you actually know the material? Let me put it this way. If you have to look it up or think about it, or go back and check your notes, you don’t know it well enough.
There are many reasons Kevin sets the Level 5 bar this high. Members at this level should be able to demonstrate in their lives the results of the success principles they are learning. Not by recalling information, but by knowing it in your DNA. That’s a great lesson for life in whatever you’re studying.
It also leans into the discipline factor. Studying for something like this requires commitment, dedication and a willingness to do whatever it takes. Great qualities no matter what direction you are looking to go in life. The sad reality is that many people in society today have been seduced under the instant gratification drug, or worse, the ‘dabble factor’. This Sunday if results have not been going the way you want for a while, it may be worth just checking to see if either of those two have crept in.
After 35 years in this industry, there’s one thing I can tell you categorically. Change happens in a decision. What is a decision? Well that was one of the test questions actually. The verbatim answer I’ll share with you. Step 1 - know what you don’t want and turn your back on it. Step 2- know what you DO want and say "I’m doing it, that’s it - Period!"
Can you feel the difference in making THAT kind of decision versus what most people confuse for a decision which is more like a wishy-washy statement of intent?
What could be a decision YOU make this week that will have an impact on your future?
It could be a health decision. To stop eating sugar, or visit the gym twice a week, or join a yoga group.
It could be a financial decision. To stop with destructive debt and make and stick to a plan to clear your credit cards. Or to learn the basic principles of wealth building and actually apply them.
It could be a relationship decision. To stop the need to be right. To learn your partner's love language and use it once a day.
To put it bluntly, decisions, build destinies. Not circumstances. Not excuses. Not your parents or what they did, not the government or what it's doing, not your Ex or what they said. Decisions. What is yours going to be this week?
I made a decision to pass the Level 5 exam - and in case you were wondering, I did. At 94%. Although if I hadn’t I would have studied harder and booked in for the next one. Because the one thing failure can never live with is the persistence of someone who is committed.
Have you ever wondered why the affirmations do not stick? Why the achievement, when it finally arrives, somehow never quite lands? Why the validation, when it comes, does not fill the shape you thought it would?
It is because you have been trying to build something that was already there. You were not born with a self-worth deficiency, there. You were born whole, and everything you have been doing to earn what was always yours has been the wrong work in the wrong direction.
In this video I walk through five of the most common weights people quietly carry on top of their own self-worth, and what happens when even one of them comes off.
Ten minutes: stick to the end if you have them today.
