Creating Breakthroughs in Your Life

Creating Breakthroughs in Your Life

"Continued learning is the most important predictor of success."

• Brett Pinegar
  

 

Have you ever felt a desire to change but haven't been able to? If you have, then you're just like the vast majority of us. I can see a lot of areas I'd like to change in my life so I've been searching for ways to make a "breakthrough."

So, when I had the chance to sit and talk with Brett Pinegar, the author of "The Breakthrough Company" I was in hopes I could use some of the principles he's discovered on a personal level. I couldn't have arranged for this meeting alone so I give my thanks to Wayne Brown Institute and Mountain West Capital Network for opening the way for me.

Fall has always seemed to be a time of new openings, new beginnings. Perhaps it's because it signals the opening of a new school year, a new football season and training camp for basketball. The leaves begin to change because the nights become cooler. Everything seems to be changing and I always feel a sense of anticipation.

The anticipation I feel is decidedly different from the dread my fourteen year old daughter feels as she begins another school year. It isn't that she doesn't like to learn. Far from it; she reads far more than most people I know. As I look at her I realize that at an early age she's discovered what Brett Pinegar calls "The most important predictor of success."

Continual learning or being a life-long learner is essential for success. That makes sense when you look at the pace of change in today's society. I've had to continually make changes in the way I think and work, just to keep up!

If there's one certainty in life, it's change. Life seems to be designed that way. Still, knowing that doesn't make changes easy. This was made clear to me when visiting with my friend Ed Dalton.

We were talking about the challenges his daughter is facing. She's a bright young woman who had a successful medical practice. One day as she descended the stairs at her home, arms full of stuff, she tripped and fell. The fall broke her ankle in a horrific way and it's led to a cascade of other medical issues that have left her clinging to life on several occasions.

As I sat face to face with Ed talking about their challenges, one important question came to my mind. So, I asked it, "What can you learn from this?"

Ed took the note book he always carries in his pocket and wrote the question down. He could instantly see the importance of this small question. It's a question that's important for each of us to ask on a daily basis. Make sure you ask it to yourself every day!

Asking, "What can I learn" will cause you to become what Brett Pinegar calls, "an advocate for change." It means you'll enable yourself to look at the world from different views. You'll become adaptable; being able to change more quickly. This change will create what psychologists call "the cycle of positives" in your life. Positive lifestyles always attract more positive lifestyles, and that's when your life will really begin to grow and change for the better. Larry Glenn says, "Because you possess the experience and knowledge, you can begin helping others improve their lives as well."

New people will begin to associate with you as they're drawn into your cycle of positive experience and knowledge. They'll be important to you because they'll help you discover new truths and enable you to surround yourself with a group of "Sages" or Mentors. Associate with others who will tell you the truth so your cycle of positives will keep growing and your new life and joyful lifestyle will keep creating, accomplishing, and attracting the new life you've always desired.

Begin to create your cycle of positives today by becoming a continual learner, asking what you can learn from your experiences, adapting to change as quickly as possible, looking at different points of view, advocating change, associating with others who will tell you the truth, and surrounding yourself with a group of Sages. If you will, you'll begin to create breakthroughs in your life!