Albert Einstein is credited with one of the most overused cliché’s ever, “Insanity: doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” But there is some validity in the meaning of the phrase because if we want different results we can’t continue driving down the same street and expecting a different scenery.   So the question I often ask, especially those who seek my advice, why are we stuck in this malaise and how do we get out of it?  I hypothesize by making the argument that no one would consciously or intentionally choose the least of two potential scenarios, and if one does choose the worst situation it is only because they didn’t fully understand the alternative or was ignorant to the facts of the best choice.

Recently I have talked to several people including a couple of life coaching clients who fit in this category.  They want different results in their personal life, business ventures and the like yet they will not make different choices.  They have the passion, the desire and the work ethic, however they make choices that do not support the desired results they are after.  So as I re-think my hypothesis I struggle with how to get people to see it from the inside out versus the outside in and my conclusion is that people have to be willing to make a paradigm shift in their thinking.  This requires feeding your brain and soul with new food but only after you go through a complete cleansing process.  A person has to free themselves from what they think, believe or have been told and open themselves up to new possibilities which is the cleansing process.  Once that occurs the next steps is to feed the brain and soul with the right information whether it is thru school, seminars, books, music or your inner circle.

To change our results we have to change how we think, and by thinking differently we change how we feel and when we feel different we change what we do, by changing what we do we change our results.  This is how we prove to ourselves that we are not INSANE.