Self Realized, Shatter Your Limits

Beyond Promises: How To Activate Your Inner Power

• Linton Bergsen • Episode 93

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Have you ever considered unlocking your true potential lies in questioning everything you've ever been taught? In this transformative episode, I turn to the wisdom of Bruce Lee using some of the knowledge from his YouTube video The Mindset That Separates Bruce Lee From Others https://youtu.be/CR0K2BBo7Os?si=7hCa8lW3X7BjPU-8  and the groundbreaking innovations of Nikola Tesla to challenge the limits of conventional wisdom. By stepping outside the boundaries of what you know, you can ignite personal growth and connect with your inner power. This isn't just about adopting new habits in diet or exercise, it's also about cultivating a mindset that dares to question, experiment, and transcend the ordinary to discover your extraordinary capabilities.

Join me as you explore how curiosity and courage can fuel eternal growth. Dive into the art of aligning theory with practical application, emphasizing the importance of continuous questioning and exploration. Through honest introspection and a quest for understanding, you'll find ways to remain purposeful and connected to the very essence of creativity.

Subscribe to stay engaged with future episodes and explore more about this journey at selfrealized.com, including insights from my book "Purposeful Vision." Embrace the courage to challenge the status quo and unlock the limitless potential within you.

Let me know your thoughts on this episode. Text me your feedback! 🙂

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Linton Bergsen:

Welcome to the Self-Realized Podcast with Linton Bergsen, where you will shatter your limits. I am not much into the self-help industry as much as I'm into the self-realized individual, which is you, what matters most to you, how you get there and the obstacles that may be in your way. If you would like to be part of this podcast and part of that discussion, I welcome you here with an open heart, open mind and open arms. So, without further ado, let's get on with the podcast. Thank you for taking the time out of your very, very valuable day to join me on episode 93 of the Self-Realized Shatio Limits podcast.

Linton Bergsen:

Beyond Promises How to Activate Your Inner Power. How do you activate your inner power? Where would that come from? That activation come from? It's not as complicated as you may think. In the show notes I have left a link to a YouTube video. If you have the time, I would like you to watch and listen to. The video is by Bruce Lee, who was a phenomenal martial arts expert for those of you who may not be familiar with him, and he also made a lot of movies. One of his most well-known movies is Enter the Dragon, and the reason I suggest you look at the video when you have time is because the answer to the question beyond promises how to activate your inner power is really encapsulated in what he is saying and presenting. The video is an hour long, so I broke down some of the ideas and concepts that he is sharing that I agree with and I think you'll find very useful. His suggestion is that people came to do martial arts and they wanted to be as good as he was at it and they trained and they were fit and they were strong and they worked out and had a certain diet and discipline that they were given and they did that diligently over and over again. What he's suggesting, and what I agree with, is that they could never become better or as good as him as long as they just concentrated on diet and exercise. Why as long as they just concentrated on diet and exercise? Why? Because they were staying within the confines and the mindset of the techniques and the results that those techniques would give them. They were promised certain results by doing certain things a certain way with a certain outcome.

Linton Bergsen:

How Bruce Lee differentiated himself, and how you can differentiate yourself, is this he suggests that being involved with just techniques and following what people tell you can only lead you to the results that they got. And how do you then begin to look at activating your inner power and becoming the best at something, if that is your goal, or at least becoming very good at something above the average, if you only want to follow the guidance and the suggestions that others give you, that they have tried and tested, that they were given before that. So it's an ongoing cycle. Everybody's just doing what everybody else has been told to do. The techniques are the same.

Linton Bergsen:

Bruce lee said that what differentiated him out wasn't his training, wasn't his fitness. It was his ability to access his own inner power and direction within his own life and what he wanted to do, by questioning what was put in front of him, by challenging the techniques that were presented to him. I agree with that mindset and the difference it can make in your life. He realized for himself that you can't go beyond a certain point unless you question what has been given to you, and that is common sense and that really is how to activate your inner power. He understood that. A lot of people understand that, from a common sense perspective, if someone says to you, here's a technique, and they may be considered to be a master, as they did in his field of martial arts. He decided to research and look at things a little differently as to could the techniques that he has been presented be improved upon? Are the techniques that he's been given generating the most amount of power for the results that he wants in his martial arts?

Linton Bergsen:

Well, through questioning, through not accepting the status quo, through thinking outside the box, he went beyond where most people would take martial arts, outside of the norm, by questioning and by developing a mindset of what is truly possible, if I go beyond the techniques and parameters that I have been given, because he refused to be limited by them and experiment beyond the norm. He mentioned and I agree with this that everybody that tried to be like him or be as good as he was couldn't be as good as he was, not because they weren't physically able or they didn't have the strength to be as good as he was. They simply couldn't be as good as he was because they didn't think outside of the box, they didn't question to activate their true inner power beyond the promises that they had been given as to what could be accomplished, beyond the promises that they had been given as to what could be accomplished. So what's the true message about you activating your inner power? It's not about if you can really work harder than anybody else, because a lot of people work hard but they don't get anywhere. It's not that if you are physically and mentally fitter than someone else that you might be able to outperform, if that's what you want to do, or at least be your best at what you do. No, your true inner power lies in the fact.

Linton Bergsen:

Are you questioning what's going on in your life, beyond what people are presenting to you, beyond the techniques and promises of what should be possible? Contemplate in that for a moment. Isn't that the biggest difference? Contemplate in that for a moment. Isn't that the biggest difference that you can make in your life to yourself? Going beyond the promises that people are making you and telling you what is possible? As Bruce Lee did, take it a step further. Ask the difficult questions, challenge yourself, challenge yourself and if you have to go against the status quo Now, you might be a disruptor at that point, but you're disrupting things not for the sake of it, but for your own personal well-being and development. Because if you don't do it, if you don't question, if you don't develop that mindset of not accepting things as they are and questioning people, situations, circumstances around you about. Well, I understand that you've done it this way and it looks a certain way when you do it, but I have come up with another way of doing something that is different, that works for me. That could even be an improvement upon what you've done. Now, a lot of people are not receptive to that, but that doesn't make any difference, does it? Because as long as you are receptive to it and it's working for you as it worked for him, then you continue on, because you're getting better results, faster than most people, because they're doing the same thing over and over again that they've been told and they're getting the same results.

Linton Bergsen:

Questioning and activating that curious mindset within yourself is how you activate your inner power. Don't accept other people's promises of what is possible for you, because they're measuring themselves against what they think you can do, and the world is filled with that. If you do this, you'll get that result. No, if I do this, that's the promise you're making. If I think differently, I might get a different result, and that's the promise I're making. If I think differently, I might get a different result, and that's the promise I'm making to myself which promise would you rather make? The one someone else is making for you or the one that you're making to yourself? If you want to activate your inner power, the promise you're going to make to yourself going forward is I will question what is presented to me. I will look at things from a different perspective. I will accept what is presented to me, but it won't be the final step I take. It'll be one of the steps I take.

Linton Bergsen:

If you look at history, you'll see examples of that. You'll see that Nikola Tesla worked with Thomas Edison and at the time Nikola Tesla met Thomas Edison. He was involved in electricity in the form of direct current. Tesla, obviously being around Thomas Edison, working with him, could have accepted direct current as the norm, as what was going to be the norm for electricity, but he didn't. He was in an environment that allowed him to be exposed to these concepts and ideas about electricity. But he decided to think out of the box, take it a little further and Nikola Tesla came up with AC, alternating current. He took the idea to Thomas Edison. They didn't see eye to eye on that. Thomas Edison had his direct current, nikola Tesla had alternating current. So Nikola Tesla eventually went his own way to develop what he had come up with AC, alternating current, which is now the electricity that we all have in our homes. The important point is, like Bruce Lee, he was in an environment that allowed him to be exposed to concepts and people that he was interested in, but his mind was such that that wasn't enough. He wanted to do something a little different and see how things could be improved upon.

Linton Bergsen:

That is how you become better and more successful in your field, if you want to be, than other people, because a lot of people can apply current techniques. A lot of people can be told what to do. We see that in all of our lives. In pretty much every area of our life, we are told if we do this, we'll get this result. That is the promise. Because we want to know what the result will be is the promise because we want to know what the result will be, and there's nothing wrong with that, as long as you go beyond that point, beyond the promise that you are made and you activate your inner power by the all-important mindset of curiosity and questioning how you are going to be an individual that really has your own unique abilities expressed is, for a moment in time to contemplate, to think to yourself, be curious, ask questions, don't be frightened to go up against the status quo, so to speak, and say well, I understand, if you're working with an organization or you're working with different people, that that is how things are normally done and these are the results that we have received from doing things this way. However, what if we try this? And I have an idea.

Linton Bergsen:

Because you want to be an innovator, you want to be a creator, because that's how you feel fulfilled in your life. Innovation and creativity and curiosity all are activated by your inner power of questioning how things are now, the current situation, going beyond the promises that you have been told are possible or that people would like to deliver to you. That you have been told are possible or that people would like to deliver to you. You are going to go beyond just receiving information. You are going to create your own personalized, individual, functional knowledge and information by experiencing new things for yourself, by developing your curiosity, doing the research to implement certain things. If that's what you need to do in your life, as Bruce Lee did, that other people may not be doing right now.

Linton Bergsen:

One of the concepts that Bruce Lee talks about in the YouTube video is the concept of functional truth. I call it practical spirituality and I think along the same lines as Bruce Lee when it comes to that concept, because functional truth is what you really want. You really want to have tested things in your own life that don't just work in theory, but they work in the reality of everyday life. They are functional, and the only way that you can live a functional truth is by asking questions, running experiments and see if, in everyday stresses, in everyday situations, does your truth, does your reality hold up every day or does it fall apart? Is it in fact a functional truth or is it just theory? And that requires you to be brutally honest about your life and what you're doing with it and how you're approaching it, because questioning requires courage, it requires you to want to get down to the very core of what is working in your life, not just in theory, because that is of no use to you.

Linton Bergsen:

You can ask yourself questions, honest questions, about your business life, about your personal life, your relationships. You can ask questions to yourself about your goals and it's in the questioning that you may have and come up with more questions and keep peeling back that onion, so that you are constantly evolving and growing and getting into the very depth of your soul and your being, even in your spiritual life. You can ask questions about your meditation, the techniques that you have been given. Are they working for you? Can you refine them? What could you do differently? Just because you were given this technique of meditation, it doesn't mean you just apply it blindly or you follow it without some introspection upon the results and you measure the results. You begin to feel them as a practical, functioning reality in your life of something that you can use. Can you actually, in a functioning way, feel the peace that you are trying to get out of meditation or whatever it is that you're trying to accomplish? Ask yourself those questions Am I really getting out of this, what I'm putting into it, and if not, why not? And then keep re-examining that in a very deep and profound way.

Linton Bergsen:

I am going to give you some questions from the Bruce Lee video that he suggests you ask. I agree with them and I will give you them here today, because when you look at the video when you have time, it'll be in context. But if you don't have time right now to look at the video, at least you will have some questions formatted in your own mind that you can begin to use. When people begin to present things to you that they suggest might be beneficial for your life and the outcomes that you would like to have for them to have true meaning to you, you may want to ask these questions Level 1. How does it work? Level 2. Why does it work? Level 2. Why does it work? Level 3. Under what conditions does it fail? Level four what hidden assumptions are we making? Level five how can we break through these assumptions?

Linton Bergsen:

And if you'd like to know more about assumptions, I talk about that in episode number 20, how assumptions are ruining your life. Number 20, how assumptions are ruining your life. Bruce Lee suggests that in his experience, most people never got past level one or two before they gave up on the questioning. Obviously, you have to go through them all in order to get results. These are just five questions that you can begin to implement in your life when you're presented with situations, that you can use them ongoing without them failing when you go into the real world, because if you only have a theory about anything and it fails in the real world, it's because you haven't questioned what it is you're doing and honed it down to a very simplistic place of this is what works and this is how, and this is why and that is what you really want in your life.

Linton Bergsen:

Take things down to the simplest version of themselves. Get rid of the complexity. And I agree so much with Bruce Lee in this video. That's why I suggest you watch it and listen to it when you can. Complexity is part of our life. We get involved in complex situations sometimes, but then it is up to us. If we're truly going to empower ourselves and go beyond superficial promises and activate our inner power, we have to begin to dissect certain things, simplify them and use what we can in the most effective manner, and that again requires application from you into the questioning of the validity and application of everything in your life. I will leave you today with three more suggestions from the video that I feel are very important and I do support that will allow you to live beyond promises and activate your inner power.

Linton Bergsen:

There are three things that you want to do in order to make sure that you are indeed activating your inner power successfully, and the questions that you're asking are having the results that you would like. Does it work in reality? Are they practical, functional truths that you are beginning to own? Number one test everything under resistance. Number two measure results, not intentions. And number three be willing to discard what fails, no matter how long you have practiced it. No matter how long you have practiced it.

Linton Bergsen:

Questioning, experimenting, running theory against practical application requires courage. It requires you to go beyond promises that are made by individuals and people as a possibility of outcomes and to have the courage to activate your own inner power by questioning what's going on around you, no matter how difficult or painful that may be. For you to constantly be in a state of personal development and growth Ultimately, there is no end to growth. Ultimately, there's only continual growth. And for you to be that individual that feels constantly alive and moving towards something extraordinary in your life, you have to continue that quest, that journey of questioning curiosity, to remain feeling alive, purposeful and connected to the source of the entire creation, because life is a mystery, creation is a mystery, and when we live in that mystery of I wonder what's next and embrace it with enthusiasm and expectation as opportunities for growth and exploration, we become sponges, ready and willing to receive the answers to the very many questions that we have.

Linton Bergsen:

I sincerely appreciate you listening to the podcast. Please subscribe so you do not miss any upcoming episodes. Whatever platform you're on, please leave a rating and review. I would greatly appreciate it. Any additional information on me, Linton Bergsen and my five-star reviewed book, Purposeful Vision is available at selfrealized. com. Which is all one word. You can also leave any comments or suggestions on the website. I look forward to connecting with you very soon and take good care of yourself.