How To Reinvent Yourself
132: Only few will understand.
Welcome reader! Since Telegram members decided on this week's article. It is time for us to cover an interesting one. Reinventing yourself. What does it mean? How should you approach it? Is it even possible? We are bringing you an overview of how to reinvent yourself and what it means in the first place. Reinventing is not what the majority thinks…
Reinventing Yourself?
Reinventing: Before we go any further. Everyone will have a different definition of reinventing and what it means in the first place. Not just a different definition but also the approach to it. Our definition of reinventing? It comes down to figuring out your operating principles and challenging them. This is by far the easiest way to describe it. What is the result of challenging your core beliefs and principles? It comes down to reinventing. A new set of core principles = a new version of you. This is the bare-bones equation that should apply to most situations. Where is this applicable? One could argue in every area of your life. Where will you see the biggest impact of the change? The most visible results for the majority will be split between business, career, and social life. Why those three? If you think about it for a moment, you realize that most of us give those three a big chunk of our daily energy. Not just energy—we also care about results across all three since they have a big impact on our lives. Status, money, social acceptance, emotional support, sense of progress… They all fit under those three—the reason they are the easiest ones to track in terms of reinventing. Career is one of the easiest ones to track. Why? Have you spent years in one industry and want to break into another? Reinventing will have to happen for you to start from zero and build from there—a basic example that should make things clear for everyone. What does reinventing look like on a bigger scale? Toyota is a great example—textiles, cars, food, trucks for government, batteries, etc… We suggest checking the Founders podcast episode on it (source).
Just as established products and brands need updating to stay alive and vibrant, you periodically need to refresh or reinvent yourself. - Mireille Guiliano
Why would you reinvent: Common patterns that are not hard to notice—yet you never thought about them… Until the now. There are numerous examples of those who manage to crush it for a few years—just to hit a big obstacle that seems impossible to overcome: wasting years fighting or simply giving up and calling it a day. This is common and happens more often than you think. Some would argue that it is part of life. When things go well for longer periods, it frequently leads to letting your guard down. Consequences of that? Poor performance and suboptimal results in the long run. How many times have you met those who had everything going for them at one point? A few years pass, and they are lost. Struggling to keep their momentum. This is an easy-to-notice pattern that highlights when to start thinking about reinventing yourself. Another typical pattern that signals it's time to start questioning yourself is when you feel the shift. How you approach or value things is the easiest way to notice it—noticing the change. When the reinventing happens—there is a noticeable difference in how you value things. A shift often projects in the form of feeling that you are wasting your time. On the opposite side of the spectrum? You might feel you are on the right track and should double down on your actions. Everyone reading this has been there at one point in their life—there is this feeling that what you are doing is working, and you should focus further on it.
Progress=reinventing: The younger you are, the more sense it makes. The reality is that if you are measuring (in any form or shape) progress and actively putting in the effort to achieve something (necessity). Reinventing part is inevitable—naturally it will happen every few years. To develop further—you must change. Either through self-realization and actively applying the knowledge (internal factors) or by taking the slower route and letting the environment (external factors) take care of it. Another way to put it? The challenges and opportunities will change you. The internal and external results will most likely be the same—over a long enough period. The internal system is not enforced or actively worked on and won't give much in return. What is the difference between the two? How long will it take for you to notice the results. Relying on external factors usually takes more time and is the slower path—a more natural one. We challenge you to deeply consider what we wrote here and reflect on your life. It would not take long to realize that every time you had a big breakthrough or progress in your life… It was because you took a certain period before noticing the difference where the change was happening.
We could all argue that this was part of the reinvention process. The result? A new version of yourself. Should you fear reinventing yourself and ditching the old principles and beliefs? There are cases in which the new version might not be better than the old one—better suited for your current position in life. No one can deny it. If you are influenced and surrounded by a bad group of people, regularly (ab)using substances or doing stuff that won’t push you out of group’s comfort zone. Those factors will impact you negatively. More so if you are not working on the internal part and relying entirely on the external part to do the reinventing. In the majority of cases? There is nothing to worry about. The reinvention process is normal and should be encouraged as it often means you will be given new tools to handle the old problems. We could all argue that the old approaches and things taught to our grandparents would still work if reinvention were unnecessary. However, everyone reading this knows that is not the case. It is similar to the old world versus the new world we covered last year. Companies evolve, business needs evolve, and personal needs grow. Change is required. Everything was created decades ago but is still present in our lives because founders, creators, and owners managed to reinvent it at the right time.
Problem with this material: The problem with topics such as this one or mindset in general is that they are only valuable to a small population. Better said, they are only helpful to those in a good enough position not to worry about their basic needs. The same applies to any other mindset material we have put out—such as maxims for living a certain life. They don’t make sense if you are struggling or in a position where your #1 goal is to survive. If you are in that position and currently building yourself up… Your time would be better spent starting your side business and learning to minimize risks. If you read thoroughly and follow the steps inside… Both will impact your life and steer you toward a comfortable (risk-free) position. The reality is that actively pushing to reinvent and challenge your inner principles is for those in a comfy position. Does that mean you should stop reading? No. Take care of the fundamentals before diving deeper into this material.
NLP - Neuro-Linguistic Programming (woo-woo level above)
Make sure to check out the Excellence Assured website (source).
Why are we talking about psychotherapy: Suppose you have never heard of NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming)—it falls under psychotherapy, and you have missed out on it if you don’t know what it is. Why are we talking about it in the reinventing post? NLP is one of those things that works. Popularized by Richard Bandler and John Grinder in the 70s. Use case? Helping you reach a specific goal. Disorders, phobias, and addictions. You name it. We are far from experts on the topic, yet since we were introduced to it by one of our wealthy associates years ago… We have noticed specific improvements in our lives and how we managed to play around with the methods. Our goal here is not to go into the details of NLP—we are leaving that part for you to discover. We mention it because one of the main ideas surrounding NLP and how it was initially spread was that it was based on modeling.
Modeling successful strategies and behaviors of those who do it better than you. The topic we covered in our post on mimicking more successful than you. NLP preaches that we all create internal representations of our experiences that shape our perceptions. The answer? A simple one: NLP can be a fundamental teaching tool for reinventing yourself. You won't be able to notice or actively enforce the reinvention to some extent. However, having a good set of tools and principles to work from will set you miles ahead of others. This gives you solid guidelines on what to focus on and keep in mind when working on the internal part. The process itself is a long one. Anyone who claims it is possible to become a different person (reinvent yourself) in a short period is lying to you. Neither having a good sense of when that change is happening and feeling the difference is not something to take for granted. Trust us on this—knowledge of NLP can change your life and should not be ignored.
Your power to choose your direction of your life allows you to reinvent yourself, to change your future, and to powerfully influence the rest of creation. - Stephen Covey
Where to start with NLP: Avoid wasting your precious time on mediocre content or AI-generated articles that Google is full of. Start with the book Lines For Changing Minds or Business NLP for Dummies. Both are not the best of the best. Neither are they going to go into the details of NLP. Neither they will overwhelm you with concepts you have never heard of. Yet they are still more than good enough reads that should help you understand the basic concepts of NLP and what it is all about. Providing practical examples of how they affect your reinventing process is essential—leaving you with an interesting take on its power from Bandler himself.