After 6 years, I quit.

At 15 I knew the business I wanted to start. By 24, it wasn't what I wanted anymore.

What do Brave New World, network marketing, and your family upbringing have in common?

For a while I felt like a huge failure, and that I'd wasted my time. Yet it formed me. It conditioned an internal environment that would not conform to the external environment. There was this voice in my head that I needed to invest at least 15 minutes a day in learning and growing.

Conditioned For _____?

If you don't know what you want, any road will get you there. - Keith Kochner

What are you conditioning yourself for? Are you putting yourself in environments where your best necessary? Are you training your body and mind? Your creativity? Your ability to be excellent in "small things?" Are you dreaming great dreams, and having the courage to go after them?

“No man has the right to be an amateur in the matter of physical training. It is a shame for a man to grow old without seeing the beauty and strength of which his body is capable.” ― Socrates

No man has the right to be an amateur in the matter of mental training. It is a shame for a man to grow old without seeing the beauty and creativity of which his mind is capable.

My name is Daniel Baarns, I operate a mobile detailing business in the Sacramento area, and have been fascinated by business and the process of conditioning my mind since I was 15.

I started my first business at 18. My mind was conditioned to see the necessity of learning and applying what I learned.

It's two legs:

1. Learning

2. Action

Learning without action leads to spinning in circles. Acting without learning and improving also leads to going in circles. (often making the same mistakes over and over)

Before I started this business I had the conditioning of my family. There was this entrepreneurial thread. Both my parents had their own businesses. There was also this idea of being impressive and/or perfect (perhaps an LA thing). I had siblings who got almost all A's in college. So I knew I could do very well in school because I had the same genes. I knew if I didn't do well it was my responsibility because they had the same genes as me and they were doing well. If they could do it so could I.

This tendency towards personal responsibility started very early.

When I wanted to learn a martial art at 13, I payed for it. When I went to summer camps in high school, It was out of my own money. When I wanted to go on a trip to Disneyland with my church at 16 and pay for my sister to go too, I went and got a job to pay for that. I didn't expect to be given things.

When I moved to northern California to do a 2 year internship I knew I needed to make money to pay for this. The internship had two "days off" which I used to do yard work or other odd jobs to make money. For these two years and the next 3 years afterwards I also worked on every Sunday. This conditioned me to see weekends as a time that I work. Over the last 8 years I've worked either Saturday or Sunday. Either because I worked at a church, or because I was detailing and Saturdays are really good days for many people to have their vehicle detailed. I don't see weekends as days off.

You're conditioning as you grow up and early in your life has an impact on how you live today. But It doesn't define who you are. Wether you had an environment that conditioned you to be confident and empowered you to figure things out or not you can create this today.

What is expected of you?

How can you create an expectation of excellence? A habit of showing up as your best self in every area of your life. For many people this starts with physical health. There is something powerful about having mastery over your physical health. When accumulating small wins in this arena, it becomes easier to accumulate wins in other areas. For years people saw me as disciplined because I've worked out since I was 11 years old, and my family has a high value on being healthy. This set me up for success in ways that I didn't fully understand until now.

How do you start to build this internal Environment?

How do you build the confidence to start?

For me it began with physical health. Because I was healthy, I believe that can learn most things with a bit of time and practice. This was a conditioning from a young age. I've been conditioned to be healthy from my families culture.

There is something about having a level of control over my body, that does help me in other areas of my life.

I also joined a network marketing company at 18 and that environment normalized growth. Learning and growing were required and celebrated in this environment. Personal growth plus application of that growth into your business was the way to increase your income.

Because of that I was introduced to Keith Kochner, and he shared about a concept called a 36 month mentality. How your actions today link to who you want to be in 36 months. He is one of the voices I want to become most like.

What Brave New World taught me about conditioning. (after my 3rd time reading it)

When I was in middle school I'd fall asleep listening to metal.

"The principle of sleep-teaching, or hypnopaedia had been discovered." - Brave New World

It's a way of brainwashing yourself with the material of your own choosing.

"They'll have that repeated 40 or 50 times more before they wake... A hundred and twenty times three times a week for thirty months." - Brave New World

How could you reprogram you mind towards faith hope and love with 14,400 repetitions of the same thing over 30 months? You are already programming yourself with something. Is it what you want to become?

In 2020, I listened to these podcasts called Fathers and Sons part 1 and 2 (I’ll link them at the end) falling asleep for weeks or months straight. It had one core prayer that ended up in me going to Ecuador (a dream I’d had since I was 17) The prayer was this: “I pray that (you reading this) would live by faith, be known by love and be a voice of hope. That you would dream great dreams and have the courage to go after them.”

I also used it as a way to learn or maintain languages. I'd fall asleep listening to Spanish to keep my mind used to hearing the language. I'm currently falling asleep listening to Russian.

"Spend a lot of time with a little vocabulary, rather spending a little time with a lot of vocabulary" - Language Lords Youtube Video

This is true of who we listen to as well. Choose whose voices matter to you, and spend time with them until it's a part of who you are. I've read How to Win Friends and Influence People 10 times in the last 10 years. Some of how Dale Carnegie wrote and thought is unconsciously a part of me, because I've spent hours listening to his book.

It's hardest to start.

According to Dr Shad Helmstetter most children have heard "no" or what they can't do 148,000 times by the time they reach 18.

How do you gain the confidence to go to a new class?

How do you get yourself to try something new when It's so far outside your comfort zone?

You're biggest problem will be changing the way view yourself.

That the way you've always been doesn't have to remain who you'll always be you can condition a new you with time and repetition.

Warning: This won’t happen overnight! How to condition your internal world (in 8 steps and 36 months)

1. Inventory the voices that shape your current world view:

   1. Your family and upbringing (tradition/religion Ect.)

   2. Your friends

   3. What you listen to and watch: Music/Youtube/Streaming Services/Social Media

   4. What you read

2. Develop physical discipline (even as simple as a 5 minute workout or walk to begin with)

3. Choose the 3-5 voices of people who's essence and character you want to emulate.

4. Develop a list of topics you want to learn about. (like Ben Franklin did more on that here)

5. Create a weekly feedback loop with a friend or coach to stay honest with yourself. (hint: we're all human the goal is progression, not perfection)

6. Invest a minimum of 15 minutes learning about one of these concepts each day

7. Fall asleep listening to one of the 3-5 voices that you want to become like.

8. Keep your daily actions in alignment with who you want to be in 36 months. (break it down into 12 week sections)

References/Influences:

Language Lords Youtube Video

Dr Shad Holmstetter Interview

Brave New World - Aldous Huxley

Keith Kochner - Mentorfish (tons of content there)

Erwin McManus - Mindshift Pod

Fathers and Sons Part 1

Fathers and Sons Part 2

Have nothing to do with godless myths and old wives’ tales; rather, train yourself to be godly. For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come. 1 Timothy 4:7-8

No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. Hebrews 12:11

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—His good, pleasing and perfect will. Romans 12:2