The greatest control is to have no need for control.
Control is an interesting topic.
Most have an extreme need for it, yet it continues to stay beyond our grasp.
The Secret was a worldwide phenomenon. The Law of Attraction became a huge hit.
I’m grateful to have participated; and I also believe that a large portion of the viewership interpreted it through a romanticized lens.
60% of the word attraction is action!
If you sit in your living room visualizing
all day long they’ll come take your furniture away.
The romantics want so badly to believe that we can control external circumstances with our minds.
If you’ve ever attempted Jedi mind control how’s it working out for you?
If you’re honest, you’ll be forced to admit “not very well.”
You can’t control external circumstances. 
You can only control your response to external circumstances,
which allows you to influence external circumstances.
Take Control.
It can change the course of your results and your life.
When life kicked me in the teeth, many a romantic was shattered in their thinking. “One of the LOA experts had something bad happen to him.”
To preserve their belief system they had to make me “wrong.”
Instantly the internet was abuzz with comments like, “Boy, he must not really know how to use the LOA.”
I mean after all, if I did know how to use the LOA “nothing bad would ever happen,” right?
Wrong.
With that logic Socrates, Jesus, St. Paul, Apostle Peter, Martin Luther King, Gandhi, Mandela and a whole host of other world-changers must not have known the LOA either.
Please.
How do you define “bad”? Truth told, the things you think are bad
are only the things contrary to your expectations and desires.
Often unrealistic expectations.
Ultimately you can only control yourself and your response to life.
You can control your thinking and psychology.
You can control your skills and implementation of those skills.
So it stands to reason you must have some degree of control over the actions you take with regard to your particular intention or goal.
That’s why it’s vitally important that you choose an intention you have the ability to complete.
To do this you must have self-awareness; and a realistic understanding of who you are.
How really Self-Aware are you?
When you choose a pipe-dream intention all other strategies fall apart; and herein resides the primary challenge causing frustration and failure to the masses.
When you choose a pipe-dream intention, all other strategies fall apart;
Herein resides the primary challenge causing frustration and failure.
Now please understand, just because you have the skills to complete something doesn’t mean it’s a walk in the park.
No.
Quite the contrary.
Countless studies in psychology and ultimate performance prove that those who reach a level of mastery work hard.
Long and hard.
Mastery ensues when the consequences and stakes are high. 
Go all in.
Choosing something difficult carries the creative tension necessary to not only build a high consequence environment (a quality of ultimate performance), but also the deep feeling that you can do this—it’s just not easy.
In fact, far from easy.
It’s not supposed to be easy.
If world-class work were easy everyone would be doing it.
Then it would only be mediocre-class.
But you can do this. You have the unique genius and gifts, they just need to be developed to maximum and leveraged to mastery.
That presupposes you’ve chosen a goal, direction, intention that you have the unique gifts and genius to accomplish.
Not a pipe dream like the masses.
But a real dream like the masters.
While the masses chase romantic glimmer and pipe dreams.
The masters work diligently on their true authentic dream.
Being in your right place brings a feeling of control. Not control of external circumstances. But control of the internal strategies that allow influence of external circumstances.
Get the difference?
You can’t control the waves of life
but you can learn how to swim and surf.
Where did you begin?
You want to have a greater degree of control?
Go after your own unique authentic dream.
Not mine.
Not what society tells you to go after.
But your own unique Magnificent Obsession that you’re willing to trade all your days for, from this day to the last.
Whether you ever “make it” or not is not the point.
You’re focused; and you’re in flow; and your happiness and fulfillment are overflowing.
Stay Awake, Love Life, and Be Epic!
James
