The Ten Realizations of a Steemit Ninja, Pt 2, the First Realization and How to Use this Guide

How This Book Works

As a man thinks in his heart, so is he- Ancient Proverb

Einstein said that continuing to do the same thing and expecting different results was the definition of insanity.

This guide is designed to help you open up your imagination and change the way you think. Each chapter is written to help you reach a specific realization that is needed to progress to the next level. Many of them may be things you have already recognized in your own experience, some will be new.

At the end of each section you will find specific action steps, with suggestions for free services that will help you achieve the results you want. If you choose, use this as your business plan and follow it to a T, but I really intend it to be a set of guidelines to show you one way it can be done.

Following the work steps is a written affirmation. These are designed to be read aloud, with one section being read every day for ten days. Read each three times, once immediately after waking up, once after your midday meal, and once aloud before bed.

Each new realization will include the basic elements of the realizations that come before. It is said that if something is repeated for a period of thirty days it becomes a part of your thinking, a habit, or way of seeing things.

I suggest to get the biggest benefit from these ideas, that the final realization, covering the basics of all ten realizations be read for thirty days, and can be adopted as a daily reading.

Why? If you are like me, this sounds a little crazy at first. Why would reading something from this book, or any other, make such a change in the way you do things? The answer is, I don't know, and in fact I don't care, but the author of this book has used this type of mind re-education many times over and seen the results.

If you want to change your actions, to avoid insanity (according to Einstein) you must first change your thinking. As creatures of habit, many of our actions become automated, kneejerk reactions based on ideas and patterns of thinking that have been built up through study and life experience over years.

To introduce a radically new way of thinking (which I hope this is) you need to interrupt the current thoughts and replace them with something new.

That, or it's magic, whichever, but I will give you this: Anyone who can prove that they have followed the reading program previously suggested and has seen absolutely no benefit in their business lives, can have their money back.

One word on the concept of "realizations". "Confessions",

"Affirmations" and a host of other terms have been used through the years to describe positive verbal reinforcements. What we are after here is something a bit deeper. We want you to recognize things that you already know and put them into practice to "realize" them.

Realization: noun 1. the making or being made real of something imagined, planned, etc. 2. the result of such a process

The First Realization

Alone You Are Powerless

“No man is an island." Poet, John Donne

You are a self made Business Ninja! You worked your way through business school. Pulled yourself up every rung of the corporate ladder. Studied hard to gain the skills you needed. Worked nights stocking shelves to pay off your student debts and finance your first business.

You glide through markets with silent stealth, separating competitors from would be customers, and winning them over to your way of doing things like a sales assassin, and you have no one to thank but yourself for your success. You earned it, and no one can take credit for your accomplishments. Right?

Maybe, but then again...

Although Ninjas are always depicted as the lone warrior, sneaking into the enemy stronghold solo to carry out their dangerous missions, no one ever learned to disappear into thin air, throw Ninja stars with deadly accuracy, or escape from enemy clutches unscathed, without a teacher.

Neither can you. But it isn't enough to know, or even understand this. A realization is a much more powerful experience, and it is squarely at the heart of your rise to Networking Ninja mastery.

Before you begin your training, let's talk about what this realization will mean to you. First, it should not be a hopeless thing, it is not meant to belittle your own accomplishments, or cast doubt on your skills, abilities or talents.

Those are yours, you worked hard to achieve them and you are rightly proud of your accomplishments. We will talk more about those later when we get to the 5th Realization, the realization of what you have to offer.

When I was forced to leave the comfort of my theater academy, a job that I had held for fifteen years, due to the pressures of the housing market collapse in 2008, it was scary. I realized that I had no real connections in business.

So, I found a friend who had been working on making connections in the business networking community in our city and asked him to introduce me to networking. It was one of the best decisions of my life. He needed my creativity and communication skills, I needed his people and computer skills, together we formed a formidable team that neither of us could have built alone.

So, here is where it begins. To really appreciate how much you owe your success to others, sit down with a pen and paper, or fresh word processor document and laptop, whichever works best for you, and think back as far as you can remember.

Begin a list of your accomplishments. Make this as detailed as possible. Start with things like, learning to read, or ride a bike. Move on to your first championship baseball game, or orchestra award, listing every accomplishment up to and including your current job or business. Everything that you have ever done well at.

Once the list is complete, go through each item on the list and name at least one person without whom that item would not have been possible. Try to recreate the web of acquaintances and relationships that helped make you into the woman or man you are today.

Focus on the positive, there is plenty of time in life for regrets and bitterness, this is a time to be thankful.

Pick a few of these people, the ones that really stick out and write just a couple of sentences explaining to them their contribution to who you have become. Remember, stay focused on the good about you. There are plenty of people around who will remind you of the bad.

Now read these aloud to yourself, thinking through each of them and the difference they made, how each opportunity led to another, how each relationship moved you forward, prepared you for something new, opened a new door.

As you do this, allow the fabric of your life to unfold inside your imagination. Follow all the little forgotten paths, like how the ability to ride your bike led to your time at the library, or the comic book store, or made it possible for you to take your first job.

See how the influence of people who were willing to teach you and help you, recommend you for jobs, and build into your life made it richer. Don't allow yourself to delve into their motives, it is not useful. Stay on the positive.

Allow this to continue unfolding until you feel you have a picture, a snapshot of the influences in your life and at least some of what they meant.

Quietly, in your mind, begin to remove these influences from your life one by one and see what is left. See how one missed opportunity erases others, erases experiences, erases relationships. Allow yourself to feel that loss.

If you are honest, you will probably find that there is little you can truly take credit for, except perhaps those things you have helped others accomplish. This feeling, which hopefully contains equal parts gratitude and humility, this is the realization of how powerless you would be if you were truly alone in this world.

This feeling can lead to good things. We can only truly be our best selves when we allow others to invest in us, and we, in turn, invest in them.

From this realization you can begin your quest for Steemit Ninja-ness. Now that you see how valuable connections are, you will begin seeking them out. Not just for what they will add to you, but what you can add to them as well. This realization of powerlessness will empower you to build the network you need to build the life you have been dreaming of.

After a month or two of building on our casual acquaintance, James and I had a talk. We decided to partner up on a business idea. I would supply his skill with words, while James would bring his web development skills to create something that would be greater than the sum of its parts. That idea would have to wait, because someone else was waiting in the wings to bring an even bigger idea into focus for us.

The First Realization

(to be read as described)

Alone I am powerless
Without the aid of those who have gone before, and are walking alongside, my success will be impossible.
Even the simple act of planting a seed was proceeded by the planting of another.
I am powerless, but not hopeless and the realization of my powerlessness brings no fear.
Life will provide exactly the right resources at exactly the right time if I am open to their arrival and unafraid to accept them no matter the source.
My powerlessness brings me a sense of peace, because I am powerless even to fail on my own.
What business can succeed without customers?
What student can learn without teachers?
What builder can build without materials?
I will adopt an attitude of gratefulness to those who have been my teachers.
I will accept with humility the resources that others bring to aid in my success, even when the price is paid through my own labor, for I recognize that without them, my labor is useless.
Alone I am powerless.
But around me, in front of me and behind me are all the abundance of the universe, and I am not alone.

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