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We may not be able to control everything in our outer world,

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but we certainly can control our inner world.

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And so, It's not so important to not react.

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I mean, everybody reacts.

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I react.

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The question is, how long are you going to react?

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That's the question.

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So,

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we found out that when people react emotionally

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with anger, with antagonism

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there's an arousal that takes place because

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you're turning on the sympathetic nervous system.

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And the sympathetic nervous system is a primitive system
saying,
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Alex, whatever that, whatever that is, is a threat to you.

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And if there's a threat, a good way to

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deal with a threat is to get aggressive.

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That's primitive.

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It's animal.

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It's very animal.

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Some people will say, Oh my God, there's my ex.

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And instead of getting angry, they run,

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they flee.

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They're in fear.

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They're like the fear, I'm better just getting away.

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So they fear causes them to run.

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when people feel fear, when they feel anger,

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when they feel pain, those are the primary stimulators

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that switch on that sympathetic nervous system.

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And they used to say

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that it's automatic

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It happens automatically.

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That's part of the autonomic nervous system

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and you really don't have any control of it.

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Turns out that's absolutely not the truth.

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So first thing is learning how to shorten your response

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To the emotional reaction.

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So if you have an event that happens to your life

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in your life, and I say, Alex, why are you so mad today?

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And you say, Oh, it's because of this situation

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and this person, this happened this way.
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And I would say, Oh my gosh, do you mean

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that that person or that circumstance

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is controlling the way you feel and the way you think?

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Now anything that's controlling the way we feel

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and the way we think makes us victims.

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Whatever that is.

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Now, that's okay.

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But if you keep that emotional reaction going on

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for hours or days, and I say to you, Alex, it's five days.

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What's up?

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And you say to me, I'm, I'm upset from

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something that happened to me five days ago.

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I'd say you have a mood.

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You're in a mood.

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Now, some people keep that same emotional

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reaction going on for weeks or months.

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And then I would say, well, Alex has a angry temperament.

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It becomes a temperament.

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If we keep it going for now, this is true.

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People keep this going for years on end.

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If it goes on for years, now it's a personality trait.

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So here's the weird part about it.

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You ask that person who's been angry for years, why they're
angry

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and they'll recall an event from 10 years ago,

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or a series of events from 10 years ago

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and the research on the memory says that 50% of that story

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isn't even the truth that they can't remember the truth.
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They embellish the story and make it sound worse than

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it really was to excuse themselves from changing.

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Now, what we tell people is

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forget the event.

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It doesn't matter.

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The details of the event doesn't matter

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What matters

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is learning how to overcome the emotion.

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So when you're sitting in a meditation

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and all of a sudden out of nowhere, your body starts getting
aroused.

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And it starts getting frustrated

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and it starts getting angry and people say, I'm doing my
meditation wrong.

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You know what I say to them?
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No

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You're doing it right.

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That has to come up.

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So then,

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so when the anger and the frustration comes up

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and a person's in a meditation,

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they have one of two choices to quit, which is what they've
always done.

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But if you're sitting with 1500 people and no

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one else is quitting, you're not going to quit.

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And if I teach you how to lower the volume to

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that emotion, And I teach you a way to change that

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every time you settle the body back down into the

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present moment and lower the volume to that anger.
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That's a victory because you're telling the body,

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it's no longer the mind that you're the mind.

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Now it'll go, well, yeah, well, what about

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this circumstance and what about that?

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And it'll get aroused again.

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And then you notice it and instead of turning on the TV or

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getting on your cell phone or getting on the social media.

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You lower the volume again.

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Now, this is the work.

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It turns out every time you do that, that victory,

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you're telling the body that it's

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no longer the mind, that you're the mind.

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And then all of a sudden it wants to get up and go

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 it's busy.

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It's got things to do.

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And it's, and, and you become aware that it wants to

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do that and you bring it back to the present moment.

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You're executing a will

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that's greater than the program.

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Now, it turns out if you do this enough times,

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Sooner or later, the body surrenders.

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Sooner or later, the body acquiesces.

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It says, I'm no longer the mind.

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Alex is the mind.

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And when that occurs

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there's a liberation of energy.

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That anger, that frustration, literally turns into energy.
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It's released into the field as information.

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Now, you return back into your life,

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and you see the same person or the same circumstance,

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your response to them is going to be much less.

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Why?

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Because you took care of it.

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Within you, you're not trying to fix it out there,

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it's just that your response is different.

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So now, if you're no longer responding to the environment,

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and your response to the environment

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isn't weakening the organism, because stress depletes
energy,

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then you're less susceptible to the environment.

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Now you can understand that whether it’s joyful or
stressful, with every thought you think,
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every emotion you feel,

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and every event you experience, you’re acting as an
epigenetic engineer of your own cells.

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You control your destiny.

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So this raises another question: If your environment
changes and you then program new genes in new ways,

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is it possible

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— based on your perceptions and beliefs

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—to program the gene ahead of the actual environment?

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Feelings and emotions are normally the end products of
experiences,

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but can you combine a clear intention

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with an emotion that begins to give the body a sampling of
the future experience

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before it’s been made manifest?

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When you’re truly focused on an intention for some future
outcome,

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if you can make inner thought more real than the outer
environment during the process,

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the brain won’t know the difference between the two.

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Then your body, as the unconscious mind,

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will begin to experience the new future event in the present
moment.

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You’ll signal new genes, in new ways, to prepare for this
imagined future event.

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If you continue to mentally practice enough times this

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new series of choices, behaviors, and experiences that you
desire,

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reproducing the same new level of mind over and over again,

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then your brain will begin to physically change

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—installing new neurological circuitry to begin to think
from that new level of mind

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—to look as if the experience has already happened.

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You’ll be producing epigenetic variations that lead to

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real structural and functional changes in the body by
thought alone

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—just as do those who respond to a placebo.

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Then your brain and body will no longer be living in the
same past;

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they’ll be living in the new future that you created in
your mind.

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This is possible through mental rehearsal.

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This technique is basically closing your eyes and repeatedly
imagining performing an action,

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and mentally reviewing the future you want,

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all the while reminding yourself of who you no longer want
to be (the old self) and who you do want to be.

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This process involves thinking about your future actions,

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mentally planning your choices, and focusing your mind on a
new experience.

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Let’s go over this sequence in greater detail

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so we can more thoroughly understand exactly what’s
happening in mental rehearsal and how it works.
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As you mentally rehearse a destiny or dream about a new
outcome,

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you imagine it over and over again until it becomes
familiar to you.

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The more knowledge and experience you have wired in your
brain about the new reality you desire,

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the more resources you have to create a better model of it
in your mental picturing,

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and so the greater your intention and expectation are (as
with the hotel maids).

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You are “reminding” yourself of what your life will look
like and feel like once you get what you want.

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Now you are putting an intention behind your attention.

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Then you consciously marry your thoughts and intentions with
a heightened state of emotion,

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such as joy or gratitude.

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(More on heightened states of emotion is coming up.)

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Once you can embrace that new emotion and you get more
excited,

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you’re bathing your body in the neurochemistry that would be
present if that future event were actually happening.

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It could be suggested that you’re giving your body a taste
of the future experience.

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Your brain and body don’t know the difference between
having an actual experience in your life

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and just thinking about the experience—neurochemically, it’s
the same.

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So your brain and body begin to believe they’re actually
living in the new experience in the present moment.

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By keeping your focus on this future event and not letting
any other thoughts distract you,

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in a matter of moments, you turn down the volume on the
neural circuits connected to the old self,

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which begins to turn off the old genes, and you fire and
wire new neural circuits,

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which initiates the right signals to activate new genes in
new ways.

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Thanks to the neuroplasticity discussed previously, the
circuits in your brain begin to reorganize themselves

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to reflect what you’re mentally rehearsing.

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And as you keep coupling your new thoughts and mental images
with that strong, positive emotion,

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then your mind and body are working together—and you’re now
in a new state of being.

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At this point, your brain and body are no longer a record of
the past;

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they are a map to the future—a future that you’ve created
in your mind.

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Your thoughts have become your experience, and you just
became the placebo.

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A Few Mental-Rehearsal Success Stories

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Maybe you heard that story a while back about a major who
was imprisoned in a concentration camp in Vietnam

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who mentally practiced playing golf on a particular course
every day to keep himself sane

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—only to shoot a perfect score when he was finally released
and returned home.

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Or perhaps you’ve heard the account of Soviet human-rights
activist Anatoly Shcharansky, later known as

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Natan Sharansky, who spent more than nine years imprisoned

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in the Soviet Union after being falsely accused of spying
for the United States in the 1970s.

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Sharansky—who spent 400 days of his prison term in a small,
darkened, freezing-cold punishment cell

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—played a game of mental chess against himself every day,

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keeping track of the board coordinates and the positions of
each piece in his mind.

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This enabled Sharansky to maintain many of his neural maps

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(which normally require external stimulation to stay
intact).

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After his release, he immigrated to Israel and eventually
became an Israeli cabinet minister.

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When world chess champion Gary Kasparov came to Israel in
1996

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to play a simultaneous chess match against 25 Israelis,
Sharansky beat him.

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Aaron Rodgers, quarterback for the Green Bay Packers, also

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imagines moves in his head that he often later executes
with precision on the field.

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Leading up to the Packers’ 2011 Super Bowl win, in a
play-off game that the sixth-seeded Packers won 48 to 21
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against the top-seeded Atlanta Falcons, Rodgers completed
31 of 36 passes (86.1 percent),

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the fifth-best postseason completion percentage of all time.

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“In the sixth grade, a coach taught us about the importance
of visualization,”

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Rodgers told a sports reporter for USA Today. “When I’m in a
meeting, watching film, or[lying] in bed

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before I go to sleep, I always visualize making those plays.

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A lot of those plays I made in the game, I had thought
about. As I [lay] on the couch, I visualized making them.”

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Rodgers was also able to successfully spin out of three
potential sacks in that game,

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later noting about those plays, “I visualized the majority
before I made them.”

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Countless other professional athletes have also used mental
rehearsal to stunning effect,

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including golfer Tiger Woods; basketball stars Michael
Jordan, Larry Bird, and Jerry West;

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and baseball pitcher Roy Halladay.

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 Champion golfer Jack Nicklaus wrote in his book Golf My
Way:

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I never hit a shot, even in practice, without having a very
sharp, in-focus picture of it in my head.

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It’s like a color movie. First, I “see” the ball where I
want it to finish,

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nice and white and sitting up high on the bright-green
grass.

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Then the scene quickly changes, and I “see” the ball going
there:

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its path, trajectory, and shape, even its behavior on
landing.

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Then there’s sort of a fade-out, and the next scene shows me
making the kind

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of swing that will turn the previous images into reality.

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Only at the end of this short, private, Hollywood
spectacular do I select a club and step up to the ball.

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As we can see from these examples alone (and there are many,
many more just like them),

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plenty of evidence shows that mental rehearsal is extremely
effective for learning

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a physical skill with minimal physical practice.

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I can’t resist adding one more example, this time from Jim
Carrey,

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who tells an amazing story about what he did when he first
came to Los Angeles in the late 1980s

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as a struggling actor looking for work.

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He’d written a paragraph-long affirmation on a piece of
paper about meeting the right type of people,

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getting the right types of acting jobs,

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working on the right movie with the right casting, and being
successful and contributing something worthwhile

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and making a difference in the world.

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He would go up to Mulholland Drive in the Hollywood Hills
every night

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and lean back in his convertible and look up at the sky.

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He’d say that paragraph to himself, committing it to
memory,

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as he imagined that what he was describing was actually
happening.

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And he wouldn’t drive back down from that Hollywood overlook
until he felt as though

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he was the person he’d been imagining, until it felt real
for him.

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He even wrote a check to himself for $10 million,

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penning “for acting services rendered” on it and dating it
“Thanksgiving 1995.”

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He carried the check in his wallet for years.

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Finally, in 1994, three movies were released that made
Carrey a star.

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First, Ace Ventura: Pet Detective came out in February,
followed by The Mask in July.

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And for his role in the third movie, Dumb and Dumber,

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released in December, Carrey received a check for exactly
$10 million.

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He created exactly what he had envisioned for himself.

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What all of these individuals have in common is that they
eliminated the external environment,

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got beyond their bodies, and transcended time so that they
could make significant neurological changes within.
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When they presented themselves to the world, they were able
to get their minds and bodies to work together,

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and they created in the material world what they’d first
conceived in the mental realm.

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Scientific studies back this up.

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To start with, many experiments on mental rehearsal

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prove that when you concentrate on a particular region of
the body,

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your thoughts stimulate the region in the brain that governs
that part

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—and if you keep doing it, physical changes in the brain’s
sensory area will then follow.

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It makes sense, because if you keep placing your awareness
in the same place,

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you are firing and wiring the same networks of neurons.

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And as a result, you’ll build stronger brain maps in that
area.

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In a Harvard study, research subjects

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 who’d never before played the piano mentally practiced

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a simple, five-finger piano exercise for two hours a day
for five days

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—and made the same brain changes as the subjects who
physically practiced the same activities,

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but without ever lifting a finger.

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The region of their brains that controls finger movements
increased dramatically,

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allowing their brains to look as though the experience
they’d imagined had actually happened.

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They installed the neurological hardware (circuits) and
software (programs),

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thereby creating new brain maps by thought alone.

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In another study of 30 people over a 12-week period,

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In another study of 30 people over a 12-week period,

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In another study of 30 people over a 12-week period,

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some regularly exercised their little fingers,

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while others just imagined doing the same thing.
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While the group that actually did the physical exercises
increased the strength of their little fingers

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by 53 percent, the group that only imagined doing the same
thing also increased the strength of their little fingers

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—by 35 percent. Their bodies had changed to look as if they
were having the physical experience in external reality over
and over again— but they only experienced it in their
minds. Their minds changed their bodies.
In a similar experiment, ten volunteers each imagined
flexing one of their biceps as hard as they could five times
a week. Researchers recorded the subjects’ electrical brain
activity during the sessions and measured their muscle
strength every two weeks. Those who only imagined flexing
increased their bicep muscle strength by 13.5 percent in
just a few weeks, and they maintained the gain for three
months after the training stopped. Their bodies responded to
a new mind.

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Their bodies had changed to look as if they were having the
physical experience in external reality over and over again

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Their bodies had changed to look as if they were having the
physical experience in external reality over and over again

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Their bodies had changed to look as if they were having the
physical experience in external reality over and over again

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— but they only experienced it in their minds.

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Their minds changed their bodies.

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In a similar experiment, ten volunteers
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each imagined flexing one of their biceps as hard as they
could five times a week.

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Researchers recorded the subjects’ electrical brain activity
during the sessions

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and measured their muscle strength every two weeks.

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Those who only imagined flexing increased their bicep muscle
strength by 13.5 percent in just a few weeks,

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and they maintained the gain for three months after the
training stopped.

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Their bodies responded to a new mind.

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A final example is a French study that compared subjects

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who either lifted or imagined lifting dumbbells of
different weights.

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Those who imagined lifting heavier weights

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activated their muscles more than did those who imagined
lifting lighter weights.

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In all three of these studies on mental rehearsal,

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In all three of these studies on mental rehearsal,
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the subjects were able to measurably increase their body
strength using only their thoughts.

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You may well wonder if studies exist showing what happens
when we follow the entire sequence

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—when we not only imagine what we want to create,

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but also connect with strong positive emotion.