The following article was taken from my upcoming book titled, Unlock Yourself. It has been re-purposed for this article on LinkedIn. The book is currently available on Amazon Kindle for FREE until April 24th.
We have three primary gates in which you receive and process information. Picture an immaculate mansion with three heavily guarded entrances under surveillance.
Anytime someone wants to enter, you have to actively allow them in. If it’s someone you don’t trust, will they make it through your gate? How about if they’re heavily armed with the intention to hurt you, will you let them in? I sure hope not!
The same should hold true with your mind. Treat your mind like the mansion. We all have an ear gate, an eye gate, and a mouth gate.
In order to cap the negative, you will have to get really good at monitoring your gates.
1. Ear Gate
We’ve covered a LOT about your ear gate.
Who and what you listen to will determine the direction you go. There are people who will come out of the wood work just to tell you that you can’t do something. These people will constantly strip you down and distract you from your goals.
Don’t allow them into your gate.
There are other things that could enter through your ear gate, like music, that is counter-productive to your vision. I’m not saying that I don’t appreciate a good beat or some vibe music, but that’s not the primary source of content that I allow into my ear gate.
As a matter of fact, music that is not encouraging or uplifting is the last thing I allow into my ear gate. Beware of talk radio that has no correlation to creating the success you’re wanting, or gossip from those around you; those things have a direct impact on your ability to move forward.
When you constantly allow to negative influences to enter your mind, you subject yourself to fear. When fear sets in, you stop moving in the direction of your goals.
Cap the negative that you can hear.
2. Eye Gate
What you see has a huge impact on what you believe you can accomplish. You know what I avoided my entire life, even to this day?
THE NEWS!
I deeply despise news stations because they choose to only report the negative things happening around the world, which leads people to believe that the world is just a horrible place. It couldn’t be further from the truth.
Here’s what I learned. Turn off the news! If something is important enough, the news will find you. Why? Because the negative person at your job or in your class will be the first to tell you about it.
Protect your eye gate from the negative influences that can enter. Stay away from all of the mindless videos on social media that teach you nothing.
You have to adopt the mentality of, Am I watching this to be entertained or educated? I’m not saying you can’t enjoy a few movies or shows…a year (ha-ha but seriously).
I’m encouraging you to spend more of your time viewing things that will inspire hope and optimism in your life, instead of fear and doubt.
Let’s circle back to social media. I have to mention more about this because, for most of us, it is the primary source of content that we interact with today. I encourage you to be intentional about your newsfeed/timeline.
I encourage you to follow those who either (1) have created success in their lives within the career or industry you’re pursuing, or (2) those who are positive and supporting your dreams and goals.
Why? Because that’s a trait of successful people. Think about globally recognized successful people. Check their Instagram accounts for their followers and following counts.
That’s not just a coincidence. They aren’t trying to keep a certain ratio.
The numbers are the way that they are because successful people understand that what they see when they’re scrolling down their timeline has a HUGE impact on their eye gate.
They choose to follow a select few people because they are controlling what they see on their newsfeed when they are on social media.
They’re basically communicating that there are only a few people who they trust to let into their mansion, everyone else, can stay on the outside and peak through the gates because they don’t bring value and perspective to what they’re pursuing.
Take a lesson from some of the most influential and successful people of our generation and clean up your newsfeed.
If they’re so intentional and selective about who they follow, don’t you think you should be too? Unfollow those who are only a distraction and not a catalyst for your success.
3. Mouth Gate
The last gate is your mouth gate and this one is a little tricky. Tricky because it swings both ways.
Of course, you can think of the mouth gate as literally what you feed your body and we’ll talk about that, because what you feed your body is important.
I am not going to take the time to map out a full nutrition plan on what you should eat. But I do want to talk about two specific things that I believe are just unnecessary, drugs and alcohol.
Now, before you accuse me of telling you not to drink and throw me in the category of all drinking is bad, I want to clear the air. I honestly don’t care whether you do or you don’t drink.
I haven’t done any extensive research on it to determine whether or not it’s good or bad for your health. What I do know is, I prefer my life without it. I am much more productive and focused on my goals/vision without alcohol in my system, than with it.
I don’t judge you if you think differently. I don’t think I’m any better than you either. It’s simply a preference I choose to uphold. Regardless, it is definitely something you should monitor entering your mouth gate.
Now let’s talk about the flip side of your mouth, what you’re saying out of it.
There is a direct correlation to what you say out of your mouth and whether or not you will achieve success you’re pursuing.
I have a mentor of mine who challenged me to finish every statement that came out of my mouth with “…and that’s exactly how I want it to be.”
I vaguely (I say vaguely, because I’ve come so far from using negative statements that I had to think hard on what I used to say) remember saying things like, “I’m just not good at organizing stuff.”
“I’m broke.”
“I can’t afford that trip.”
Then I started adding, “…and that’s exactly how I want it to be.” You know what I quickly found out?
What I was saying was NOT exactly how I wanted it to be! I wanted the complete opposite to be true.
So, I began to check my words before they left my gate. I started to rephrase statements to reflect exactly how I wanted my life to be.
Today I say things like, “I’m a money magnet — money finds me wherever I go.”
“I comfortably take trips throughout the year that provide unique opportunities to create memories with my family.”
“I organize my time and calendar efficiently, allowing me to get more done in less time.”
I started speaking things the way I wanted them to be, and guess what? They started to happen! My family goes on at least five trips a year (I remember my family taking only four trips in my entire childhood).
Sometimes we get unexpected checks in the mail that we didn’t plan on receiving. And today, I am able to accomplish in one day what most sales professionals take weeks to get done. That’s what I call God’s favor!
Listen, the longest relationship you will ever have is with yourself. What kind of relationship is it?
Are you verbally abusing yourself on a daily basis or are your encouraging yourself and nurturing the fact that you were born with greatness inside of you?
I wanted to develop the habit of speaking positive things over myself.
You’ll have enough people who will want to dump negative things on you. Do yourself a favor and don’t be an echo of their negativity.
Develop the habit of using your words to take care of yourself instead of harming yourself. Monitor what is leaving your mouth gate.
About the Author:
Eddie is an author and keynote speaker. He has a passion to help youth and young adults to break self-limiting beliefs and earn the success they were all born to create. If you’re interested in booking Eddie at your next event, click here.
You can learn more about his story here.
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