Adjusting Goals

RIGHT after I posted my last blog — about wanting to attract a 1955 Mercedes-Benz Gullwing SL300 into my life —  I learned the windows in the Gullwing doors do not lower. That means once you close the doors, you are sealed inside.

It also means the inside cockpit will get HOT. Yes, there are side vents. But drivers in the 1950s would open the Gullwing doors at stop lights in order to let air in. (!)

No wonder Clark Cable has the door open!

I live in hot and humid Texas. This car would not be pleasant to be in for very long.

With this fresh news now in my awareness, the tag phrase “…this or something even better” takes on a whole lot more relevance.

I no longer want that car.

Lesson: Always be willing to adjust your goals as new information comes to you.

But let’s dig deeper.

Why did I want that car in the first place?

Why was I inspired to pursue it?

Why didn’t it work out?

I think there’s a lesson here for you and me. Let me reveal it through a quick story…

Teye and his amazing guitars

Recently I met Teye, an Austin guitar maker of some gorgeous hand made guitars. His are playable art. They sound incredible and look beautiful. He brought in two guitars (pictured above) and we talked for a couple of hours about guitars and music. Along the way, he told me his story. (Told here with his permission.)

At one point he was wealthy and well off. He drove a luxury car, was highly paid as a performing musician as well as a music teacher, and had the life most of us would envy. He was set for life.

But Teye wasn’t happy.

In fact, he told me he was almost suicidal.

Why?

Because he had no challenge. He was comfortable. He was coasting. He had nothing in him to turn into a fire. No spark. He was alive but dead inside.

He was one of those “quietly desperate” that Thoreau warned us about.

And that’s when he did something about it.

He contacted the late Tony Zemaitis, a guitar maker of now legendary and collectible guitars. Eric Clapton, George Harrison, and other icons love his guitars.

Teye commissioned Zemaitis to make a guitar for him. It would cost around ten grand to get the project rolling. This was around 1990, when ten grand meant more than it does today.

The late Tony Zemaitis

This was the action Teye needed to take to come alive again.

But I didn’t understand it perfectly, so I asked for details.

“How did ordering a Zemaitis guitar change your life?”

“Because I had to do something different to raise the extra money,” Teye told me. “Wanting it broke me out of my comfort zone and forced me to think bigger and act bigger. Today I’m a guitar maker largely because of that big step back then.”

This stunning guitar was made for Teye by Zemaitis. Today it's worth upwards to $100,000.

And that’s why I was led to want that Gullwing, a car selling for more than $850,000. Not that I’m unhappy or feeling desperate, but it was time for me to expand my potential and increase my wealth set point.

The effort to attract the Gullwing wasn’t about attracting such an expensive car; it was about stretching myself into being the kind of person who could easily afford such a car.

Previously the most expensive car I ever owned was the Rolls-Royce Phantom. I bought it for $450,000 — on the day the stock market dropped the most points since the Great Depression of 1929. So much for me being a victim of circumstances.

Getting that car expanded my sense of deservingness, and also led to the creation of the now famous Rolls-Royce Phantom Mastermind, an evening with me that became so popular ABC News covered the one I did with fitness celebrity Jennifer Nicole Lee. Those special masterminds also paid for the Rolls. In short, attracting the Rolls also attracted the means to pay for the Rolls.

Jennifer Nicole Lee at Phantom Mastermind

But the Gullwing was selling for $900,000.

That’s twice what the Rolls sold for!

This was expanding my own sense of what’s possible.

I remember making the call to the dealership that has the Mercedes. I was nervous. In my mind, I didn’t think of myself as a high-end car collector. I have a handful of cars, and I’ve given away a handful of cars. But I’m no Jay Leno.

See PS below about this book

Well, that’s simply a belief. And beliefs are what create our reality. So wanting that car made me look at — and dissolve — my limiting beliefs.

Obviously I’m not encouraging you to order cars or guitars beyond your means. But I am encouraging you to reach beyond your comfort zone and go for more. It doesn’t have to be a purchase, it can be a purpose.

Whenever you desire something bigger than yourself, you expand your mind, melt limitations, and turbocharge your energy.

I've hired Teye to build this beauty for me

The other day I interviewed Arielle Ford, the world’s most famous book publicist, for my Hypnotic Gold members. She told me the authors who were the most successful were the ones with “a sense of mission.” They weren’t just selling books; they were changing lives.

I finished reading Arnold Schwarzenegger’s amazing book, Total Recall, and see the same sense of “goals bigger than me” syndrome. When he was governor of California, he created a list of goals that made the people around him hyperventilate. But he knew “big risk, big reward.”

My wanting a rare Gullwing, if only for a few days, expanded my potential to allow more into my life, and increased my creativity in conjuring up ways to receive more. After all, a billionaire friend once told me, “The more people you help, the more wealthy you can become.”

Think about that.

Lots of lessons in this post:

• Adjust your goals as new information becomes available.
• Desire something bigger than yourself to stretch your potential.
• Have a mission to serve others while expanding your own power.

You may have gleaned another lesson or two from this post and the last one. Feel free to share your insights with me and others with a comment below.

Meanwhile, I wonder what goal is next?

Ao Akua,

joe

PS — Your goals should make you excited as well as a little nervous. If you want to see someone showing you what it is all about to go for something truly huge, watch this video of Phillipe Petit in 1974 walking a tight rope across the Twin Towers. He spent years dreaming and planning. And when he got in the air on that rope high above New York City, he spent 45 minutes there! Read Petit’s astonishing book, Man On Wire (or see the documentary of the same name), for the breathtaking details. What is your big daring scary exciting dream?

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