You're Doing Personal Growth All Wrong
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Welcome to today's episode of the Mindset Mentor Podcast. I am your host, Rob Dial. If you haven't done so, hit that subscribe button so you never miss another podcast episode. I put out episodes four times a week for almost 10 years now. If you want to improve yourself, improve your life, hit that subscribe button so that you never, ever, ever miss another episode. Today, we're going to be talking about how you might be doing personal growth, personal development all wrong.

and that self-help books and conferences and journaling and meditating might not be what you need. And what I'm gonna teach you today is a strategy that I think is gonna help you improve your life quickly. It's a perspective of a way that you should look at the world to grow as fast as you possibly can.

I believe that every single thing that happens to you and happens to me in our lives, every single moment of our life, good, bad, neutral, whatever label we want to put on it, I believe that it is brought to us as an opportunity for us to learn. I believe that our life is a classroom.

and that our soul is here to learn, and that your life is the perfectly crafted curriculum for you to learn what you need to learn while you're here. Why? I don't know. I don't know why. I don't know what happens after this. I don't know what happens before this.

I'll give you a couple just random fun things to think about. But the problem is that most people don't see life that way. They don't see life as a classroom. The biggest misconceptions that I have found about personal development and where I really screwed up in personal development was I thought personal development was sitting down to read a book and

And so I have 400 personal development books and mindset and business and leadership books that I've read over my lifetime. I thought that it was sitting down to meditate and getting myself to learn to be quiet. I thought that it was going to a conference and jumping around like an idiot for a few hours every single day. I thought that it was journaling. I thought that it was listening to a podcast. And all of those things are great. They are an aspect of personal development.

And I do think that they're needed. I think all of them are amazing, but they're not the main thing. They're not the only thing. People think like, oh, I've got to wake up and I've got to have my morning routine and I got to get my 30 minutes of PD in, you know, PD personal development. I got to get my 30 minutes of personal development in. I got to read or I got to meditate or I got to journal. I got to listen to a podcast and, you know, I got to get my personal development in.

Those are fine, but the real place where personal development happens and where you learn the most if you have a keen sense of paying attention to what's happening in your life is your life itself is where your personal development is. That's where your lessons come from. That's where the work has to be put in. You know, some people will sit down and they'll read a book and

And they'll be like, I just read a book on meditation and being more Zen. And I feel great. I got my personal development in. And then 20 minutes later, they go and they get into a massive argument with their spouse. And they don't realize that the book was not their personal development for the day. The argument with their spouse was their greatest opportunity for personal development that day.

Why was there an argument? Why was I triggered in that moment?

What was it about that moment that triggered me? What triggered her? Why were we triggered in that moment? And to sit back and go, that's really interesting. What can I do to learn and get better? Because the book is great. Yeah, I love reading. I think reading's great. I think it's definitely something we should all do. But the argument with the spouse is the universe going, hey, you need to work on this thing. And I'm gonna bring you this lesson over and over and over again. So you got triggered. You were in an argument.

why was there a trigger for you? That trigger, that moment of being triggered is one of the biggest opportunities in your life to learn.

A trigger, and if you've been listening to the podcast for a long time, you know this, when you're triggered, it is a place where you are not free. You are hung up somewhere. And being triggered by somebody else is not somebody else's fault. It's not like, oh, they triggered me. It's their fault. Boo hoo, I'm a victim. No, being triggered is our fault. If I'm triggered, it's not somebody else's fault because I was the one that was triggered. We were triggered.

And I want this to really hit home. A trigger is not your enemy. It's not something that you're trying to avoid. It's an invitation for you to go deeper within yourself. It's a spotlight showing you a wound that hasn't healed yet and might need some more work and some more care. And if someone else doesn't get triggered by the exact same thing, then it's proof that the issue isn't out there.

It's inside of me. It's inside of you. It's inside of us. It's not a flaw. It's a flashlight. It's shining its light on what you need to work on next. And so that's the biggest thing. Were you cut off on the drive to work after you got done with your 20 minutes of meditation and you got pissed and now the next 15 minutes on the way to work, you're cussing at this person who's in front of you? Ah, no, it's not the meditation that's the self-development. It's that triggering right there that's the self-development.

And you have to understand, it's very important. This is the way I always put myself into perspective. I'm one of those people who just really likes to play devil's advocate for myself. Like I look at one side, I'm like, yeah, but if that's what you think, what else is a possibility? So I think to myself, okay, I was triggered by X, Y, Z. If I were to take somebody else, is there a chance that somebody else in the world would not be triggered by X, Y, Z? Yeah. Okay, well, then that's the case. It shows me

that it's not outside of me it shows me that it's inside of me the thing they need to work on so it's not the trigger it's not the other person it's not getting cut off it's not my spouse it's me so you just got to think of that for a second so how can we work through it did your spouse get triggered why where did that come from for them

Can we also help them go through it? You can listen to this podcast, and I love that you listen to this podcast, but it's nothing compared to your real life. You can be all excited. Maybe you're listening to this podcast, you're on the way to Target with your child. You're listening to this podcast, you're on the way to Target, and 30 minutes after this podcast gets done, your child has a temper tantrum in Target on aisle seven, and it just pisses you off.

Right. You're like, oh, my God, they always do this. Or maybe you're just like freaking out. What is this person? You know, that person that's over there, is she judging me? That moment, that moment's your dojo. That moment is your classroom.

target with your kids screaming, that old woman that's judging you at the end of the aisle, and you're starting to freak out. Oh my gosh, is she judging me? What does she think of me? Does she think I'm a terrible parent? My child's driving me crazy. That's the moment where you learn peace, not by listening to my podcast about peace or how to meditate.

You learn peace in the moment where shit's hitting the fan and it's all over the walls. Not when you're in the Himalayan mountains. No, no, no. Here.

And now that's where you learn it. You have to believe me that that moment is a much better place to learn and grow and to have your own personal development than anything else. Can you learn to keep calm in the middle of any storm? Whatever that storm might look like. That child having a temper tantrum is the universe coming to you through your child saying, hey,

Here's what you need to work on right now. Do you think about that for a second? Like, how interesting is that? Maybe, maybe, yeah, it is my child that's throwing a temper tantrum, but maybe I have too much of a short temper and the universe is going, hey, you know what you need to work on today? You know what's really holding you back? Yeah, your short fuse. So you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to have your child have a temper tantrum on aisle seven,

And I'm going to have the lady at the end of the aisle judge you so that you can work on your inner peace. Did you take the universe up on the opportunity? You know, if your boyfriend or girlfriend forgets to call you, they were supposed to call you two hours ago. Maybe they're just out having fun with their friends. Maybe they're mountain biking and they don't have their phone on. They don't have service.

And it triggers you and it triggers your fear of abandonment because of some issue that's unhealed from your childhood. And you get mad at them and you're like, it's your fault you didn't call me. It's your fault. No, no, no, no. That's your trigger. Sure, you can blame it on them, but you were the one that was triggered. And so you got to ask yourself like,

what's this feeling reminding me of? Okay, I'm really triggered that my boyfriend hasn't called me in a while. He went mountain biking. Is he okay? Did he get injured? Is he with some other girl right now? Whatever it might be, right? And you ask yourself, what's this feeling reminding me of? Who's the real person that I'm upset with? Is it my partner or is it my parent from 30 years ago? And we will be right back.

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And when you start to really see this, and I like really, I mean like really, really see this, you go, oh my God, almost every single moment of my life is a lesson. Your life is the perfectly crafted curriculum for you to evolve into the highest version of yourself. And guess what? The universe is just going to keep giving you the same lesson over and over and over again until you pass it.

That's why you keep dating the same person or acting the same way or being triggered by the exact same people or you keep self-sabotaging in some sort of way. And so you've got to learn the lesson or else the lesson, the opportunity to get the lesson is going to keep on coming up until you work through it.

I believe, and this is my belief, you don't have to take this on, I'm completely fine, but I'll just tell you my explanation, right? I believe that our souls, this thing that's inhabiting this body of mine, took this body in this exact life to learn and go through whatever it needs to go through to get on to the next level or the next plane or whatever might happen after this thing. So everything that happens to me because my soul chose it, so everything that happens to me was chosen by me.

Not me, Rob, but my soul. Because Rob was just a name that was given to me when I was born. You know, I was named after my dad. The way I like to see it and I imagine is like your soul sitting down and it's writing down and drafting a college syllabus, basically. Before you were born and, you know, I'll say, we'll take my soul, right? It's like, oh, I was just sitting there and, you know,

In this life, I want to learn compassion. I want to learn forgiveness. I want to learn some courage that's in there. So, okay, if I want to learn compassion, if I want to learn some forgiveness, if I want to learn courage, if I want to learn all that, okay, maybe give me some childhood abandonment issues. Maybe being really hard on myself. Give me some money struggles. Money struggles would be good. Maybe a toxic relationship or two.

Maybe a couple loved ones dying. And my soul goes, "Hmm, yep, that one looks good. Okay, I'll take that body." And I know it sounds crazy, but what if it was true? What if every challenge is a custom-designed lesson for your expansion? Wouldn't that be interesting?

love, loss, sadness, happiness, anger, frustration, joy. Every single one of those feelings that comes up inside of us is some sort of opportunity for me to learn and for me to grow. And anytime that we're just so caught up in the moment, we don't take ourself out of the moment, we can miss those lessons. We can miss our opportunities to grow. And I understand you're not gonna be perfect in everything that you do. You're gonna lose yourself to being triggered at some point in time. I get that.

And then maybe later on down the road, you're going to go, oh man, like I really lost myself. I shouldn't have said that to her. I shouldn't have done that thing. Well, what can I learn from that? And I want you just to realize that the whole point of what I'm trying to say here, and I really want to get across, is that the highest version of you, the best version of you, I'm sorry, but it's not found in a book. It's on the other side of a breakdown.

The highest version of you is not found in a morning meditation. It's in getting cut off on the road on the way to work. The highest version of you is not going to a conference. All of these things are important. They're all very important. It's where you learn more, but

Really where all these things come into practice, you really start to work through and understand about yourself is in these moments where you're triggered, where things happen to you and where you lose yourself so that you can find yourself. And so what you want to do is notice when you get caught up in something, notice the feeling. Breathe that feeling in. Don't resist it. Oh my gosh, I'm feeling really, really angry right now. Don't resist it. Completely fine. What am I feeling right now? I'm feeling extremely angry. Okay. Why am I feeling this way?

This is where you really start to figure out about yourself. This is like the emotional alchemy is what it is, where you turn your pain into wisdom. Wouldn't that be nice? Like that's really the point of pain is to give us more wisdom. And so when you feel that sadness, when you feel that anger, when you feel yourself being, you know, absolutely frustrated about everything that's going on,

You breathe it in. You don't resist it. You feel it and you say, what am I feeling? What am I feeling right now? Why am I feeling this way? And that's where you can turn your pain into wisdom. The wisest people in the world are not the ones who have read the most books. They're the ones who have learned the most from life. They're usually the ones who have been through the most pain and turned it into wisdom.

They're not just like feeling the feelings. Oh, just sit in a corner and just close your eyes and feel your feelings. No, you're actually learning to decode your own life. This is where like the real transformation actually happens. And so when you look at it, being triggered is a gift. Being mad is a gift. Feeling absolute joy is a gift, right?

Feel all of them. Don't resist them. Your resistance doesn't help you. Your resistance to those dark feelings or those hard feelings, it doesn't help you. It doesn't help your loved ones. It doesn't help your children. It doesn't help the world. It's showing you where you're not free. And this is a moment where you can really take a step back and you can learn from it. Because personal development is not something that you schedule. It's something that you live.

The argument is the lesson. The trigger is what teaches you. Your life is the curriculum. So stop treating personal growth like it's just a hobby.

Every moment of your life is personal development. You can't escape the classroom, so you might as well start learning the true lessons while you're here. So that's what I got for you for today's episode. If you love this episode, please do me a favor. Share it on your Instagram stories. Tag me in at RobDialJr, R-O-B-D-I-A-L-J-R. The only way this podcast grows is from you guys sharing it grassroots. So every time you share it, I greatly, greatly appreciate it. And it really, really helps pay it forward for this podcast to be able to grow.

And with that, I'm going to leave the same way I leave you every single episode. Make it your mission to make somebody else's day better. I appreciate you and I hope that you have an amazing day.