The Holy Sh*t Moment: How lasting change can happen in an instant

Much of the pre-work involves information gathering and embracing new ways of thinking, but it also requires not letting sudden insight pass you by.

It involves opening your mind, asking the question Is this it?

It’s about looking at the world with an investigative mind-set, in which what you seek is opportunity to change. Inspiration can arrive from anywhere and at any time. Be prepared.

Is. This. It?

Ask yourself that question when you experience something that might be a catalyst for change. Most of the time, the answer to the question is going to be “No, it really isn’t.” But it’s all practice.

It can be because of this practice, the opening of yourself, the attunement, that allows epiphany to strike. Speaking of practice, getting stuck is good.

“When you tackle a problem, and fail to solve it, it sticks in your craw—and your brain.” This is from Professor Beeman’s book The Eureka Factor, coauthored with John Kounios, a professor of psychology in cognitive and brain sciences at Drexel University. The authors explain that ideas can require an “incubation period.” The work you do thinking now doesn’t mean you have your epiphany right now too. You work until you “get stuck.” Then the unconscious takes over while you’re busy doing other things.

In most stories of major life transformation, an epiphany is almost a constant. Many who have experienced massive change can identify a specific instance when their outlook got on track in a much more positive way. Changing one’s body is a powerful manifestation of the moment of change, because a healthy body often equates to a healthy mind, and overcoming the challenges associated with physical improvement also imparts valuable life skills. I mean, unless it’s weight loss resulting from unhealthy methods such as popping unregulated diet pills like they’re Skittles or going on some batshit crazy fad diet some celebrity is flogging. The latest dietary dumbassery I heard about was an Oscar winner proudly proclaiming the completion of her eight-day-long, goat-milk-only cleanse. I’m happy I don’t have the job of cleaning her bathroom.

The Snowball Effect

There is a switch inside many people set at “I can’t.”

When it flips over to “I can” for one thing, it doesn’t stop there. Research shows life-changing epiphanies are rarely “one and done.” Often the catalyst for initial change is a massive mental shift, but smaller epiphanies can arise at random during people’s life journeys, to bump them further along their quests to be the best humans they can. Professor Miller explained that people who have such experiences often have further, clarifying epiphanies later in life. “There appears to be an opening to having that experience,” he said.

Take a moment and think back: Has this happened before?

Have you experienced a life-changing moment in the past? What was it like? How did it manifest? Can you relive it? Can you imagine something like that happening again? Did you learn something important from the experience you can bring toward future life change?

If the answer is yes, it’s called a “past performance accomplishment.” It’s a parameter of self-efficacy theory, created by Stanford University psychology professor Albert Bandura in 1977. It’s about how you form perceptions regarding your ability to perform specific behaviors. Past success = confidence, which makes people more determined to persevere, even in the face of adversity.

If you’ve had an important insight in the past, it makes it more likely you can have one again in the future. Cue Jimi Hendrix: Are you experienced?

Positive life change can assume myriad forms; don’t fret if you’re not interested in pushing your body. But I do encourage contemplating some form of activity as part of the new you. I say this because you were not meant to sit idly and watch Earth spin on her axis. You were meant to rise and join the fray that is the human condition. Movement empowers from top to toenails; it can even come to define you, should you find the right exercise.

Whichever activity a person chooses, if they enjoy it, is the right one. The path ahead has more choices than there are beers in a Munich autumn. Finding which flavor suits best requires taking a few taste tests.

The Holy Sh!t Moment is about achieving the clarity of purpose to carve your own path to success.

Switching Tracks

Consider this word carefully: “momentous.”

The topic of this book is not about merely deciding the future path your life will take. It is about a momentous event in which you suddenly become aware of the answer and change at a fundamental level from the experience. It’s not only a spark of insight, it’s an awakening of passion.

Such an “answer” is rarely well-defined or black-and-white, and effort is required to find your way along the appropriate path.

Do you remember The Karate Kid? Not the worst film ever, but the message is dogshit.

Perhaps you’re too young, or maybe you were there, in that theater, and you disagree. That’s because it was the eighties, the decade of bad decisions, even though we didn’t realize it at the time. So many pastels …

Go ahead and watch it again—the original with Ralph Macchio—and see if you realize why the message it relays is canine feces.

My wife is a second-degree black belt in karate. Both our children are black belts, and my daughter competes at the international level. I can attest that you don’t get good at karate by spending a few weeks waxing cars and painting fences. You get good at it because it’s your lifelong passion. And because it is your passion, you are motivated to do the damn work, hours of work, day after day and year after year!

The Karate Kid disrespects the work by advocating an extreme shortcut to success. It disrespects the fact that my daughter has been in karate since she was five years old, and trained her ass off, sometimes twenty or more hours a week, to win that gold medal at the USA Open ten years later.

Work is glorious, and inspired work transforms. It transforms your body, your mind, your spirit. Someone who kicks ass at life is not a sofa-sitter. Such people can be efficient, but they’re not the type always questing for a quick fix. They don’t believe—using weight loss as an example—that some miracle macronutrient ratio is going to open a rift in the space-time-insulin continuum and magically transport their belly fat to a parallel universe. They know effort is required, but they don’t mind, because they’ve become inspired.

Work equals accomplishment, the forms of which can be innumerable, and such accomplishments are habit-forming. Again, this is far from being just about diet and exercise. For someone who feels their life lacks purpose, it can be an amazing thing to suddenly find more drive than you know what to do with.

Here is a quick task. It should only take a few seconds, but that doesn’t mean it will be easy. You ready?

Make a promise to yourself that you’re done with believing in bullshit quick fixes and unrealistic shortcuts to major accomplishment, be they accomplishments with your body, your brain, your career, your finances, or your relationships. Accept reality: it is work creating your desired outcome. Do it now. Integrate this fundamental truth. Then move forward.

The overarching goal is to change the way you feel about the work so it doesn’t seem like work. That is an attitude adjustment that can happen in just a few seconds. There can be a rapid change in mind-set. You can’t become a karate master quickly, but you can become inspired to do it in an instant. It’s this accelerated mental shift that has the power to change your life.

As British historian and philosopher Arnold Toynbee said, “The supreme accomplishment is to blur the line between work and play.” Your passion to achieve can be triggered in that single defining moment when you realize, Enough of this bullshit. Motivation is no longer a scarce resource after such a momentous event. It comes built in.

Being active is hard. Eating healthy is hard. Conquering addiction is hard. Relationships are hard. Making money and advancing your career is hard. Life is hard, whether you choose to work at improving it or not. A life-changing moment can make everything much less of a challenge. Sometimes, if the epiphany is powerful enough, it makes the changes not just easier but mandatory, because every new step feels as though it was meant to be. The recipient of the epiphany is compelled to walk this new path, perhaps even race down it.

Speaking of racing and things that are hard, recall the words of President John F. Kennedy regarding the space race and putting a man on the moon. He said we choose to do these things “not because they are easy, but because they are hard.”

You should aspire to do more with your life.

Because it is hard.

Act Now!

Dream (realistically) big and imagine the new person you want to be.

Think of an ambitious quest you could undertake.

Develop a thirst for adventure. Remember the librarian who traded cigarettes for swords.

Consider not using a notebook, but instead committing ideas to memory for regular rumination to achieve later enlightenment.

Ponder until you “get stuck.” Then engage in a diversion to let your unconscious continue working at it.

Endeavor to meet the magic moment partway. Realize you may have to engage in some uninspired work prior to the lightning strike.

Become attuned for lightning to strike. Ask yourself, “Is this it?”

Ask if a life-changing moment has happened to you before. Examine if this is something you have experience with—determine if you have a past performance accomplishment—so you can use that knowledge to make it happen again.

Accept that work is not only necessary but glorious in its ability to inspire passion and transform you. Try to find work that will feel like play.

Remember the words of JFK and embrace change: because it is hard.

PART ONE (#ulink_75e395e2-f868-5ee7-bbbc-a5b6b3260209)

Epiphany and Cognitive Behavior Change (#ulink_75e395e2-f868-5ee7-bbbc-a5b6b3260209)