When you woke up this morning, I bet you thought you were in full control over your own life. That's right, you honestly believed that you controlled your own destiny and that whatever happened today — was based on your own decisions.
Think again. What if that wasn't true?
What if I could show you that you lost control over your mind, and thus your thoughts and your decisions?
Would you like to find out if that's true?
Before we begin, let me first address the giant elephant in the room.
Yes, who the heck am I?
Why should you listen to me, why should you care what I have to say and why on earth would I know what I'm talking about?
Those are three very valid and important questions to answer. So let me answer them one by one for you.
Who am I?
First, my name is The School Doc, but you can just call me Doc for short. And I have been an educator for the last 20 years, starting in the classroom as a teacher, then working my way up the education ladder to principal and superintendent.
But if you start following me, you will quickly realize that those are just my job titles and the truth is job titles don't really mean anything in reality.
Why you should listen to me?
If you have control your own mind and decisions right now, then you should listen to me and follow my account, and here's why?
The fact is that I'm a recognized expert in the field of education, as well as a 21st century skills expert. I have written over 300 articles on Medium over the last 3 years, explaining how the school system works (or doesn't work), 21st century skills and the path to success in the 21st century. If you care about those topics — I highly encourage you to go read some of my past work.
Why should you care?
If you don't want people to manipulate you or to have influence over your thoughts and opinions so easily — then I hope you hit the follow button right now. My goal with this Medium account is to help people regain control over their own minds and also their financial futures.
I'm not a Wall Street expert, or a financial advisor. What I know is based on actual academic research conducted over the last 20 years. Not only that, but I have applied all the academic research into the real world and tested those theories, to see which ones were real and which ones were "fake."
How do I know what I'm talking about?
It's not easy becoming an expert in anything, especially in the 21st century. And to be clear, it wasn't my goal to become an expert in education, but rather I was just trying to answer really important questions that my teachers, students and parents were asking me.
For example, I have been asked more times than I can count — what does an effective teacher look like? The problem is that the average person doesn't know the bottom line answer, instead they make a best guess based on talking points and buzz words they might have heard someone on social media say — and those "talking points" then become the basis of arguments.
The truth is that talking points only help you win debates, but they cannot help you solve real world problems. And my goal is not to win a debate with people. You have the right to believe whatever you want to believe, even if what you believe isn't factual.
But if you are sick and tired of the world being a bad and evil place — then you should hear me out. And that's because I know how to solve real world problems. I don't use "talking points," instead I use real academic research. And the reason I bother to write articles is simply because I like helping people raise good kids and also be more successful, so they can have less stress and find more happiness and joy in life.
Do you control your thoughts or not?
That is the big picture question on the table. And if you don't control your thoughts, what happened? How did you allow someone to infiltrate your brain without you even knowing it?
The "Talking Point" Dilemma
I recently tweeted this on my profile.
The proliferation of social media and talking head commentators has contributed to a rise in "talking points" about every topic and issue in society.
For example, if you want to discuss "school shootings" then you will hear people talk about these talking points:
- Guns don't kill people, people kill people
- We need stricter gun regulations
- The 2nd Amendment protects citizens rights to bear arms
- We need more "safety officers" in schools
- Students need more SEL courses to deal with trauma
I'm sure you've heard all of these talking points before, but the problem is none of these bullet points address the underlying problem.
Why are kids shooting their classmates and teachers? Why are children seeking "revenge" on innocent people, when those people didn't do anything to them?
Taking Back Control
My goal with this article is to help you take back control over your mind and your thoughts. And once you do that — you will regain control over your decisions.
If you have full control over your mind and thoughts right now — then this article probably makes 100% sense to you. If you control your mind, you can literally see how other people are being manipulated on a daily basis.
But what if you can't see it?
What if you think I'm making all of this up?
Well, that should be your first red flag.
Yes, if you think that this article is fake news, then you probably no longer have control over your brain. And I know that may sound frightening, but consider this:
Why would I warn you about mind control, by manipulating you about mind control?
The fact is the rational and logical brain would prevent me from manipulating you the minute I alerted you to manipulation. Can you agree with that?
Therefore the next logical question to ask is: how are people manipulating others so easily?
And the answer is through "confirmation bias."
That's right, if you want to control someone else's thoughts and decisions, all you need to do is figure out what they already believe, and then tell them even more outrageous things that "confirm that bias."
What ends up happening is that the person who hears this "outrageous confirmation" doubles down on those beliefs. Not only do you agree with the person, but now you think they must be the "expert" on this topic, simply because they are saying things that you agree with, but that are so far beyond what everyone else is saying around you.
And if you study history at all, this is called the "Goebbels effect."
So how can you regain control?
I wish I had better news for you, but if you have been manipulated by someone else, the road back to brain freedom is a challenging one. And that's because you need to first admit that you "might" have been manipulated in the first place.
And the toughest thing for any human being to do is admit — they might have been fooled.
Admitting that we were the "fool" is the last thing any human being wants to do — so we will do major mental gymnastics to avoid this cold hard truth.
But here's the good news!
Once you admit that you "might" have been manipulated — it's smooth sailing from there. That's right, the hardest part of this journey to take back control over your mind is literally the FIRST STEP!
So just admit that you "might" have been manipulated — trust me — this will save your life.
What's Step Two?
After you admit that someone may have duped you, the next thing you need to do is sit down and think about what your "beliefs." Yes, you need to think about whatever topic or issue that you had die-hard beliefs about in the first place.
Do you believe Donald Trump is the anti-christ? Do you believe Democrats are the devil? Do you think that Israel is an "apartheid" state? Do you think capitalism is bad? Do you think Bernie Sanders and AOC tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?
I have news for you — none of those beliefs are based in fact.
That doesn't mean you can't believe them, or you don't have the right to your opinion. The issue in this article is about regaining control over your mind and decisions, remember?
And if your blood started to boil reading the previous paragraph in italics, that should be red flag #2 that you've been manipulated. And here's my point.
You have the right, as an American, to believe whatever you want to believe. If you want to believe that aliens created the earth millions of years ago and that's why they keep coming back to check in on us — that's your right to believe that.
But your opinions shouldn't make you so upset that your blood pressure goes up. Opinions shouldn't ruin our lives. Opinions shouldn't cloud our judgment and decisions.
If you believe that a certain stock is going to the moon, but the data and fundamentals prove the company is about to bankrupt — would you invest all your money because of your "belief?"
And the answer is No! You're not crazy and you're not stupid.
The problem is that when you lose control over your mind and your thoughts and hand it over to someone else — all they want to do is "tweak" you to make you go nuts over opinions and ignore facts.
What's Step Three?
Step three is the easiest and also the most enjoyable part of this journey to regaining control over your brain and that's because this is where you calm yourself down.
Yes, that's right, step three is mental self-care.
For the last 20 years, I have helped thousands of students calm themselves down. And trust me, it wasn't easy to get a student who was so mad that their entire face turned purple, to start breathing calmly again.
But that's what I want you to do right now.
Take a deep breath, hold it in for 5 seconds and then slowly exhale.
Do this slowly three times.
Breathe in and hold for 5 seconds and then slowly exhale.
The slower you can do this the better. If you try and do this breathing exercise too fast, you could end up hyper-ventilating.
Why does breathing slowly work? According to the science and academic research, taking slow and deep breaths re-regulates our central nervous system. It slows down your heart rate and also puts your blood pressure in better balance.
And guess what happens next?
The serotonin levels in the brain equalize and you are able to think clearly and rationally again. It's like magic!
What Next?
The answer to this question is now up to you. You tell me, "what next?"
What are you trying to accomplish in life? What roadblocks are you encountering? What is your biggest frustration? Where do you want your success journey to go?
Let me know what's going on in your world and I will see if I can help you reach your dreams.
The Roadmap for Success
I don't do private one on one coaching anymore, but I am working on developing a course and group coaching community for people who want help pursuing their dreams.
This is the Roadmap for Success. This is an academic concept that I developed back in 2011 based on all the relevant 21st century research on how to help kids be more successful in school and in life.
This is just one of the essential learning objectives you need to learn if you want to become smarter than Harvard graduates. And I'm not being "silly" about that. I used this concept along with these other academic concepts, such as:
- How the 21st Century Works
- The Rules of the 21st Century
- The Success Playbook
- The Five Essential 21st Century Skills
In order to teach my high school students how to out-compete Harvard grads. And it worked. One of my former graduates became a successful entrepreneur at the age of 23, simply because he applied all of these concepts into his life and built a better future for himself.
And the key take-away is to know that the only formal education under his belt was a high school diploma and an auto-mechanics certificate from a trade school.
So if you're reading this and saying, "I can't be successful."
Or "Only the top 1% have access to economic opportunities."
Then I want you to think again. The 23 year old former graduate of mine didn't come from a wealthy family. He couldn't afford college and if he tried to walk into a bank to get a business loan — they would have laughed at him.
You don't have to suffer, if you don't want to anymore.
But the truth is that you don't know everything you need to know about success in the 21st century. Therefore the answer to all your problems is upgrading your education. That's it.
I don't have an "offer" for you right now, so if you want to know more, simply hit the follow button that way you will get alerts sent directly to your email inbox when I post a new story. And I promise you, I will write a new article about this 21st century education offer real soon!!
About the Author:
The School Doc is the founder of Leaf Academy, the first online school that teaches people success and everything they need to know about how to be more successful in the 21st century. He is also the author of the groundbreaking book, "Disrupting Education: The Path to 21st Century Schools" which outlines how to fix the K12 system and explains the answer he told the Joint Legislative Committee on the Public Schools in 2017. Order your copy today on Amazon here.