The No.1 Habit for Personal Growth (It’s a hard one to beat)

I’m currently listening to yet another audiobook – The Ultimate Jim Rohn Library. And in it, he mentions that “Humans are the only life form that will do less than they possibly can…..”  Many of us humans are inherently lazy. Our brains are focused on protection and survival. Keeping us safe. It doesn’t care much for growth or effort that it would rather we didn’t do. Its often a push.  A struggle against resistance. We are very much unlike the ants and the bees, constantly on the go, not caring about a holiday in the sun, missing the latest episode on Netflix or meeting their insect buddies at the bar. Rohn goes on to explain – “…. how tall will a tree grow? As tall as it possibly can.”

And its absolutely spot on. I think back to a scarcely ventured road in Northumberland. A road, known mainly to cyclists and people staying at the religious retreat there. It’s a place called Minsteracres and it is home to a breathtaking avenue of tall, strong redwood trees, planted in the 1800’s. As high up to the heavens as you could crane your neck to marvel at them. This particular road is more than familiar to me, as it was on a chilly day in January 1991 that I had only God above to thank me for being alive to this day. After turning left at the end of this quiet, tree lined road onto the A68, just a short few metres later its a right turn down another unclassified road.

I was first out onto the main road and heading for this right hand turn when disaster struck. Just as my Raleigh Banana racing bike nosed its way eastbound off the A68, I saw a white flash. Then nothing.  “His arm’s definitely broken” were the first words I heard several minutes later.

I had been on a club run with the Jarrow St Christophers Cycling Club and we were heading back to South Tyneside after our Sunday ride to Edmundbyers. Unbeknownst to me, as I’d crossed the centre lines of the carriageway to turn right, a vehicle was hurtling down the hill at speed behind me. A white pickup truck, complete with reinforced bull bars on the front, had illegally crossed the solid white lines to overtake me, not realising I was turning right into the junction. WHAM! No amount of braking could save me as he slammed into me.

Fifteen years old, barely a picking on me and with only a wooly hat on my head, I was thrown many metres down the road and lay in a crumpled, unconscious heap. There had been a Doctor staying at the gatehouse on the Minsteraces road as my club mates discovered when they roused the alarm. It was his words I heard when I came ‘to’.

Bluelighted off to hospital I slipped into unconsciousness again. I was left with a broken collarbone and humerus, although I failed to see the funny side of this! Cuts and grazes all down my face, a broken nose and a gouge or two in my side. Sadly, the Raleigh Banana was toast!  A week in hospital followed and when I returned to school, I changed my project in Design & Communication from whatever flavour it had been to one themed on Road Safety. Research at the library taught me that at speeds of over 50mph, statistically, the survival rate (from a fatality)  was just 10%! (The impact speed had been estimated by the Police as being way over 50 based on the skid marks from the drivers’ panicked braking)

 

I should have died that day. But I didn’t. And I firmly believe that big fella upstairs kept me alive. I simply wasn’t meant to be one of those future statistics. Now, for what PURPOSE I was allowed a second chance of life for, is anybody’s guess but I’m eternally grateful for it. Hang on… I’ve gone off-piste a bit here.

INTERLUDE – – – (MUSIC PLAYS IN THE BACKGROUND)

Trees!! I was talking about TREES! Now, where was I?  Ah yes… growth. When I lived at The Hermitage in Rydal, it always puzzled me why Barefoot Ben used to always listen to audiobooks in his car. Why not listen to music or the radio like everyone else, I wondered? Skip THAT – most of you are now thinking, “Who the hell is Barefoot Ben??” Haha. He was my landlord when I moved to the Lake District from Tyneside in 2016. OK, moving on…

Working as a builder for three years, I started listening to audiobooks and youtube stuff to pass the long days. But it wasn’t until I chose to overhaul my life and make some big changes at the end of 2022 that I started devouring Audiobooks at a rate equivalent to that of a chainsmoker. I’ve gone from book to book to book. Mixed in with normal paperback books too,  Prior to the beginning of 2023 I may have read or listened to about a dozen books or so in the previous 5 years. Pretty, pathetic as I never used to be that shoddy.

A couple of years previously, whilst working on the Scottish island of Jura,  I was aptly listening to ‘1984’.  Apt because Jura is where the tuberculosis stricken, George Orwell wrote his timeless tale of the classes and authoritarism back in 1948. “The most un-get-at-able place on earth” is how described the remote Scottish island.  I was listening to it and scampering up and down some scaffolding whilst working on a former Post Office on the north of the island. Content in my own little Orwellian world, the words “What are you listening to?”  broke through my audiobook sanctuary. “1984 – have you read it?” was my reply.  I was laughed at, with a response of – “I don’t think I’ve read more than two books in my whole life”  Looking at him and knowing his character, this didn’t come as any great shock to me.

Asides from this sporadic dipping in and out of the odd Audiobook here and there, to have almost stopped reading entirely for so many years, just wasn’t ME. When I was an infant, my mam taught me to read before I’d even started school. I made sure to continue this trend when my daughter was born. We’d read at night before she got her bedtime stories and she would take to it quite well until her mental tiredness called a halt on things. By the time she reached school she was leaps and bounds ahead of everyone else and she blitzed through books at lightening speed. As an adult, she’s still an avid reader and seems to get through mountains of books. It really puts her old man to shame. But I’m super proud of her continuation of it. But why did I STOP? Excuses!! No time to read/listen to books. Music is better. Reading didn’t hold enough importance to me. Etc etc

Until it it DID become important. Since the start of last year I have read or listened to approximately 45 books in the last 22 months. Some of which, I have re-read once or twice over again. And that’s just books. Multiple podcasts, webinars, courses. A constant cycle of learning, growth, knowledge. And you know what? The impact and deep nourishing benefits you gain is simply immeasurable!

The majority of my reading and listening has been on self-improvement, development, the “self help”  section (hate that terminology). Also business, entrepreneurship and mindset. Similar to our chap Barefoot Ben, its become my new normal. Reading/Listening to inspirational books is without question THE most beneficial, positive habit you can start to develop and build on. Your commuting time, long drives, doing housework. All of this ‘dead’ time is an opportunity for growth and learning. For a well balanced, literary consumption, I like to read some travel books, comedy, novels and life stories as part of the mix too.

The very first ‘self help’ book I read was bought in WH Smiths’ at Edinburgh Waverly. I had dropped my daughter back in Scotland and was awaiting the train back to the North East. To pass the time I’d invariably stand and read the Cycling Weekly in there. But wait! There, on the best sellers stand was  “Get Things Done” by Robert Kelsey – ‘What stops smart people achieving more and how you can change.’  It just SPOKE to me! I NEEDED this book in my life. I demolished 70 pages by the time the train pulled into Central Station in Newcastle. Almost a third of the book done already.  But then… It sat idle. That was 2014. Well, over the next FIVE years, that unfinished book came with me to France, New York, Crete (3 times) and all round the UK! And I’ll tell you this little gem – “….achieve more and how you can change” it promised….. I couldn’t even get the ‘Get Things Done’ book, DONE!!! What the hell was WRONG with me!?  It took until 2019 when I was preparing to start my pizza business, that I had a renewed drive and ambition to WANT to read it all.  To take the most famous line from the outstanding book by Viktor Frankl – Man’s Search for Meaning – “If you have a compelling WHY, then you can endure any HOW”  Off the back of Robert Kelsey’s book and his frequent references to Stephen Covey,  I then downloaded the Grandaddy of them all – “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People”  – this is without question THE cornerstone of all self help/improvement/development books. I swear that if I’d read this in my teens or twenties then my life would have been infinitely better for its teachings. Its a little longer than most, but you can read/listen to it in single chunks of the seven, to pace it out a bit.

So Micky, what do you recommend? I hear you ask  Over the last two years, here are just a few that I can recommend from my own personal impact they had on me, (Skipping past the Get Things Done book!! That merely served a purpose for me. Presented the canvas onto which I’d paint the landscape of my future learnings)

THE “IF YOU’RE GONNA READ/LISTEN TO ANYTHING – CHOOSE THESE” – LIST

F*cki ng Unstoppable – by Paul Mort.  It was his ‘Best year yet’ free Webinar in December 2022 that started the ball rolling for me in making big life affecting changes. And,as a fellow Geordie, born in South Shields, from a similar upbringing to my own, like attracted like. He can be a bit sweary and brutally direct at times – so be ready for that. But it totally resonated deeply with me and I’ve not looked back since. Paul made it available to listen for free on Soundcloud. Just click the link. It DOES say ‘…a mans guide…” But don’t let that fool you because I firmly believe its relevant to ANYONE in my opinion.

I’ve already mentioned a few absolute corkers already, but these next two made me think completely differently and I couldn’t recommend them highly enough The Compound Effect – Darren Hardy. How small, micro changes, daily, over time, have a huge impact on your life, health and wealth.  And in typing into Google one day –  “Why do I talk so much?” – yes, seriously, I really DID! A New York Times article about an upcoming book release called STFU: The Power of Keeping Your Mouth Shut in a World That Won’t Stop Talking – Dan Lyons Well, as you may well imagine, once again – it ‘Talked’ to me, Its brilliant. And it highlights the fact that many of us….most of us, simply DON’T listen or really try and concentrate and engage in one another.

Some other notable mentions, but not exhaustive are listed below. Perhaps I’ll do an entire page on this site, dedicated to book summaries etc. What do you think? Would that be beneficial for you?

PEOPLE & NETWORKING

The original  How to Win Friends and Influence People – Dale Carnegie, whilst being dated in some of its references to famous people long since passed, I still valued it slightly higher than the modern slant on it by Leil Lowndes –  How to Talk to Anyone. One of my most recently completed books – Never Eat Alone – Keith Ferrazzi has nothing whatever to do with eating nor lonelines but it a tremendous wealth of information on networking and maintaining strong connections with people.

WEALTH & AMBITION

Think and Grow Rich – Napoleon Hill or The Richest Man in Babylon – George S Clason are both good books on finance, wealth and ambition.

MINDSET

The Secret by Rhonda Bryne is a more relatable and, in my opinion, digestable approach than the same message presented by Jerry & Ester Hicks in The Law of Attraction on the subject of mindset and abundance. We get in life what we attract, good or bad. Many of the books mentioned here, instil the importance of taking responsibility for ones own destiny based on our actions and choices. These two books present the concept that we can CREATE whatever we want, for ourselves. A theme supported by Napoleon Hills’ classic writings.

THAT WAS THEN. WHAT AM I READING NOW? 

Currently my reading 12 Rules for Life – Jordan Peterson on audiobook. Quite a slow burner as he is clearly a bit too intellectual and vocabulary astute for poor old me! On paperback, and in keeping with my theme of ’12’ – I’ve nearly finished The 12 Week Year – Brian Moran & Michael Lennington, which is another utterly brilliant book. Pivotal!   And lastly, another slower read and one that I have deep fascination in, is the life and journals of one our greatest ever explorers. It follows the exact transcripts of Captain Scott and his team’s tragic quest to reach the South Pole Journals – By Robert Falcon Scott (Captain Scott’s Last Expedition)

CONCLUSION

A lot of time has been spent, carefully compiling this post, QUITE a lot. Because hopefully, even just ONE person, will find something in these books, that creates a monumental positive shift in THEM too. I don’t have affiliate links (for the books I’ve mentioned or pointed you towards)  or anything like that, this is just me, trying my best to share what’s worked so well for me. Historically, I used to choke on paying the £8.99 monthly subscription to Audible for two monthly Audiobooks. I’d wait. Ready to pounce on any free trials that gave a couple of free reads for signing up .Then I’d cancel. Ridiculous!

The value that listening to some great advice and lessons that could help us improve ourselves, grow as humans. Ever growing, flourishing, never satisfied. Always striving for higher – just like the mighty Redwoods at Minsteraces, is simply unfathomable and certainly worth far more than a paltry  tenner a month!!

If you are going to take on an addiction. Take this one – an addiction to learning, reading (or listening), small, persistent improvement and helping others as often as you feasibly can. Daily.

There is SO much you can take away from this post here. It led me into taking some huge positive action this year, like when I signed up and qualified in Paul Mort’s Internationally recognised Coaching Qualification – details can be found HERE

If anyone would like to work with me, get some accountability, hit me with some goals you’d like to help you smash, be they big or small.  Or simply help you START a new path to personal growth. Then please drop me a line. I’d love to work with you or even just have an amazing and positive chat that may lead to you too, turning your life around. I firmly believe THIS is why I was kept alive that dreadful January day, back in 1991 – to live a purposeful life that helps as many people as I possibly can.

You can get me on

hello@12minutesdaily.com   or 0771 25232645.   Lets Go!

PS – I DO still listen to music a lot too. It will be a sad day when I stop dancing in the kitchen!

PPS – Please follow me for updates on the link on my page and add any comments and feedback on this below, I’d love to hear from you 🙂