Published on June 24th, 2013 | by Jason Goldberg

Why the *$&@ won’t anyone high-five me? – Finding Joy by Altering Conditioning

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Hey all you creatives and creators! This is Jason Goldberg and YOU are watching MEometryTV, THE place to be to yearn more, learn more and earn more from your life and business.

So for those of you who are my VIPeeps and signed up for my exclusive email updates, you know that I just returned from 10 days trekking across Eastern and Central Europe. What a freaking blast that was! It was a good solid mix of work and play and was an experience I will never forget. I went with a big group of people for a research project. I forged some amazing bonds with those people while learning a ton about myself and the culture of the countries we visited.

One place in particular, Warsaw, the capital of Poland, where we spent 4 days, really intrigued me. Being REALLY excited to be in a new country, while also being the least shy of the bunch and never turning down an opportunity to do some impromptu experiments, I decided to try a fun little game.

While walking through the streets of Warsaw, exploring the city as a complete neophyte to the region, I decided I would high-five as many people as I could. The goal was really just to have split second connections with as many locals as possible and bring a smile to their faces, without looking like a dumb tourist. So simple right, walk by them, raise up my hand a few steps before we passed and presto, hand clap city right? Oh hellz no! I was ridiculously wrong. Could it be that the infamous “high-five” just doesn’t translate in Europe? I retreated after a day of defeat and started researching online and with other locals who told me they knew exactly what a high-five was. So what was I doing wrong? I had showered, wasn’t wearing anything offensive, had a big smile on my face when approaching and even tapped my finger in the palm of my hand to suggest the response I was looking for but nada, zilch, not a single strangers palm would be introduced to mine while in this beautiful city.

Lets have a quick history lesson. Warsaw was all but completely destroyed as a result of World War II attacks. Couple this with the communist
regime that ruled the country for the 2^nd half of the 20^th century and the picture of why I wasn’t getting any love may start becoming a bit clearer.

Though the people I was trying to high-five were not, themselves, around during that period of time, their parents and/or grandparents were. Many of these younger individuals may be the product of a so-called “post-communist” mentality that has conditioned them to keep their heads down, stay to themselves, be less willing to take risks, and have a lower level of trust for outsiders or to adapt to new realities and situations.

Don’t get me wrong, Poland is really incredible and the people of Warsaw that I got to meet, sit down and spend time with are really caring and loving individuals and this is by no means meant to be a generalization of an entire nation of people. That would just be stupid and short-sighted. In fact, the reason my experiment intrigued me so much is, because, if anyone has a good reason for holding on to their own security, being skeptical and not wanting to be outgoing with strangers, it is the polish people. And though I can’t begin to understand what growing up in that environment must have been like, I feel like at some level, I get it.

So it got me thinking? What about the rest of us? What conditioning have we been exposed to and absorbed, either from our parents, our friends or, GASP OURSELVES that is holding us back from giving out that proverbial high-five and potentially experiencing new forms of joy in our lives? What do we hold as being SO TRUE in our minds that we are unwilling to even entertain the notion that this “fact” is nothing more than fiction we have developed to protect us from a boogie-monster that doesn’t exist?

I don’t deserve a loving relationship
I can’t trust people
I’ll never be good enough
People are always judging me
I will never find happiness
I have to be the best in order to be successful

Do any of these ring a bell in your conditioned mind? I have dealt and continue to deal with some of these myself because of years of negative external conditioning. And the worst part of this whole deal is that believing the negative conditioning to be true actually attracts experiences that will back-up the beliefs, making them stronger and harder to overcome. Craptasticness at its absolute finest!

Luckily to every yin there is a yang and thus one way to overcome this negative conditioning is by disassociating from it. Disassociating means to completely let go of the negative belief and then to replace it with a new and empowering belief.

Let’s take an example, like the one I just mentioned about not deserving a loving relationship. If you keep that in your mind as being a truth that you have conditioned yourself to believe, then you will attract people that will never be able to give you the loving relationship that you do, in fact, totally deserve, and the cycle continues. So how do we reframe this belief and recondition ourselves in a way that builds a new reality where a loving relationship IS possible. There can be a lot to this process and as it takes time, but the first step is to come up with a new belief that does not combat the old belief directly. In other words, the new belief can’t be “I deserve a loving relationship”. Your brain is too smart to do a complete 180 like that when you have been telling it the opposite unconsciously for so long. Your reframed belief may be something like, “If I am aware of the remarkable qualities I possess, then I will attract others with those same qualities”. Notice the reframed belief does not even speak directly to having a loving relationship, but if you repeat this mantra to yourself enough and it becomes a new belief, your unconscious mind cannot help but attract people who are like-minded and who will love and appreciate you for the marvelous person that you are! Give it a try!

It won’t happen overnight, just as the original conditioning didn’t, but once you have replaced the original fear with a new reality, you will see a positive influence in your life and start attracting experiences that bring you confidence, joy and a feeling of alignment with your ideal self. The goal here is to get your mind to understand that the limiting belief is irrational and untrue and to replace the belief with an honest one that will help you to bust through your conditioned bubble and high-five the crap out of life! It takes awareness, conscious effort and maybe a little help from people you trust, but is totally rich and rewarding in the long run. I read somewhere that the only job of a belief is to prove itself true. Make sure the beliefs that you have are working for you and not against you.

As you know, we yearn, learn and earn exponentially more when we share our gifts with each other. I want to hear from you, so leave a comment below if you have some negative conditioning you are working to overcome or need help reframing a belief. Our community is here to support each other in the good and not-so-good times, so share away. If you loved this video, please subscribe to our YouTube channel be sure to share it with your friends. Also, don’t forget to head over to MEometry.com to sign up for exclusive email updates and to get insights that I only share with my most engaged peeps!

Plus, If you want your own personal JG to coach you to be the best and most confident, creative and successful version of yourself that you can be? Click the “work with JG” link above or the pic of me on the right for an absolutely free, one-on-one strategy session over Skype or phone to see if what I got is what you need to get where you desire to go!

Remember that you and your gifts are extraordinary and exceptional. Be You, Do You, and Love You because you know there is only one OF you!

See you next time on MEometryTV

Authentically Yours,

Jason Goldberg

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About the Author

Jason Goldberg What does an award-winning serial entrepreneur, a network engineer, a former rapper (who opened for the Wu-Tang Clan), and a previously 332lb man have in common? They are all the same guy! “JG” has helped inspire and empower entrepreneurs and small business owners via executive, life and business coaching. He has also worked with the likes of NASA, Wyndham Vacation Ownership and Northrop Grumman.