How to Control Your Head Trash by Noah St. John

If you’re familiar with my work, you’ll know that I use the term “head trash” to refer to the persistent, nagging voice—otherwise known as your inner critic—that tells you that you’re not enough: not good enough, not likeable enough, not believable enough, etc. 

To get a sense of the big picture, think of the movie A Beautiful Mind. If you haven’t seen this movie, it’s about a brilliant mathematician whose visions—hallucinations, really—negatively impact his life. They interfere with his family, with his work, and limit his potential. By the end of the film, he has managed to control—not eliminate—these apparitions. There’s a scene in which he is helping his wife put on her coat, and he sees one of the creations of his mind. Noticing his hesitation, his wife asks him if he’s okay, and he tells her he’s fine. The idea is that despite having this very insistent head trash, he is able, finally, to control it and not let it disrupt his life. 

While it’s not always possible to eliminate your head trash entirely, you can prevent it from limiting your success. The following are four strategies for controlling your inner critic: 

1. Bring your head trash into your conscious awareness. Part of what makes head trash so insidious is that it operates mostly at an unconscious level. So the first step in controlling it is becoming aware of what specifically it is saying. As you go through your life, trying to advance your career, build your business, etc., when you hear that voice that says, “I don’t think I can do this,” what reasons is it giving you? I’ve identified about 100 types of head trash, but there’s probably more. What specific negative comments is your head trash entertaining? And, more importantly, what is the most debilitating one?  

2. Understand the cost. What is it costing you to believe your head trash? What is it costing you to hold on to it? My head trash causes me to question if anyone will believe me—even though I have all this social proof of people following my method and adding six, seven, and even eight figures to their income. If I believed that head trash, I wouldn’t be reaching out to people, writing books, doing live events, because I’d be giving in to the voice. Just like with the mathematician in A Beautiful Mind, you can hear your head trash without heeding it. 

3. Use my Afformations® method. Get enough proof that what your head trash is saying doesn’t hold any weight anymore. If you’re wanting someone to buy your product, join your network/team, or align themselves with your cause, you must present an argument, and the reasons you give them can help combat your head trash. For example, I might respond to my head trash about people not believing me by asking myself, “Why do people believe me? Why do the right people believe me?” My answer will start retraining my brain to focus on the value I am adding. 

4. Obtain the support of people who believe in you, probably more than you believe in yourself. A great place to do this is at my Freedom Lifestyle Experience event, where you’ll be surrounded by other likeminded individuals invested in their success—and yours. Visit FreedomLifeX.com for more details.  

If you follow these guidelines, you’ll be able to talk back to your head trash. You won’t never think a negative thought again—that’s a promise only a “shelf-help” guru would give you. But you will be able to control your head trash and prevent it from sidelining you on your success journey. 

Don’t let your head trash hold you back from living the Freedom Lifestyle of your dreams. Order a copy of my new book, Power Habits®: The New Science for Making Success Automatic®, and learn how to leverage the five systems of support to: 

• Make a definitive difference in the world 

• Have a genuine impact on the people you’re here to serve 

• Supercharge your ability to attract more wealth and abundance 

• Enjoy more time off without the guilt 

• Overcome the fear of failure so you can achieve more while working less 

The Proven Secret to More Wealth and Happiness by Noah St. John

Most people focus on trying to make money and trying to be happier. And while there’s nothing wrong with that, there’s just one teensy problem… 

It doesn’t work. 

Why not? Because both money and happiness are the RESULTS of other things. 

Therefore, rather than focusing on trying to make more money and trying to be happier (which are results or outcomes), the truth is that we need to focus on what causes money (income) and what causes happiness. 

As illustrated by the Income-Happiness Scale above, there are two main factors that cause Income and Happiness: Activities and Aptitude. Activities are the things you do every day—what you actually do with the minutes and hours of your day. There are two kinds of Activities you can do each day: Low-Value Activities and High-Value Activities. 

Aptitude means two things: how good you are at doing a certain Activity and how much you enjoy doing it. Therefore, there are two aspects of Aptitude: things you Suck At (and don’t enjoy doing) and things you’re Great At (and enjoy doing). 

The Hobby Quadrant 

Let’s start in the lower right-hand corner of the Income-Happiness Scale. When you have a Low-Value Activity that you’re Great At (and you enjoy), you have what’s called a Hobby. What’s the definition of a Hobby? It’s something you enjoy that you don’t get paid to do. Naturally, there’s nothing wrong with having hobbies. There is, however, one slight problem, and it comes when I ask my clients a simple yet profound question: Do you own a business, or do you own a hobby? 

How can you tell the difference? Simple. With a hobby, you’re having fun—see how it’s high on the Happiness axis—yet you’re not making much (or any) money—see how it’s low on the Income axis. As it relates to your business, that’s why it’s crucial to ask whether you own a business or whether you own a hobby.  

The Busywork Quadrant 

Moving to our lower left quadrant, we have Low-Value Activities that you Suck At (and don’t enjoy). That’s what I call Busywork. We live in a world of infinite distractions. You can watch cat videos on YouTube until the end of time. You can waste countless hours on social media. Or you can simply spend the days of your life doing Activities that don’t grow your business and don’t give you either the Income or the Happiness you want. 

Notice that in the Busywork quadrant, your Activities aren’t producing much money, and you’re not enjoying them either. So you don’t even get the benefit of having a Hobby. In fact, one of my clients told me on one of our coaching calls, “Noah, I own a Busywork!” 

Do YOU “own a Busywork”? Or are you just spending too much of your valuable time there? Why is this such an important question to ask? Because TIME is the one resource that can never be replaced. 

The Golden Handcuffs 

Moving to our upper left quadrant, we have High-Value Activities that you Suck At (and don’t enjoy). That’s what I call the Golden Handcuffs. This is where you hate the work you’re doing and feel unhappy and unfulfilled but make good money so feel like you can’t leave your job. It’s called the “Golden Handcuffs” because it’s awfully hard to leave a job that pays well, even if you hate it. 

Living Your Dream 

And finally, we get to the place where we all want to go: where you are doing High-Value Activities that you’re Great At (and that you enjoy doing). That’s where you’re in the quadrant I call Living Your Dream. Why do we call it Living Your Dream? Because when you’re doing High-Value Activities that you’re great at AND that you love doing, you’re not only living your dream… 

It’s like going to heaven without the inconvenience of dying!  

When you’re Living Your Dream, notice what’s happening to your Income. Your Income is going up, but your Happiness is going up too. In fact, there is no limit to the amount of Income you can create and no limit to the amount of Happiness you can experience. 

This article originally appeared on ValueWalk.com. 

You CAN live the life of your dreams and you CAN have the freedom of time and money that you truly desire. Learn how my Power Habits® System can help you transform your unconscious self-limiting beliefs and generate new, more productive habits so that you can earn more, live more, and have the Freedom Lifestyle of your dreams in my new book, Power Habits®: The New Science for Making Success Automatic®. Preorder your copy by September 21 to claim up to $599 in free bonuses, including live video trainings to empower you to live the Power Habits® System. 

Grow Your Home-Based Business with Help from the Power Habits® System by Noah St. John

Do you want a successful home-based business? 

Having a successful home-based business means you have the FREEDOM to do what you want, when you want…and also have the LIFESTYLE you desire…along with the EXPERIENCE of knowing you’re making great money while making a difference. 

Would you like me to give you the exact framework that has empowered my clients to find a way to add over $2 BILLION dollars in sales? 

In less than 90 days from now, you could be living a richer, happier life…with more success in your business and personal life…while working LESS than you are now. 

How do I know? Because those who follow my Power Habits® System regularly double their income while working less…sometimes in just a matter of weeks! 

For example, Ray Higdon, who has a successful career in network marketing, reflected after employing my Power Habits® System, “I made my annual income in just 44 days!” 

Prem Jantarapet came to the United States from Thailand with just $18 in her pocket and didn’t speak any English. She wanted to start a home-based business. She learned the Power Habits® System through my Freedom Lifestyle Experience workshop and now makes over $10,000 each month. 

One of the key strategies for creating a successful home-based business is getting rid of your head trash. Head trash is what keeps some entrepreneurs from growing their business. It’s formed from unconscious beliefs that hold you back by producing unproductive and unhealthy behaviors. Have you been missing out on potential customers because you’ve been prey to either fear or procrastination? Have you lost clients to someone else because you didn’t believe in yourself enough? Are people regularly passing up your offers? Head trash is likely the culprit in all these scenarios.  

In order to get rid of your head trash, you need to change your subconscious beliefs. So many people get it wrong by focusing on the external behaviors, but those will only change once your beliefs do. Using my Afformations® Method, one of the components of the Power Habits® System, can help you combat self-defeating beliefs that drive your actions. 

First, identify the habit you want to change. For example: “I want to reach out to more potential clients.” 

Next, FORM what you want into an empowering question that assumes that what you want already happened or is already true. So for this example, you might ask yourself the following: 

Why is it so easy to reach out to potential clients? 

Why are so many people interested in learning more about my business? 

Afformations® are significantly more powerful than affirmations because statements alone do not change your deeply held self-limiting beliefs. If you state, “I am good at reaching out to potential clients,” your brain will likely respond with more head trash like “Hah. No you’re not.” But when you Afform® the same idea and ask yourself about the positive result you envision, your brain is forced to provide a positive argument for your success, which, in turn, alters your belief system in an authentic and profound way. 

Third, you must give yourself to the question. Read your Afformations®, write them, say them out loud, and listen to them—daily, even hourly. Using all four modes of human communication will enable you to change your subconscious thought patterns that have been limiting the success of your home-based business. 

Finally, take new actions based on your new assumptions about life. Right now, you are making hundreds, perhaps thousands, of unconscious assumptions about life and your relationship to it. These assumptions form the basis of how you go through life—positively or negatively, confidently or hesitantly, from love or from fear. However, the problem is that we usually don’t recognize our own unconscious assumptions. 

For example, if you hold the assumption that “Things never work out for me,” your actions will be hesitant, your posture will be one of defeat, and you will tend to give up at the first sign of resistance or rejection. But if one of your assumptions is “Things always work out for the best for me,” your actions will tend to be confident, your posture will be self-assured, and you will persist even in the face of temporary failure. Which means that no matter what you assume, you always make yourself right. To continue our example, act on the assumption that “People are interested in learning more about the products or opportunities offered by my home-based business” by reaching out to them without fear or hesitation.   

Don’t let your head trash hold you back from living the Freedom Lifestyle of your dreams. Preorder a copy of my new book, Power Habits®: The New Science for Making Success Automatic®, and learn how to leverage the five systems of support to: 

• Make a definitive difference in the world 

• Have a genuine impact on the people you’re here to serve 

• Supercharge your ability to attract more wealth and abundance 

• Enjoy more time off without the guilt 

• Overcome the fear of failure so you can achieve more while working less 

By preordering your copy by September 21, you’ll be able to claim up to $599 in free bonuses, including live video trainings to empower you to live the Power Habits® System.