Bookish Weapon Number Twenty-Six

“The Code Of The Extraordinary Mind,” by Vishen Lakhiani includes many ideas. I disagreed with many of them, but there were some I thought were more than worthy of discussion.

Vishen has not only written this book but owns “Mindvalley” where you can upgrade your existence through a host of self-development programs.

Extraordinary

If everyone were extraordinary there wouldn’t be anyone that was extraordinary. Lakhiani makes the case that we all have that potential if we read his book and apply what he teaches.

There are many twists and turns of words and phrases in this book. One I liked was “Recoding Yourself.” Lakhiani has a background in computer engineering so coding is in his blood so to speak. All we need is a new algorithm inside us or maybe more. One of the ways to do this is to identify your “Brules.” Brules stands for bulls**t rules that guide our lives but that we should have gotten rid of long ago. I disagree with him about this, but that is another story. Certainly, there are some rules we could change for the better.

He discusses your systems for living or your software and in law number three he says, “Extraordinary minds understand that their growth depends on two things: their models of reality and their systems for living. They carefully curate the most empowering models and systems and frequently update themselves.”

Gratitude and What I Love About Myself

Eventually, every self-help writer gets around to the subject of gratitude. I loved these exercises Lakhaini gives you to do. I read somewhere else that with gratitude the key is to focus on your feelings when you write down the things you are grateful for. He wants us to do this in the evening, but I think you can do it in the morning as well.

The “Reverse Gap” is a concept from Dan Sullivan he discusses to help you experience gratitude daily. He says most of us are trained to experience the “Forward Gap.” That is the gap from where we are to where we want to be, but it doesn’t work so well. Instead, we should look backward to see how far we have come – the reverse gap.

The second exercise is asking yourself what you love about you. He says, “Think about what it is about you as a human being that you can love.” Make it three to five things.

These two exercises help you rewire your beliefs so you can be extraordinary.

Goals

“A good goal should scare you a little and excite you a lot.” I like that. He also says people confuse means goals and end goals. A career or college major are means goals. You should ask yourself what do you ultimately want to experience or have in your life. He says end goals are about following your heart and they are often feelings.

So ask yourself what experiences do I want to have in my life? How do you want to grow? How do you want to contribute? All good questions. He discusses “self-fueled goals.” These are goals that come from the inside and are not impacted by circumstances. An example he gives is “I will always be learning and growing.”

The Quest

This small section stood out. It is about finding your mission. Lakhiani says, “Recall a time when you experienced Heaven on Earth. What was happening?” Then, “Imagine you have a magic wand and with it you can create Heaven on Earth. What is Heaven on Earth for you?” And then ask, “What simple, easy concrete step(s) will you take in the next twenty-four hours to make Heaven on Earth real?

There is so much in this book that I have not discussed so please read it.