此篇Mini-lecture有理解的难度；需要先熟悉词汇，挑了几个出来。做完练习后建议细听精读达到理解。
Vocabulary：phase,cease, hinder, depict
chasing their own tails--taking action that is ineffectual and does not lead to progress
put two and two together==to figure something out from the information available.（slang）
The Journey of Self Improvement
I want to elaborate on the journey of self improvement that all of you may experience. Do you still remember your first self improvement book? After reading it, you probably got "pumped" up. You may have felt like you could do anything. You felt unconquerable and then a couple of weeks later, you were down again. So you went to the bookstore and got another book. Another incredible high after you read it. You believed in yourself, took action, felt invincible and then a couple weeks later, you became down again.
This depicts the first phase that people go through on their journey of self improvement. They rely on books, speakers, or tapes to "pump" them up, to tell them that they can do it. It's true though. You can do it. Everything you need to accomplish anything you want is already inside of you. You can do it. This is the basis, the foundation of all self improvement. Once that happens, you go on to the second phase of self improvement, which is mass absorption of knowledge. You start looking for the how to part. It's not enough to know that everything you need is already inside of you. You want to know how to use that something which is inside of you to achieve your goals. Slowly you start to gain knowledge on positive thinking,goal setting,etc. You find you have some measure of success with each "tool" you discover, but you then realize it's only effective for a little while. There are so many pieces to the puzzle of human achievement out there that you feel overwhelmed with information. You feel as if there's so much to learn and so little time and each time you think you found the key to it all, you read about yet, another key to success, and another, and another.This is the phase where most people get stuck. They start chasing their own tails. One more book, one more article, When you've read enough literature on the subject of goal achievement and start to apply some of the knowledge you've learned, you then start the journey of your third phase.
This third phase involves putting the pieces of the puzzle together. You cease looking at the things you learned as separate from one another and you start to realize that they are all part of one big picture. You start putting two and two together. You realize that positive thinking is linked to your power of choice to shape reality, which then influences the way you perceive things, hence influences your future actions. Slowly you start to merge the little pieces into bigger pieces in order to assemble the big picture and then the fourth and final phase hits you like a ton of bricks.
The fourth and final phase of self improvement involves realizing that there is a natural process to human achievement and the cycle then completes full circle. You come back to the first phase, namely that everything you needed to accomplish anything you wanted was inside of you, but this time, you are conscious of it. You understand it on a deeper level that you couldn't feel before, because now you're not hindered by formula or technique, but rather freed by nature in all its simplicity.
Long before any self improvement books were ever written, people were achieving great things without them. The reason why you see so much literature on self improvement whenever you go to a bookstore is that people have forgotten this basic fact, that what they are seeking is already within them, that they already have the means within them to achieve their goals.
Now the search begins for the how.
When they accept the fact that they have what it takes and go on that how to phase, they find themselves overwhelmed with so much information that they just don't know what to make of it.
In addition, how to deal with the barrier. Here's my advice: You've got to start seeing how everything fits together. Realize that there is no one key to success. I know you've read countless books and articles that highlight one principle as the key to success. Clear your mind of that kind of narrow minded thinking right now. Once you figure out how to achieve your goals naturally, you won't need those books like you used to. You'll have come full circle and that's when the real fun begins.
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