I attended Steve Pavlina’s Conscious Growth Workshop on January 15-17th in Las Vegas.

Before Going

I had been reading Steve Pavlina’s blog (stevepavlina.com/blog) for nearly three years, and I had purchased his book, Personal Development for Smart People. But I was reluctant to sign up. Maybe I balked at the price tag (although the workshop was only $499, I also had to pay for airfare, hotel, and food; all told, the workshop probably cost me about $900). I posted a thread on Steve’s message board, explaining that I needed some convincing. People came out of the woodwork and recommended I attend; after reading enough authentic testimonials, including a couple responses that itemized their results, I caved, and purchased. Besides, I wanted to go anyway. Worst case scenario: I discover he’s a fraud and stop wasting time reading each of his blog entries.

The Sahara

I got into Vegas a day early, and checked in at my hotel, The Sahara. About The Sahara: I paid a very cheap rate for my room. $147.59 for 3 nights, including tax. That’s less than $50 per night, and I got what I paid for. The room was poorly-lit (in order to get decent lighting, I had to turn on like 6 lamps, which at least gave it an Arabian feel). And they dinged me with a mandatory “resort fee” of $18 ($6/day) which granted me the privilege of local calls from my room as well as access to their treadmill room (not a gym: it had 3 treadmills, 2 ellipticals, 2 recumbent bikes, a bowflex-type machine, and no water cooler). But the bed was reasonably comfortable and the price was right.

It takes about 40 minutes to walk from The Sahara to The Flamingo, door-to-door. Fortunately, many workshop attendees had cars, and were generous with giving rides. But the Las Vegas Monorail had a door-to-door transit time of about 20 minutes, and 3-day passes were only $30, so I didn’t end up spending any money on cabs. (The airport shuttle cost me $6 + $2).

Basic Details

The workshop last Friday, Saturday, Sunday. It began at 9am daily and ended at 5pm. We took a 15 minute break at some point during the morning, and took 2 hour lunches.

Workshop Concepts

On day one, Steve introduced us to his model of personal growth. We covered truth, love, power, authority, courage, oneness and intelligence. Those words have specific meanings in the context of Steve’s personal growth paradigm, so I’ll explain them below. The other important concept is Planet A and Planet B: Planet A being the world in which you currently live and Planet B being your ideal world (but still a real one, with real, natural problems as well as desirable circumstances).

Truth-Love-Power Triangle

Truth: the specifics of Planet A and Planet B. What is life like? What is your daily routine? Honesty with ourselves.
Love: the degree to which your environment supports your shift to Planet B. Perhaps the most often overlooked aspect of personal development. how many times have we attempted to begin a new diet only to fail because none of our friends are able to eat out with us, or discourage us in some other way? Or attempted to remold our identity, but fail to do so because all of the places we go to, and people we hang out with, validate the old identity?
Power: our speed of getting from Planet A to Planet B. includes willpower, skill set, knowledge, …
oneness: the degree to which our environment supports our shift to Planet B, because it ultimately benefits from you being in Planet B. For example, when I wanted to focus more on helping out the homeless, staff at my college cafeteria started giving me free food at lunch.
authority: trial and error: how we get to Planet B, from Planet A
courage: The path with a heart. What inspires us? What scares us? We must do that. We will never be effective in accomplishing a goal for which we only hold tepid support in our “heart”.

Intelligence: A way to live life more intelligently!

Application

Steve covered Career/Finances, Health, Social & Relationships, Habits & Daily Routine, Skills & Education, Emotions, Spiritual Development. For each of these sections, he invited an audience member who had a clear idea of both Planet A (current reality) and Planet B (desired reality), onto the stage. He then went through the 7 principles, and asked the audience for suggestions on how the volunteer could improve alignment. Then, we ourselves went through the 7 principles and noted how we could improve alignment; after that, we paired up with a partner, to review our notes.

Emotions

Before I arrived, I noticed on Steve’s Facebook news feed a few weeks back that, at all of his workshops, somebody leaves the room in tears. I certainly didn’t think it would be me, but when we were peer-reviewing Emotions with our partners, my partner Gene said to me “Zack, you may not believe in you, but we believe in you, and I believe in you.” and I started sobbing. Steve’s friend Vicki took me outside and coached me on some emotional release techniques (the Sedona method), as well as reminded me that my ego was the one upset – not me – and that I am stronger than my ego (this is the ego – or self-construct -  in the Eckhart Tolle sense, not the Freudian ego). Just typing this brings back the pain, but now I have some stuff to work on with respect to my emotions, and I think I should see strong synergy between improved emotional wellbeing and the rest of my life. I am grateful to both Vicki and Gene for their support.

Mostly, it was very valuable to come to awareness of how important my emotions are and how much they affect my life. Just having consciousness of my pain will help me treat it and get more living out of life. I have some books to read (on Vicki’s suggestion) and I will report back with new blog posts once I am done with them.

Interestingly, at the end of the workshop this guy Chris came up to me and said that he had been avoiding me for most of the workshop since he sensed my sadness/pain, and couldn’t get involved with that. It certainly explains some of the reactions that people have to me… emotions are contagious. We’re social creatures. You don’t want to hang out with a Leper.

Frustration

I struggled throughout the workshop because I didn’t always have a clear idea of what my Planet B should be. So, I feel like I got less out of the exercises than I could have.

Steve upsold intuitive readings with his business partner/ex-wife, Erin Pavlina; they distributed a sheet and promised that the readings could bring “improved clarity”. Although I think that the notion of “psychic powers” is ridiculous, I do believe that human beings are wired to perceive patterns, and some of us are better at that than others at cold reading (e.g. via microexpressions). Because I do believe in intuition as a skill, I would have opted for a reading had the price not been a prohibitive several hundred dollar sum.

Surprises

There were a lot of people at the workshop who believed in psychic powers (or claimed to have powers of their own), or otherwise believed in what many advanced rationalists (nerds) could call new-age hocus pokery. But this one guy performed a Oneness Blessing on me, and it felt like my head was orgasming. So that’s definitely something I’m going to be looking into further.

Demographics

The workshop audience seemed to be an equalish distribution of male/female; there were omnivores and raw foodists; Germans and Americans and Russians and an Israeli. Attendees’ ages ranged from 18 to over 70. There were hippies who believed in energy healing; software engineers; zen practitioners; elderly collectors of social security; marketers. Suffice to say that there was a wide range of personalities and people at the workshop, all united by a desire for growth, open-mindedness, and (typically) gushing warmth.

I was also surprised to see Derek Sivers at the workshop, with his finacé. I read Derek’s blog at sivers.org and have enjoyed his book notes and summaries (he has some great notes on Steve’s book here), so it was a pleasure to meet him in person.

Key Takeaways

I learned a lot about the principles of growth, and all rang true from my personal experience. I remembered gems such as to only take advice from people with the results I want. I’ve wasted so much time listening to friends with unsuccessful love lives lecture me on the right way to approach dating, or fat friends lecture me on how to eat well and nutritiously.

Connections

I connected with a lot of people at the conference and it was a delight to hang out with them for 3 days. They were non-judgmental and accepting; everyone should be like that! It’s so nice to have so many cool people who I’m so enthusiastic about now populate my Facebook Chat list I’m going to be revamping my social life to experience abundance of genuine connection and friendship. But as Aristotle notes in the Nicomachean ethics, the best friendships are based on shared values; those from the workshop all share values of growth, open-mindedness, mindfulness, and (typically) kindness.

Changes

I have already changed my diet [I have lost 5 pounds in the 2 weeks since I left for the workshop], made a major change in my relationship, and started to go out and connect with people more. I hugged someone outside a bar (I was sober!), and then we started a group hug. I’m blogging more, so I can share my hard-won lessons with the world. Mostly, I want to be helpful, and happy, and fulfilled, and self-actualized, and social .. and each day, I am a little closer to my Planet B.

Conclusion

Well worth the money and time invested. Highly recommended to anyone who has already accepted that personal growth is a good thing, and whose willing to have their perspectives tested/challenged/shattered. Thanks Steve.

The TLP Triangle

So I just got back from the Conscious Growth Workshop in Las Vegas, by Steve Pavlina. I’ll post a review of it in another blog post but this one will be an explanation of his truth-love-power principle powered paradigm of personal improvement.

Two Planets

Steve asks you to consider two planets. I think it’s more clear if you consider two universes: Universe A and Universe B. Universe A is the universe in which your current situation exists. Universe B is the universe in which your desired situation exists. In both universes the laws of physics still apply – they just reflect two entirely different realities.

I’m going to use my current weight loss goals to illustrate the principles.

Truth

The principle of truth asks you to define everything about Universe A, and everything about Universe B.

So for me, the truth about my current situation is that I weigh 212 pounds, and have about 22% body fat. I have a BMI of 26.5 (overweight). I rarely work out in the gym. You can kind of see my upper 4 abs, but just barely, and if the lighting is right. I’m 6’3″, btw.

In my ideal world, I would weigh about 185 pounds, with 8% body fat. I would exercise regularly. I would have a visible six pack. I would eat more healthy, involving a diet with less processed food.

It’s healthy to lose about 1 pound a week so in order to lose 27 pounds, it will take me 27 weeks. That’s 6 months. According to this calorie calculator (http://www.bcm.edu/cnrc/caloriesneed.htm), I need to eat 3000 calories a day to maintain my weight. If I want to lose 1 pound a week, that’s 3500 calories reduction per week or 500 calories per day. That means I should limit myself to 2500 calories per day.

Love

Love is the degree to which your environment reflects you being in Universe A versus you being in Universe B. The word love is perhaps a bit confusing here, but understand it as how much does the universe support you being in Universe A instead of Universe B. Your social circle, where you live, what you interact with on an everyday basis… those are important parts of Love.

Social support is a key element of Love. In my case, it’s important to hang around people who eat good diets, and who support my goals. So I would want to make friends with raw foodists or people who won’t make me feel uncomfortable if I don’t drink when I hang out with them (alcohol leads to putting on weight). I need to stock my kitchen with healthy food.

Power

Power is the speed with which you get from A to B. If you are strong in Power, then you will accomplish your goals very quickly. In this case, for power, I need to work on: learning new recipes (so I can eat healthy and not have to eat out), learning which foods I can eat that will be conducive to fat loss, begin a high-intensity interval training program (perhaps the most effective workout program for burning fat), and improving my willpower so I stick to the diet.

Now the meta-principles:

Oneness

The principle of Oneness says that the universe will support your transition from A to B if you take on a helper mindset: that is, if what you are doing is good for the greater whole. A brief aside into social mindsets is useful here.

• Criminal mindset: you are selfish. You think about your needs above anyone else’s.
• Neutral mindset: your actions are good for you, but not necessarily bad for anyone else.
• Martyr mindset: your actions are good for humanity, but bad for you.
• Helper mindset: your actions are good for you as well as humanity.

The criminal and martyr mindsets are not sustainable. The neutral mindset is fine, but the universe (and humanity) tends to lend its support very willingly along your journey if you are truly being helpful, so why not catalyze your progress with a helper mindset?

So with my weight loss goals, if I just lose weight, it’s pretty neutral. It’s not necessarily selfish of me but it’s not really helping anyone else that much either. But perhaps if I blog about my progress and encourage others by setting a good, public example, then the universe will be more supportive. I’ll also be motivated by something bigger than myself, because I would be letting other people down, not just myself.

Authority

Authority is the principle that we are the authors of our own lives. It’s the principle that we control what Universe B looks like. Shakespeare says, “All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players.” So why not be the playwrights of our own life and have authorship?

This principle involves the mechanics of the transition. I will be trying different exercise techniques as well as different diets, and I will be posting about them on the blog. I’m thinking that it would be cool to do a 30-day trial of low GI foods and a 30-day trial of raw foods. Then I can post on the blog about which generated better results for me, with respect to weight loss. I think that low GI would be easier than raw so I will start with that.

Courage

Courage is following the path with a heart. Coraticum is Latin for heart, and you may also recognize corazón from Spanish. What path has a heart for you? I think that “with a heart” is kind of a fuzzy term and not well-defined so I prefer to think of it as: What path gets you excited; isn’t boring; challenges you? For me the path of getting to a lean body weight is definitely exciting.

Intelligence

Intelligence is Steve’s overarching principle. An intelligent life is one lived with truth, love, power, oneness, authority, and courage. It’s intelligent for me to take this step in my life; I will live longer, be happier, and grow stronger. Moreover, others will benefit and be inspired by my progress.

Concluding Notes

Remember, the idea is to go from Universe A to Universe B, not just to change one thing or achieve one goal. The economics principle of “ceteris paribus”, or “all other things equal”, does not exist in the real world. Everything must change. It would be impossible for me to suddenly gain a sixpack without also changing my diet and exercise habits. It would be impossible to maintain my diet without social support or I’m not going to be able to go out to eat with my friends. If I can’t go hang out I’m going to feel bad, be lonely, and experience stasis in Universe A. That would be lame.

The good news is that if you want to get to Universe B, there are some neat shortcuts you can take. For example, Universe B is really a buzzing Universe. Since it’s a real place, you can work to implement subtle details about Universe B into your immediate experience in order to expedite the transition process. For example, if I have a six pack, I’m probably going to feel sexy and confident about my body. So why not start that now? I won’t be carrying around extra weight, so I’m going to feel more energized, and need an outlet for my energy. So I need to find productive helpful things to work on to channel that energy. Then I’ll feel motivated to keep up my new behaviors, because the work I’m doing is so perspective. Or, I could consider that when I’m 185 pounds, I’ll only be eating 2800 calories/day to maintain weight, so I will need to restrict calories to only 2300/day instead of 2500/day!

So now, it’s time to begin: 6 months to a 6 pack!

Customer development is the idea that instead of building something and hoping people use it, you find a market (an abstract set of customers defined by common needs) and then build a product for them. It has been evangelized in recent years by Steve Blank, Eric Ries, and Marc Andreesen, among others.

You achieve product-market fit (the #1 goal of customer development) when your product matches the needs of your market. The markets’ needs are dictated by what the market is willing to pay for. Payment can be either money (flat up-front fee, or monthly fee) or continued attention. Continued attention can be monetized so it’s as good as money.

You have to make sure that your market is large enough that market size/# of people * payment is a big enough pay day for whatever your needs are.

So there are a few steps to guaranteed success.

1. Market Assessment

2. Product Building

3. Get product into hands of early customers

4. Do 40% of your users consider your product 1=Critical on a scale of 1 to 5 when surveyed? Continue building til profit. If not, return to step 1. Your market assessment will be facilitated with everything you’ve learned thus far.

The above 4 steps can occur in any order but you will eventually go through all of them at some point.

#1, Market Assessment, is the hard problem. How do you figure it out? There are a number of ways. The best way is to just build something, and see if your market likes it. The rule of thumb (evangelized by sean ellis [http://startup-marketing.com/]) is will 40% of your users be Very Disappointed (on a likert type scale from 1 to 5) if they could no longer use your product. If it fails the 40% smell test, then repeat this step until you get it.

Pick an industry that you like. Pick a website. Survey users of that website using http://www.survey.io. Use insights gleaned from that survey to conceive a forward-iterative solution. Use this wordpress theme http://ready2launch.jedenbod.cz/ to collect email addresses for your product. Notify your market about this solution using an advertisement targeted towards the pain points you learned about through survey.io [hint: use my site, http://www.CustomerFind.com]. Got enough interest? Proceed.

You may wish to use PyX. The website has good documentation/examples
http://pyx.sourceforge.net/index.html

To install, download the tgz from the website, navigate to the directory, and “sudo python setup.py install”.

Then, install TeX. You can get it from here http://www.uoregon.edu/~koch/BasicTeX.dmg — once TeX is installed, you should be good to go with PyX. Otherwise you will get weird errors.