YOU CREATE YOUR OWN EXPERIENCE

“This life is worth living, we can say,
since it is what we make it.”
-by William James

What you are about to learn is that your entire experience in the world determined solely by how you engage the world. The way everyone reacts to you - from friends to parents to strangers – is due to the way you present yourself. It’s due to the way you create yourself – image.

Tony was bigger and stronger than most people in our class and he loved acting macho. He wouldn’t just walk up to a group. He’d flex and pose as he came toward you, then he’d grab you and brag about how strong and tough he was. He obviously did this because it was the one thing that he felt distinguished himself in the crowd. He thought it impressed people, when in fact; everyone just rolled their eyes and mimicked him behind his back.

Lindsey was just as bad. When you would talk with her she was incredibly nice, but it didn’t take long to realize that she was the world’s worst gossip. She wouldn’t just pass on the truth; she would make stuff up as she went along. She was horrible and two weeks into the years, nobody would even come near her.

Why, instead of growing in popularity, did Tony and Lindsey each become more and more of a loser? Because they refused to pay attention to the way they created their own experience. Or to put it another way, they did nothing to change the way people experienced them. The point is that you control the world responds to you by the way you conduct yourself. When I talk about creating your own experience, I’m talking about the statement you make to the world through your attitude and appearance and the world’s response to you.

The good news is that you decide which role you want to play and thus, you decide which response you want to receive from the world. You decide because you choose the behaviors that put you in each of these roles. You choose: how to dress, how you talk, what kind of friends you have, who you date, where you hang out, whether or not you respect your elders, whether or not you break the law, whether or not you do drugs or drink, what kind of friend you are, what kind of work ethic you have, whether your word is good or not, whether you are a giver or a taker, whether you are a male, female, or homosexual.