The Tool by Phil Stutz and Barry Michels

The Tool by Phil Stutz and Barry Michels
Transform your problems into courage, confidence and creativity.

‘Reversal of desire’ tool

Use this tool when you need to make an action you have been avoiding. We avoid doing the things that are most painful for us, preferring to live in a Comfort Zone that severely limits what we get out of life. The tool lets you act in the face of pain and helps you get your life moving again.

Pain avoidance is a powerful habit. You get immediate relief when you defer something painful. The penalty - helpless regret at a life you wasted - won’t come until far in the future. This is why most people can’t move forward and live life to the fullest.

The first cue comes when you have to do something uncomfortable and you feel fear or resistance. Use the tool right before you act.

The second cue occurs whenever you think about doing something painful or difficult.  If you use the tool every time you have these thoughts, you will build a force that will allow you to act when the time comes.

Tool in brief:
Focus on the pain you are avoiding.; see it appear in front of you as a cloud. Silently scream, “Bring it on” to demand the pain; you want it because it has great value.

Scream silently, “I love pain” as you keep moving forward. Move so deeply into the pain you are at one with it.

Feel the cloud spit you out and close behind you. Say inwardly, “Pain sets me free”. As you leave the cloud, feel yourself propelled forward into a realm of pure light.

Once the tool connects you to the Force of Forward Motion, the world is less intimidating, your energy is greater and the future seems more hopeful.

Between the comfort zone and unlimited possibilities, it the pain zone. You have to cross the pain-zone to reach the unlimited possibilities.
‘Active of Love’ tool

When someone enrages you and you can’t get the person out of your head. You may replay what he or she did or fantasize about getting revenge. This is the Maze. It puts your life on hold while the world moves forward without you.

The childish belief that people will treat you ‘fairly’. You refuse to move forward with life until the wrong you experienced is rectified. Since that rarely happens, you are trapped.

Use active love the moment someone does something that angers you.
Use it when you find yourself reliving a personal injustice whether it was in the recent or distant past.
Use it to prepare yourself to confront a difficult person.

Tool in brief:
Concentration: Feel your heart expand to encompass the world of infinite love surrounding you. When your heart contracts back to normal size, it concentrates all this love inside your chest.

Transmission: Send all the love from your chest to the other person, holding nothing back.
Penetration: When the love enters the other person, don’t just watch, feel it enter; sense a oneness with him or her. Then relax, and you will feel all the energy you gave away returned to you.

Active Love creates Outflow which is the force that accepts everything as it is. This dissolves your sense of unfairness so you can give without reservation. Once you are in that state, nothing can make you withdraw.

Inner Authority’ tool:

In intimidating situations, you will find it difficult to express yourself or even connect with other people. These are moments when you freeze become wooden or stiff, unable to express yourself in a natural, spontaneous way. Underlying this is an irrational sense of insecurity. the tool allows you to overcome the insecurity and be yourself.

Insecurity is universal but badly misunderstood human trait. We think we know what is making us insecure - our appearance, level of education or socioeconomic status, In fact, there is something deep inside us that is the cause of all insecurity. It is called Shadow - the embodiment of all our negative traits - and we are terrified that someone will see it. As a consequence, we expand a lot of energy hiding it, which makes it impossible for us to be ourselves. The tool gives us a new way to deal with the problem of having Shadow.

Whenever you feel performance anxiety. This could be triggered by social events, confrontations, speaking in public.
Use this tool right before the event as well as during it.
A less-obvious cue would be when you are anticipating the event and worrying about it.

Tool in brief:

Standing in front of any kind of audience, see your Shadow off to one side, facing you(it works just as well with an imaginary audience or an audience composed of only one person). Ignore the audience and silently command them to ‘LISTEN’. Feel the authority that comes when you and your shadow speak with one voice.

The force of self-expression allows us to reveal ourselves in a truthful, genuine way - without caring about others' approval. It speaks through us with unusual clarity and authority, but it also expresses itself non-verbally like when an athlete is in the zone. In adults, this force gets buried in the Shadow. The tool, by connecting you to the Shadow, enables you to resurrect the force and have it flow through you.


“The Grateful Flow” tool.

When your mind is filled with worry, self-hatred or any other form of negative thinking, you have been taken over by the Black Cloud. It limits what you can do with your life, deprives your loved ones of what is best about you. Life is becomes a struggle to survive instead of the fulfillment of great promise.

The unconscious delusion that negative thoughts can control the universe. Because we think the universe is indifferent to us, we cling to the sense of  control negative thinking gives us.

Use the Grateful Flow immediately whenever you are attacked by negative thoughts. If unchallenged, negative thinking will just gets stronger.

Use the Grateful Flow any time your mind becomes undirected - when you are on hold during a phone call, stuck in traffic, or standing in line at the market.

You can even make the tool part of your daily schedule. That turns specific times (waking up, going to sleep, mealtimes) into cues.

Tool in Brief:

Start by silently stating to yourself specific things in your life you are grateful for, particularly items you’d normally take for granted. You can also include bad things that aren’t happening. Go slowly so you really feel the gratefulness for each item. Don’t use the same items each time you use the tool. You should feel a slight strain from having to come up with new ideas.

After about thirty seconds, stop thinking and focus on the physical sensation of gratefulness. You will feel it coming directly from your heart. This energy you are giving out is the grateful Flow.

As this energy emanates from your heart,  your chest will soften and open. In this state, you will feel an overwhelming presence approach you, filled with the power of infinite giving. You have made a connection to the source.

Far from being indifferent to us, there is a higher force in the universe that created us and remains intimately involved with our well-being. We call that higher force the Source. The experience of its overwhelming power dissolves all negativity. But without Gratefulness, we can’t perceive the Source.


Jeopardy Tool

The illusion that you can obtain a ‘magical something’ that will exonerate you from using the tools. This is reinforced day and night by the consumer culture that surrounds you. the illusion always leads to the same result” you quit. In success, you think the tools are no longer necessary; in failure, you are too demoralized to use them.

In any situation where you know you need a tool but, for whatever reason, can’t get yourself to use one.
When you feel you’ve grown beyond the need for the tools.

Tool in brief:

See yourself lying on your deathbed. having run out of time, this older self screams at you not to waste the present moment. You feel a deep, hidden fear that you have been squandering your life. This creates an urgent desire to use whichever basic tool you need at that moment.

You cannot overcome the tendency to quit by thinking about it. You need a higher force. We call that force willpower. It’s the one higher force you must create yourself; all the universe can do is provide a challenge that demands you generate it.