Key #1: Letting Go of Your Bananas

Letting Go of Your Bananas: How to Become More Successful by Getting Rid of Everything Rotten in Your Life
by Dr. Daniel T. Drubin

This is a book for anyone who feels they've fallen short of their career potential, or wondered if the things they do - or don't do - at work are sabotaging their careers.

The truth is, most people learn their greatest lessons not from grasping the brass ring, but from letting go of negative influences and behaviors. Now, Dr. Daniel T. Drubin helps readers identify what he terms the "rotten bananas" - unhealthy habits, relationships, jobs, and beliefs - that are holding them back, while providing job-saving, step-by-step advice on how to get back on track, including ways to:

• Increase resourcefulness
• Take responsibility and win "the blame game"
• Enhance fearlessness
• Remain purposeful, passionate, and persuasive
• And more

Chapter 1

All barrier busting and personal growth begins the moment you are willing to accept the truth about yourself. And the truth is, most of your bananas, or limitations, whether real or imagined, have been created either by you or by someone important in your life. So much of what we become in our lives has a great deal to do with the people and beliefs we were exposed to as children. Children tend to be wide open to suggestion and to modeling the behaviors of those around them, to the point where they sometimes take on the characteristics of people who influence their lives. Without an effective way to filter out some of the things they are exposed to - some of which may not be in their ultimate best interest - they become pre-programmed to think and act a certain way. The good news is that regardless of what you may have been exposed to early on, or for that matter later in your life, you can change your life by using your free will and power of choice.

You get to decide right now if you want to continue on your present path of life and have those obstacles keep you where you are, or do whatever is necessary to go beyond those barriers. You decide which of the bananas in your bunch are worth keeping and which of the rotten bananas you want to rid yourself of.

I have been told that the way they used to capture monkeys in Africa was by placing bananas in the bottoms of narrow-necked jars. When a monkey came upon the jar, in an effort to remove the banana, it would put its hand into the jar and grab on to the banana. Unwilling to let go of its food, the monkey was now stuck with a jar on its hand, which made it rather easy to catch. What does this have to do with improving the quality of your life? Everything!

When it comes to our lives, the majority of us tend to grab on to something or someone and refuse to let go. We then convince ourselves that we simply cannot survive without that person or thing, and we refuse to let go. In fact, we will even hold on to people, things, or habits that we consciously know are bad for us. It may be a bad relationship or job or a bad belief or physical habit. We cling to what we have - the safe, the secure, and the familiar - even when we know it's unhealthy and preventing us from living a better life. And while we want to go beyond where we are in life, most of our actions indicate that we are willing to stay exactly where and how we are. We just will not let go of our bananas, our sameness, our habits, our comfort, or our past.

The monkey eventually learns that if it refuses to let go of the banana, the fruit will rot and start to stink, yet the monkey still holds on. The same is true for us. If we refuse to let go of the things or people that hold us back, life starts to rot and then stink. The only way to go beyond where you are in your life is by being willing to let go of the things, people, habits, and beliefs that keep you where you are instead of where you want to be.

Letting go of your bananas begins with the power of one: one bold action, one brave decision, one limitless vision, one great question, one new idea, one burning desire, or one act of kindness. As soon as you are willing to embrace the fact that you can change the quality of your life and act on that belief, your world changes for the better.

One of life's biggest challenges is the challenge of letting go. While on an intellectual level I am certain you can understand and appreciate what I am referring to, each of us has been created with a built-in mechanism that wants us to maintain the status quo. Despite how much we want a better life, we do tend to stick with what we know to be safe and comfortable. Face it: keeping things the same, even if your life situation is awful, is safe compared with abandoning what you have and facing the unknown. The unknown is where all of your personal and professional potential lies. The known, on the other hand, is the life you are living right now. Your choices are few and simple: Keep things as they are and resent being limited or opt for the discomfort of change as you face the unknown. As long as these choices are just about the only two choices available to you, you get to choose your destiny. Choose sameness and you get more of what you have. Choose change and letting go and a whole new world of possibilities awaits you.

Rickey Henderson, the greatest base stealer in the history of baseball, had a decision to make each time he contemplated stealing a base. He could choose not to steal the base and remain exactly where he was, or he could run the risk of leaving safety and comfort for the possibility of something greater. Ricky understood that if he wanted to get to second base, the first thing that he had to do was take his foot off first base. First base represented Ricky's banana; beyond first base lay the potential to help his team and set new standards of base-stealing excellence. The same can be said of a trapeze artist. To get from one side of the net to the other, he or she must be prepared to let go. To get to a better place in your life, a place beyond your barriers, a place without rotten bananas, you must be prepared to let go of the known. Letting go of the bananas in your life requires courage and the willingness to live with the consequences of your decisions. Only those of you who are prepared to face the risks associated with letting go of the existing and embarking on the quest for a better future will have the opportunity to bask in the glow of life overflowing with personal opportunity and professional victories.

If you have chosen to remain the same, clinging on to the bananas in your life, you may as well stop reading now and give this book to someone you know who is prepared to change his or her life. On the other hand, if you are the fearless warrior I believe you are, this is the time when you have to decide what and who stays in your life and what and who must go. It's a tough choice. Most of your choices will involve how much you really want to bust out of your present life into a more rewarding one. The more you want to exchange your present for a more gratifying future, the more risk you will need to take. Letting go of the big bananas in your life will provide you with the opportunity for big change and big barrier busting. Or you can play it safer and let go of the smaller bananas in your life and experience smaller change. Regardless of the choice you make, the most important thing is that you have chosen to no longer settle for your present life circumstances, and you are moving consistently and intently in the direction of your dreams.

Life is a mirror, and what you see in your personal universe is an absolute mirror image of your feelings, thoughts, and actions. If you perceive that you have barriers, you're right, and the only thing that really matters when you have obstacles or barriers is your level of resourcefulness. Those who want the most out of life can get it if they are highly energized and creatively resourceful. That's right: everything that exists in your present state of life is a direct reflection of all of your feelings, thoughts, and actions. Change your feelings, thoughts, and actions and you change your life. Change your life and your rotten bananas disappear and your barriers begin to fall. Because your life is a mirror, what you are experiencing in your life right now is also a direct reflection of all the effort and energy you have invested in the quality of your life up to this point in time. If you want to enjoy a better and more gratifying life - a life without bananas - you must begin by altering what you see when you look at and analyze all the aspects of your life.

Copyright © 2006 by Dr. Daniel T. Drubin

About the Author

Dr. Daniel T. Drubin graduated from New York Chiropractic College in 1967. He then went on to open his own high volume chiropractic practice in Fresh Meadows, NY. From 1980-1996 Daniel was the president of Markson Management Services and published numerous articles related to the field. In 1996 Dr. Drubin moved to Park City, Utah and founded Chiropractic Elite Organization. CEO, an all inclusive management & marketing firm, provided chiropractic entrepreneurs with the management and marketing tools necessary to build million dollar practices.