Overseas Think Tank for Indonesia

Title: Sky without Limit: Fifteen Self-Challenges to Realize Your Visions
Author: Dr. Beni Bevly
Language: English
Publisher: Afton Institute
Genre: Empowerment
Specification: 173 pages, 4.25″ x 6.88″, and soft cover
Price: $18.00 (BUY)

Introduction

My tai chi master used to teach the way of life by telling stories. I remember one of them:

A long time ago, a very wealthy man and his family lived in harmony in the Far East Kingdom. On his birthday, he invited many people, including one renowned calligrapher who was also a tai chi master. He presented his calligraphy as a gift to that wealthy man.

The man thought it must be a very valuable gift, so he unwrapped it in front of his guests. However, he and the guests were shocked when they read:

Grandfather and grandmother die.
Father and mother die.
Children die.
Then grandchildren die.

Of course the wealthy man was angry. However, the tai chi master explained, “What if I wrote instead: First, grandchildren die. Second, children die. Third, father and mother die. And last, grandfather and grandmother die. Wouldn’t that be very sad? Because the younger people die first. But if the older people die first, then followed by the younger, that would be a natural and happy family.”

In this book, you will find a lot of words, sentences, and challenges that are as blunt as this story. But behind the bluntness lies a proven method that will drive you to realize you visions.
If you want to find the easy, instant, and comfortable way to realize those visions, this is not the right book for you. Please close it now and put it back on the shelf, because through this book, I won’t be showing you an easy and instant way to become a successful person.

Instead, you will be asked to challenge yourself to do things you don’t want to do, and even to create a rival for yourself. Behind all these challenges, basically you will be driven to become the best person you can be and to live out your visions for your life.

In many publications, the authors use the word dream to describe a lifelong wish and aspiration in doing and becoming. Here, I refrain from using dream because I will be talking about how to work towards your goals by doing. Doing itself is an action based on perseverance and endurance, not a passive and simplistic activity such as dreaming.

As we make this journey together, I will often tell you what you don’t want to hear, I will show you what you don’t want to see, and I will ask you to do what you don’t want to do. You will be challenged along the way to do more than you now believe you can, and you will begin to find in yourself the courage and commitment to make your life into what you now only wish it could be. By learning to meet these new challenges, you will find in yourself greater power that you ever imagined.

Why do I challenge you instead of acting like a traditional coach who encourages you with a pat on the back and leads you along a predefined road?

First, because I have learned from my own experience that challenging works better than coaching. Presenting you with a challenge lets you explore your own power to achieve your goals instead of depending on someone else to keep motivating you to do better. When that other person isn’t available, your motivation can disappear too, because it’s being fueled by someone else.

Second, our society teaches us all independence from an early age, which explains why many of us aren’t so coachable. Some people hire coaches to help them succeed, yet the results aren’t very pretty because there’s a conflict as to who is in charge of your independence.
An external coach can become a crutch to lean on, creating dependency and resentment—not to mention the belief you need help to succeed. Instead you should want to learn how to motivate yourself and to see what you can achieve under your own power. In this book, I’m going to show you how to be your own coach and rely on yourself for the motivation to succeed while challenging you to fly alone.

As we explore new challenges together, you’ll receive far more than just encouragement to fulfill your aspirations. Instead, I’ll be your personal guide, showing you how to challenge yourself. By meeting these challenges, you’ll develop the ability to coach yourself to success. You already have inside you the strength and will to make yourself a winner—and to realize your visions. I’ll be with you as you learn how to tap into that power and use it for yourself. It won’t always be easy, but the rewards will be great.

In the following chapters, you will challenge yourself to:

1. Walk through fire to pursue what you passionately want.
2. Do what you do not want to do to accomplish the important things that you must do to pursue your visions.
3. Declare your success by creating a statement of your goals.
4. Create your own inner rival so you can measure how you are doing.
5. Create your next rivals so that you can achieve more, above and beyond your present goals.

You will learn that the sky is not the limit—the only limit is yourself. And you will learn how to remove all your limitations, then create a sky without limit by:

1. Killing the dragon within, becoming selfless by eliminating arrogance.
2. Giving more without selfishness, gaining the power of giving and teaching.
3. Walking endlessly, showing determination and perseverance instead of quitting.
4. Being militant about what you want, learning that there is no in-between—there is only doubt and compromise or total confidence.
5. Becoming “Achilles,” acting courageously instead of being fearful.
6. Being antiestablishmentarian, turning crisis to opportunity.

You will also be asked to forget the typical notion of the American Dream because we’ll redefine what it actually is: not just a dream per se, but more about committing yourself to talk loudly about what you’re going to do and to act upon it. In so doing, you’ll find out that there is more than one road to success.

You’ll also learn the lesson of a volcano: choosing the right moment and the right place to make the greatest impact, one that nobody will ever forget.

Finally, you will push harder and live stronger in every aspect of your life.

In the words of Joyce Wycroft:

To know what you do not know, you must go where you have not gone, see what you have not seen, do what you have not done, and be what you have not been.

Because, after all, success is not a destination—it is an adventure to realize your visions.

Are you ready? Let’s begin.

(BUY)

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Dr. Beni Bevly is an analyst Overseas Think Tank for Indonesia, Northern California. His educational backgrounds are organizational leadership, marketing, and political science. His proven organizational and management skills have propelled him to management positions in one of Fortune 500’s corporations. He is a life coach, a certified fitness trainer, a specialist in martial arts conditioning, and an international martial arts black belt holder.