Worldwide Chaos (and How to Rise Above the Fray)

I know it’s easy to get pulled into the latest news cycle, as we’re seeing more and more chaos and confusion around the world. 

But I want us to remember that we stand for freedom.  

And helping entrepreneurs rise above to create better lives.  And so, today we’re actually going to open up and talk about the craziness going on in the world, and how to handle it. 

And I’ll give you my best tips on how to do just that, during such a chaotic time.

Amazing clip from The Network (1976)

So, what is going on? 

We’re in a planet-wide created chaos. 

What’s chaos? 

It’s confusion. 

For me, network marketing has always been about freedom. 

This is an excerpt from the 1976 movie “Network,” that I think is going to best set the tone for what I’m going to talk about. The main character, who is a network newscaster, is speaking:

“I don’t have to tell you things are bad. Everybody knows things are bad. It’s a depression. Everybody’s out of work or scared of losing their job. 

The dollar buys a nickel’s worth. Banks are going bust. Shopkeepers got to keep a gun under the counter. Punks are running wild in the street. There’s nobody anywhere seems to know what to do, and there’s no end to it. 

We know the air is unfit to breathe and our food is unfit to eat. We sit watching our TVs while some local newscaster tells us that today we had 15 homicides and 63 violent crimes as if that’s the way it’s supposed to be. 

We know things are bad, worse than bad. They’re crazy. It’s like everything everywhere is going crazy, so we don’t go out anymore. We sit in the house while slowly the world we’re living in is getting smaller.

“And all we say is, ‘Please at least leave us alone in our living rooms. Let me have my toaster and my TV and my steel belted radios. And I won’t say anything. Just leave us alone.’ 

“Well, I’m not going to leave you alone. I want you to get mad. I don’t want you to protest. I don’t want you to write – I don’t want you to write to your Congressman, because I wouldn’t know what to tell you to write. 

I don’t know what to do about the depression or the inflation and the Russians and the crime in the street. All I know is that first you’ve got to get mad. You’ve got to say, “I’m a human being, God dammit! My life has value!”

That was 45 years ago. It’s pretty much still the same. I don’t know if you noticed that.

No, I’m not mad. I’m actually amused at it because it’s literally funny when you see that it’s just this constant repetition of things. 

What he was talking about is basically very much the same thing that’s going on right now. 

What’s creating the confusion? 

Inability to evaluate data. 

Overcome Confusion: How to Evaluate the Data Yourself

“Never learned” is one of the reasons. You just never learned to evaluate a piece of data. It’s never been something that’s in the forefront of your mind. 

If you never learned how to evaluate the data, then you’re likely to hand over the reins. 

I use this word “reins” because it has to do with controlling horses. The reins are what the person is holding. 

You can just imagine that if you let go of the reins, you’re just hanging out, and the horse is going to go where the horse wants to go. 

Very often, if you don’t know how to evaluate data, you give the reins to somebody else to evaluate the data. 

I’ve often said that if someone doesn’t have the ability to evaluate, they must take on the opinion of another. That can be dangerous. You have to really vet the person that you’re allowing to hang onto the reins. That’s really the scene. 

Here’s an example using a change box that was on my desk. It has coins in it and a washer for a hose, and various other things. I’m going to use it to describe the way that I view this. 

It’s a simple concept. When you look at the newsfeed or the Facebook feed or what your friend is sending you, or what’s going on in Skype or Telegram, all of this stuff becomes data and it all merges together and looks like a change box. 

You have to pick it up and look at it and look at each piece of data. Each item is a piece of data. You’re trying to find that one that’s more important.

How do you determine if it’s more important? Well, how does it affect your life? 

If it affects your life, then you need to pull it out. If it’s something that’s going on somewhere else, that doesn’t affect your life, it’s a lower priority. I’m going to come back to this a little bit later on. 

If you don’t know how to evaluate data, you hand the reins over to somebody, and they better be trustworthy. 

Overcome Confusion: Separate Propaganda From Truth

You’re going to crack up laughing when you see some of this stuff that’s now been proven to be propaganda and how it all happens. It’s the inability to differentiate propaganda.

Propaganda is false information purposely done to manipulate a public. So for those who want to control, they use propaganda. 

Omitting on purpose. Something may be there that’s truthful, but they’re omitting it. You can also view that. Much of it is hidden false subversion and distraction. Fill the newsfeed so that what we’re hiding isn’t apparent, creating an inability to evaluate. 

The Speed of Information and the Fog of War

Another main topic is the speed at which it comes. It comes fast: boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom! 

You don’t have time to evaluate. Therefore, you end up handing everything over. You become numb and you become a non-citizen, almost non-human because it creates this daze. 

I just got this picture of you walking into a darker room from being outside where it’s really bright, and you come in and it’s hazy. You can’t see the same way. If you went the other way, and come out of a dark room out into the sun, it’s the same thing. 

If you watch somebody who’s watching TV a lot, you can see they get into a trance. That’s all that it really takes in order to just program, program, program. I’m not talking about the television show that you’re watching, I’m talking about the programming of the television. 

It’s very easy when you’re in a trance to be programmed because you’re in the fog of war. Everything seems to be about an emergency, danger, and antagonism. 

“Oh my gosh! Unbelievable!” 

That’s the type of thing that draws you in and makes you feel as though you’ve got to be involved, thinking you must join the confusion. 

Don’t join the confusion until you’ve evaluated it. 

Developing Your Own Independent Viewpoint 

I want you to just picture this, because this is how I do it. I have my world. What is my world? I live on a farm. I’ve got a family. I have church. I have friends. I have these items that are in my world. 

I like to look at a piece of data over here. It’s a piece of information. That’s all that it is. I’ve not evaluated it yet. I’ll just look at it. 

That is a point of view. 

I can look at it from one angle, another angle, around the back, upside down, or another way. I’m going to look at it from all different angles. It’s a point of view. I can have a point of view. 

Let’s say that somebody is sitting over here. He might have a different point of view. 

You always need to be looking at it from the perspective of your world and what you want in your world. 

You are independent from the world. It’s your point of view versus another point of view. 

Just because it’s their point of view, doesn’t mean it’s your point of view. 

I’m giving you basically the liberty to look at it where you can say, “No, I don’t want that,” or, “Yeah, I do want that.” It’s just a piece of data. 

Filter On What’s Most Important to You — Reduce Noise

Here’s the world. Each one of these orange squares represent a piece of information.  That’s all that they are – BUT, they all look the same. 

And, that’s the problem.

It’s like you’re looking down inside of a change box and say, “All I see is pennies.” 

Whether or not you bring that piece of data into your world or not is optional. Most people don’t really know that because they just accumulate all of it, and then they can’t distinguish what’s really, really important for them. 

This is my world: 

• When I’m plugged into the TV, I am receiving another’s viewpoint. 
• When I’m plugged into the internet, I’m receiving another’s viewpoint. 
• When I send my kids to school, they are receiving another’s viewpoint. 

If you think about it, you’re taking your precious child and handing him or her over to a stranger and saying, “I’ll see you in six or seven hours,” for 15, 16, 17 years. It’s crazy as an idea. It’s not you building your family unit. It’s about handing them off. 

You have to really evaluate that school. You very much need to evaluate the teachers and the other students, because that’s how crazy ideas, and whole movements and things like that occur. 

So, choose what you want and what you don’t want.

Example of Propaganda From CNBC

I read this article on CNBC and it says, “Unemployment and job metrics have improved for all. But the wealthy, White and higher-educated have done better than the others, federal data show.” 

Anything strike you about that? That is what I mean when I’m talking about data, that data right there is programming.

You can accept that or not. It doesn’t make any logical sense in that sentence. None whatsoever. Being White is not the cause of doing better. They just dropped that piece in there. 

Now you can get this picture of what I’m talking about. In my world there’s data. I connect into a TV or the internet. I’m getting other people’s data coming in. I can say, “Nope, not going to, because this data is not logical in that.” 

If I can show one White person who has not improved, then it’s not about race.

This whole racial inequality is junk to me. I’ve grown up around every kind of color person. I’m a color person. It has zero to do with it. This is pure propaganda. 

I immediately unsubscribe. I won’t receive anything from that organization. 

Again, I know that they are on the propaganda line. They are trying to give propaganda stealthily inside of a real piece of data.

The Difference Between Teaching vs Training

Since I opened that can of worms, let’s just go ahead and touch it. Teaching versus training: there is a huge difference. 

Teaching is theory. Training is application. 

Teaching in the education world (I’m talking about school), is mostly theory, and that’s the problem. 

They’re not taking the theory out there and saying, “Bird is a species. Now go out and photograph 10 different species of birds, identify what their differences are, and identify what their similarities are.” 

Now that would be the application of understanding the life of fowl. That’s the concept that is really missing. 

I, Tim Sales, was not equal in my fourth grade to 12th grade classes. I was not equal. I was below the lowest person in the room.

Why? Because of my color? No, it’s not even logical. You can’t connect any other data points to that. There is no lineup of factual truth in that. 

Merit System vs Spoils System

Spoil system is the practice of filling appointive public offices with friends and supporters of the ruling political party. It’s true also in a company or a business or something like that.

They can be sifting for this sort of thing. 

Someone in a position of hiring could be prejudiced. The reason I’m showing you this is that yes, there could be prejudice going on, but it’s not because somebody had it better off because they were white. It’s because they have a person who is recruiting people who is prejudiced.

What I recommend everybody get onto is the merit system: rewards based on competency and real production. 

That’s one of the reasons I like network marketing so much. It’s based solely on the merit system. 

Anybody and everybody should be on the merit system and only the merit system, because it is the most productive of all. 

That way the boss’ daughter or the boss’ son-in-law doesn’t get their rank advanced because of who they are. That’s the reason it’s all based upon production. 

Choose What YOU Want (And Don’t Want) In Your World

So again, choose what you want and don’t want in your world. If something’s coming this way, just exit out. “Nope. Don’t want that.” 

Or, “I’ll take that.” You get to pick and choose. 

Yes, I’m connected to the world. I need things from the world. 

A lot of people sometimes feel like, “I’m out of here.” They just completely disconnect. They’ve given the reins for the planet over to somebody else. Who? I don’t care who. 

We do have responsibilities in our community. We have responsibilities in our state. We have responsibilities as a countryman, or woman. 

Every one of us do. 

It’s not about hiding and not doing anything, but I must evaluate carefully what I include. 

I don’t have to agree with everything that goes on. In fact, I disagree with much that goes on. 

How to Prioritize (Big Rocks) and Ignore (Noise)

What’s most important? How do you choose which parts to evaluate? 

It’s what can affect your world. You look at everything and think, “What’s most important in my life?”

If I just did that, I would hop over and I would say something really simple. 

I’d say, “My family.” I would take a piece out of the change box and evaluate if it can affect my family. 

If that can affect me, I’m going to put that on the table that I’m going to evaluate. Anything having to do with schools, medical inside schools, education, health, food (which is related to health), or my close environment gets evaluated. 

I live on a farm. I’m not worried about my kids joining a gang or something like that. I’m more worried about them falling in the river and ending up down in the Gulf of Mexico. 

Here’s another important one, and that’s going to be my wife.

If it affects her, I’ll pull out another one and it’s going to be less important. 

When choosing what can affect your world, volume of or repetition of, does not equal senior priority. 

That’s very, very important because if you’ll notice in the newsfeed, they start pounding a story over and over and over. Repetition, repetition, repetition. They are trying to raise something that is of a penny value and raise it up to a senior value. 

Anytime I watch that behavior, I pretty much never watch that channel again. 

Now, if you’ve seen a lot of my videos, you will see one thing. There is a repetition of the Pipeline, because it is for people who want to earn money, whether they are in network marketing or in sales in corporate America, or really any kind of sales.

The Pipeline is the senior piece of information of the entire industry of sales and marketing. That is the reason that I constantly repeat it. 

The other thing that I would advise you on is,  don’t set this up once and leave it. Constantly prioritize the data that is coming to you. 

The Bucket Approach – How to Prioritize 

Evaluate what can affect you and find a good source. 

Let me walk you though how I prioritize the data I evaluate with this bucket approach. 

As gather information I’m going to decide which bucket to put it in. 

This first bucket here would be  would be number one, things that I need to evaluate now. Something that I would put in the first bucket, to evaluate now, might have to do with my kids. 

I’m looking at it and I’m trying to find points that keep adding up: this plus this plus this equals this. They’re very, very important pieces of data. 

The second bucket is about what to do next, and then the third bucket, I call “Someday.” Maybe I may get to that someday. It’s not as important, but these I’m going to do in sequence. 

Tree Chopping Metaphor

The way I like to look at it is that it’s probably a little bit difficult to see the photo above, but this guy has got an ax and he’s chopping a tree. 

The way that I view it is, I got this from James Clear in “Atomic Habits.” I think that’s where I got it from. 

When you just take a tree and an ax, and let’s say that you have 50 trees, and let’s suppose that the way you went about it was that you hit an ax into one tree one time, and then you went to another tree and hit another tree with an ax. 

And you did that all the way around, how long would it take for you to hit this one tree down? That’s not the way to go about it.

When I get focused, just like in network marketing, I take two and I’m going to keep on chopping one tree. I prioritize what to do now, and that’s what I do. I will not move off of it unless something really, really big pops up. 

I actually assigned the task to one of my employees and said, “Look, I’ve got to stay focused. I want you to keep your eye on this particular item.” 

Something was going on in the world, heavy newsfeed on it. A lot of different information was coming about. I would pull off and I would look at sources elsewhere off of the media stream. I would go to more citizen-based newsfeeds. He would update me only if it was very urgent. 

That gives you an idea of the way that I’ve constructed my life so that I end up keeping in my world what I want in my world and what I don’t want in my world, out of my world. 

It creates an incredible life. It creates a peace of mind. It creates one of tremendous stability. I’m not constantly being worried by people who shouldn’t be able to affect me. 

Your thoughts on your world versus the world; do you have a choice? 

If you find someone who’s struggling a little bit, send them this video. This is not necessarily specific to network marketing, just send them the video so that they can get this idea. 

It really does raise you up above the fray. It raises you up above the weeds.

You can just look at the data and make decisions, and it’ll put a smile on your face.

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