The Software Of Your Mind: How Changing Your State Of Mind Changes Everything

By Lee Reffel and Robin Austin

The Software of Your Mind: How Changing Your State of Mind Changes Everything is the definitive guide to tranforming your life. Through practical exercises and techniques, you will learn to make the changes needed to move from a place of anxiety,grief, and depression to one of faith, hope, and self-confidence.

 

You will learn to overcome self-doubt,self-sabotage, and negative self-talk, master your emotions and conquer your fear. In addition, you will be able to turn defeat into victory and make the most of every opportunity.

 

The Software of Your Mind is the key to unlocking your true potential and becoming the person you want to be. Take the first step to becoming the best version of yourself and start transforming your life today!

 

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lee Reffel
• Release date: Apr 29, 2023
• ISBN: 9781792396038

Book preview

Acknowledgements

Lee:

I want to thank and honor my mom, dad, grandma, and grandpa. You taught me a strong work ethic, patience, and perseverance to overcome life’s challenges. I am grateful to my twin, Lyle, for being a good brother through thick and thin and giving me tough love when I need it.

I thank my wife Leah, daughter Anna, and mother-in-law Luanne. Their feedback, patience, and sacrifice were invaluable. Thanks to my beloved friend Camille for her continuous prayers, encouragement, enthusiasm, and friendship.

Thanks to my good friend and co-author, Robin Austin. It has been a hero’s journey and I’m very grateful for your help and support all these years with supporting Leah, Luanne, and Anna. We have both expanded our understanding through sharing our unique philosophies, experience, and wisdom, in creating this impactful book.

I’m grateful for my other instructors, Kim, Nick, Jesse, and Erik and my other dear friends. You know who you are. I am thankful to all the people who have challenged, guided, and influenced me to become the person I am today.

A special thank you to Jeremy and Krystal for creating the Certified Mastery Coaching program, and fellow mastery coaches for their mentorship. This course helped refine my vision of purpose to create this book and help others overcome their challenges.

Robin:

Thank you, Mom, and Dad, for encouraging me when I doubted myself and founding my childhood in guiding principles that uplift and assist me to strive for greatness!

Anne, Thank you for twenty-five years of love and companionship! I always knew our children were cared for! You were the mother of our children, Grant, Jordan, and Noelle, my wife, and a true soul mate, and the light of my life, and inspiration. You taught me more about human relationships than anyone ever has. Thank you, darling!

Jordan, you were, and are, always an inspiration! Thank you, son! Anne, Jordan, you light my path as angels watching over us. You are always loved and remembered.

Luanne, thank you for your kindness and generosity. My dearest friend, you stepped in to help me when I most needed it. You have consistently assisted and supported me, and my efforts. I love you. Thank you for being who you are.

Grant, our discussions have helped grow, shape, and challenge my thinking, helping me generate the Joie de Vivre, and inspiration to fulfill my greatest aspirations. Thank you! You have always been an inspiration to me! I love you, dearly, son!

Joie, Grant could never have found anyone more wonderful to bring into our family! I treasure you more than I can tell. Daisy, and Sam, I love you and appreciate how you’ve been there for me, and your mom and dad, and kept my mind sharp, and heart light through some difficult hours, and happy, joyous, hilarious hours we’ve shared. Thanks for being phenomenal!

Noelle, thank you for being an exemplar of loving kindness, and an inspiration not only for me, but for so very many others. Love all ways at all times! Sam, thank you for your tender-hearted embrace of not only Noelle, but her family, and me, and your own thoughtful, careful fathering. Annie, thanks for determining your own destiny. I honor you for deciding for yourself, (and your parents, who make so many of those choices possible).

Nikki, Thanks for challenging, and disputing the things I told you. It’s great to spar with a worthy opponent, and friend.

Dave, Perri, Clara, Edward, thanks for taking me in, welcoming me, and feeding me when I needed it. A special thanks, Dave, for assisting us greatly with editing this book.

Sam, James, Corey, thanks for the intelligent skepticism, and spirited debate. Whenever I need to sharpen my thinking, I will always try to share it with you! Fran, Genevieve, Laura, over the many years you have never neglected to offer your help and support when the opportunity presented itself. Thank you! I appreciate you! Camille, what a privilege to assist in the editing of your book! Thank you!

My co-author, Lee, has proven to be quite brilliant and a steady and reliable friend! I owe him a debt of gratitude. Thanks for inspiring and coauthoring such an exceptional work! Thanks to Anna, a kindred spirit who gets my humor, and Leah, always faithfully supportive of Lee through everything.

Lastly, we want to thank Tyrone Curtis Muggsy Bogues, who so inspired us by overcoming obstacles in his own life we couldn’t help asking if we could share his story, and he very kindly assented! Thank you, Tyrone Curtis Muggsy Bogues! You are a true champion!

Introduction

On June 21, 1948, data scientist Tom Kilburn, along with Frederic Williams, built and successfully tested the world’s first storage-based computer, the Manchester Small Scale Experimental Machine. Ada Lovelace developed the idea of software and formulas for Charles Babbage’s Analytical Engine in the 1840’s. These were visions in the mind before becoming reality.

Software undergoes numerous tests before it can be released to the public. Each version is updated to minimize flaws and increase stability. However, writing code to introduce changes sometimes corrupts it.

Trauma, anxiety, depression, worry, and other negative influences can corrupt the mind’s software. Low self-esteem, lack of confidence, guilt, self-condemnation, and other self-limiting beliefs prevent us from reaching our full potential.

What if you mastered effective visualization techniques that compel your subconscious mind to accept and deliver the best version of yourself? Could you credibly imagine a future where you use your mind in extremely powerful ways?

What if you learned several effective approaches to meditation that help you cultivate gratitude, joy, serenity, creating habits of higher achievement, better sleep, easier learning, and a deeper spiritual connection?

What if you learn and cultivate the habits of Kaizen, in which you make continuous small improvements to achieve success in every area of your life without burnout?

What if you acquire the ability to shift brainwave frequencies in a matter of moments to access inner reservoirs of creativity and resourcefulness?

For many years we have researched and studied, then mentored, trained, and assisted others to overcome self-doubt, master critical skills, set high goals, and achieve more success.

We invite you to explore and use the strategies we’ve discovered and developed to improve your life. This book offers you the opportunity to build your ideal future. Combined with strong desire and committed action these techniques will transform the Software of Your Mind. When you Change Your State of Mind, You Change Everything!

Lee E. Reffel and Robin A. Austin

The Keys to Transformation

"If everyone is speaking caterpillar, don’t be afraid to speak butterfly.

When it’s time to awaken, nothing else will suit you."

- Tama J. Kieves -

Lee:

In April 2021 I joined a coaching certification course to master my mindset and develop my own coaching business. As I worked through it, my wife and daughter kept asking me: Are you okay honey? Are you okay, dad?

I told them I was, but they sensed otherwise. Then the critical question in my coaching mentorship was asked.

What area of your life has been your biggest struggle?

I was overwhelmed by thoughts of humiliation and trauma. Loss of my loved ones had hit me hard. I needed to be alone. Emotions boiled up, and tears started to fall. Decades of bottled-up feelings poured out. Lack of confidence, self-doubt, and a fear of rejection were my biggest struggles. I never put myself first. I couldn’t say no to others and often suffered because of it.

I wanted to feel self-confident and do what was right for me. I felt a need to gain the respect of others without feeling selfish. I had to erase negative thoughts that held me back from opportunities. I desperately wanted to live a fulfilling life.

Having failed at several businesses, I wanted to find my true purpose and help others who were going through their own struggles and traumas. The next day, May 1, 2021, I called and asked my friend Robin Austin if he’d like to write a book with me about The Software of the Mind. Immediately, he was excited. He was well versed in spiritual practices, psychology, and the life experiences that led to wisdom. Together, we would make an excellent team. He had seen devastating losses. When I called, he was in the early stages of rebuilding his life after a series of setbacks.

Lee & Robin:

As we realized the importance of what we were teaching, the book quickly became a mission. We both found it to be an interesting challenge. We gained a deeper understanding of what enabled us to overcome traumas by reliving formative moments of struggle, pain, and anguish in our lives. We realized our own losses, victories, and healing could assist others to overcome their challenges and discover new possibilities to survive, thrive, and heal.

Sometimes, the right book at the right time makes all the difference in our lives. The right perspective opens doors. Each of us was touched by tragedy in ways that tested our limits. It twisted us in knots, broke our hearts, and left us unable to find comfort when we needed it most.

We explore the effects of tragic heartbreaks and devastating losses, and how we dealt with them. We survived, transformed, and thrived despite challenges related to physical and mental health. It had to be practical, and it is.

Sometimes people are ostracized and hated because of things that are beyond their control. Singled out for our age, looks, skin color, sexual orientation, the way we walk and talk, disabilities we’re born with, our intelligence or reputation, can harden our hearts. Or it can open our hearts and awaken our minds. It depends on our software.

This book is the best of the best of what we’ve learned about how mindset shapes our lives. Using these secrets, you’ll free yourself from what’s holding you back. We believe you will be helped by this book to live the life you want and deserve. We believe you can master yourself. We believe not only that you can, but you will, and you are about to set yourself free!

Lee E. Reffel and Robin A. Austin

Do You Accept Your Life As Is?

Don’t put up the walls! The same wall that keeps out disappointment keeps out happiness! Take down the walls, go for the experience, let it teach you!

- Jim Rohn -

If we believe positive thinking improves our life, well, it does, but one critical thing is missing: For us to change requires us to endure discomfort. Until we become dissatisfied with our circumstances, they rule our lives. We live with the consequences of our past until we act to create our chosen future.

Past choices, experiences, habits, and consequences imprint in our brains. Habitual activities become unconscious programs, and we follow them without thinking.

We may drive a familiar route, have virtually the same conversations, watch the same programs, put on our socks right foot first every morning, get our coffee, and so on, throughout our lives. We may scarcely remember these rote events, as our brain functions on autopilot through them.

Our present, past, and future, all reflect each other until we reject the status quo, take control of our lives, and design new thoughts, creating a new future.

We either demolish bad thought habits, or they consume our life force, leaving no reserves to create our new future. The question then, is...

"Do I accept my life as is, and the future it dictates, or is there enough about my life that I DON’T LIKE that I’ll leave my comfort zone, change thought and behavior patterns, and form habits that create the future I desire?"

We’ve all had experiences that skew our thinking. How do we overcome these limitations? Well, this is how we’ve done it...

Part 1

Early Afflictions and Triumphs

Chapter 1:

Odd Ball Out

For he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him.

- Isaiah 53:2 -

Lee:

I was born five pounds three ounces, my fraternal twin brother, Lyle, five pounds nine ounces. I have a small divot in the back of my head and scoliosis with my neck curved to the right, probably from my brother giving me a swift kick in the head five minutes before he was born.

This led to balance and posture issues and was a source of low self- esteem. I was very skinny with ramen noodle like hair. Lyle was at least ten pounds heavier and had wavy hair. To make matters worse, our parents dressed us alike until third grade, which drew attention to us, and kids teased us.

We didn’t attend preschool, so I fell behind in kindergarten. My teacher saw my struggle and the next year I was in special ed. Although it helped, I felt stupid. I wasn’t confident, particularly with girls. I wanted to fit in but wasn’t accepted. I barely passed Kindergarten.

I had a great teacher in first grade who instilled positivity in me. Mr. Stevens, my first-grade gym teacher encouraged heart and attitude in me.

When he saw me, he used to call out in his loud voice:

Winner, winner, chicken dinner!!

How are you today son?!

I excitedly said:

I’m good Mr. Stevens!

Atta boy!!

I loved his passion and appreciated that he thought I was a winner. I sure didn’t feel like one compared to the other kids who were bigger, smarter, and more socially adjusted. He also didn’t appreciate it when I cut corners, and I mean literally...

Part of gym class was a timed six-hundred-yard run, the average time was around three to three and a half minutes. We ran on a square baseball track. The elite athletic seven-year-old kids could run it in two minutes forty seconds. I was around the three minute and thirty second mark.

One day I had the brilliant idea to level the playing field and cut corners so that I wasn’t in last place. I thought it was a great idea at the time, until I ran into Mr. Stevens with his beet red face. He picked me up by the shirt collar and yelled at me:

What are you doing!! Cheating doesn’t make you a winner! I don’t want to ever see you pull that again, you hear me!?

The other kids watched as my pumping legs stopped, and my scrawny little body dangled in the air, with tears running down my face.

Yes Mr. Stevens...

He put me down and told me to run along. I felt dejected, but I set the example for myself, and others, of what not to do.

I now understand why he called me ‘winner, winner, chicken dinner.’ It’s the small wins within ourselves that matter regardless of how we finish. That lesson stayed with me.

Then, in fifth grade, my assigned teacher was Mrs. Stevens, his wife. She was a very elegant woman who had a Mid-Atlantic accent; a cross between American and British. She commanded respect and when kids had side conversations, would loudly say with a stern look on her face:

Eye contact, and body language please!

We knew it was time to shut up and listen. She gave us a lot of homework, including monthly book reports. I always seemed to procrastinate until the weekend before they were due.

One day during lunch, Mr. Stevens asked how I was doing.

I’m good, but Mrs. Stevens gives us too much homework.

She’s preparing you for your future. Life doesn’t get easier so be grateful she’s doing that. Are you doing good in her class?

Yes Mr. Stevens, thank you.

"Atta boy, you’re welcome. Winner, winner, chicken dinner!

She did make the class competitive and fun by creating teams which were awarded points with extra credit. I had a strong grasp on math at that point and did extra work on the math team helping us win. It felt good to be recognized as a leader.

I’m grateful she helped me develop a strong work ethic and taught us the importance of eye contact, body language, and commanding respect. These fundamentals have helped me throughout my life.

C

hapter 2:

Solid Foundations

Let us, before we die, gather up our heritage, and offer it to our children

- Will Durant -

Robin:

I had every advantage. My parents cared deeply about their children’s success. My mother was a schoolteacher for more than thirty years and taught us from earliest age to solve problems and think for ourselves. My father was an authoritarian who pushed us always to be and do better.

He loved us, but his style of parenting was to make it clear he liked us best, and applauded us most, when we excelled in some activity that accented his social standing and made him look good. He also set a great example of boldness and committing to a course of action with a positive attitude, even in the face of trepidation.

He came from a tiny little university town in the mountains of North Carolina and followed a dream to be an actor that carried him on to Stages in Denver, Colorado, Los Angeles, California, New York City, Boone, North Carolina, and into movies, even a cameo appearance in ‘Annie Hall’, the 1977 film that won, among others, an Oscar for ‘Best Picture’.

He moved philosophically from his southern Baptist upbringing, to become more aligned with Hindu, and Unitarian Universalist beliefs, among others. He began many more things than he finished and suffered from dreadful stage fright most of his life. Dad managed to overcome alcoholism, and cigarette smoking later in life and strove to rebuild the relationships that suffered during his years of addiction.

My mother always has been a person of tremendous integrity. She set a wonderful example of inner strength, and self-reliance, leading by example, and living by her principles. Her Father was a Presbyterian Minister, and her mother was the most brilliant student in her college. That is what attracted my grandfather. He went to the college and asked the headmaster:

In every school there is one student who stands out, head and shoulders, above her peers. Who is that in this college?

Oh, that would be Eloise! She is, by far the best student in the school!

Then that’s who I’m going to marry!

...and he set out to court her, woo her, and win her, until he did. My Grandmother, Eloise, raised her children, with the good Reverend, Wallace Theodore (W. Ted) Jones, to honor God, their parents, and be independent thinkers.

Some of my fondest childhood memories were when we would get together at the beach with Mom’s extended family. My aunts and uncles were very kind to us, very entertaining, exceedingly generous, and could be hilarious. My cousins were all beautiful, fascinating girls, from exotic, interesting places, the way I saw it. We all told stories, played games, and went to the beach, collecting shells. Once I brought home a good-sized jellyfish I found, adding it to the table where we displayed the pretty shells we had found. It vanished mysteriously later that day. There was never any reasonable explanation for this jellyfish evaporation. I love all my cousins dearly to this day.

Then we would travel into the idyllic mountain countryside, where my father was