On the Importance of Saying “Thank You” By, Van K. Tharp, Ph.D.
Originally published in Tharp’s Thoughts #709 November 25, 2014
One of my Super Traders recently mentioned that he was doing the 28-day course by Rhonda Byrne from her newest book, The Magic. I was quite curious, what is this 28-day course? I was in Australia at the time and Byrne is Australian so I knew that I would be able to find the book in the local bookstores.
Once I found it, I photo-read the entire book in about 15 minutes and decided that I needed to buy it. I worked on The Magic program while I was conducting the Peak 202 workshop and then went on a five day vacation. The book turned out to be all about gratitude. I am very interested in gratitude because when I first became a Oneness Blessing Giver over five years ago, I was told that the fastest way to increase my level of consciousness was by increasing the amount of gratitude in my life.
When Peak 203 came around a week later, I decided to incorporate The Magic program into the workshop follow-up program. In addition, my Internal Guidance told me to add an exercise to the course itself. That exercise became one of the most powerful I’ve ever given in terms of its impact.
Here’s the exercise, so that you might try it yourself: At lunch time today, go outside and say, “thank you” to at least 50 people in one hour. You must be able to give a different reason to thank each person so that the “thank you” is sincere. So, how do you feel at the thought of doing that exercise?
It’s not such a daunting task in Sydney when you consider that as soon as you go out into the streets, you can meet around 10-20 people each minute. All you have to do is pick one and say, “Thank you.” If you live in an area where there aren’t many people, you’ll have to say thank you to everyone.
When we debriefed the exercise after lunch, the feedback ranged from:
- “This was the most powerful exercise I’ve ever done.”
to,
- “That was the most awesome hour of my entire life.”
That was the kind of impact it had. Here is a specific recount of the exercise that one of my Super Traders gave at his end of the week report to me:
One of the most uplifting experiences of my life happened today. Van changed the lunch time exercise to one where we had to go out and give 50 “thank you’s” to people. It could be for anything, but each one had to be for a different reason.
So anyway, for the FIRST time I decided to NOT do this alone, but to do it with a partner. I teamed up with D in the tunnel at Central Railway Station. D and I had bought four pieces of cardboard, and we were going to pin them to our front and back, when two other class participants turned up and asked for a piece of cardboard. The universe certainly provided, and was perfect (well, from their perspective I guess).
What followed I can only describe as pure magic. We stood as a group in the tunnel, and started thanking people. The goal was to get 50 each. We were able to thank over EIGHT HUNDRED people!!! But that wasn’t the point. A lady who was an opera singer, looking quite down with the world on her shoulders, just suddenly burst into song. There were people who were uplifted. People would walk up to us and give us hugs; we lost count of the number of high fives.
Words fail me, but I know the other guys were totally in agreement that — for that hour or so — magic truly happened. It was like the energy in the whole walkway where we stood was raised an entire level on the David Hawkins scale of consciousness.
What also makes this exercise particularly poignant for me is that it was almost two years ago to the day (actual date: 18th of March) that I approached Van about being a Super Trader. It was at Peak 203 in Sydney, March 2011. I remember it well, because when we had to do the exercise where we went out to get hugs. I was shaking, almost throwing up in the bin and paralyzed with fear. I couldn’t wait for it to end. D summed it up that day by saying that I looked like Mr. Burns out of the Simpsons, half dead.
Now here I am, two years later and experiencing something that was completely transformative, pure magic. If that’s the kind of Matrix I am creating now, then “I want more of that.”
While this article has little to do with trading, it has everything to do with being a happier person and raising your level of consciousness. So, if you want an experience with Magic, then go out and do it. And if you need to recruit a couple of friends to do it with you, be my guest.
