Here’s what this is all about:

In 2003 I flipped my car over on the highway and nearly killed myself.

I fell asleep behind the wheel and I woke up to my car bouncing off the divider to my left (the one that stops you from hitting the cars on the other side).

When I woke up I had lost control of the car and was headed toward the divider on the right which was there to prevent cars from dropping over the 1 story elevated highway.

As I saw the wall coming closer I sincerely thought the car was gonna go over.

“This is it” I thought “this is how my life is going to end”.

Then I hit the wall and my car flipped.

People ask me what it felt like.

Imagine being on a wooden roller coaster with loops that goes upside down and getting smacked with a baseball bat in the chest before you hit the biggest loop.

That’s what it felt like.

There I was laying on the side of the highway, the CDs were in the middle of the highway getting trampled by cars flying by.

I can vividly remember the smell of something burning. I think it was rubber but who knows?

I thought the car was gonna explode.

The car was upside down and the driver side window was completely shattered so I crawled out.

Another driver who had seen the crash ran over to me and said: "OMG I can't believe you're alive!"

Neither could the doctors who operated on my broken hip.

They said I was damn lucky that the crash wasn't fatal.

I was hospitalized for 2 weeks and spent over 3 months in physical therapy learning to walk again.

When you're that close to losing it all you realize a few things.

First, you realize that tomorrow isn't promised and life can end at any moment so you get your priorities in order and start doing what makes you happy.

I was only 23 so I wasn't exactly sure what that was.

But I knew what made me curious.

And that was the psychology behind what makes people say "yes".

You see, the only thing I had really ever been good at was selling.

And it wasn't because I knew how to overcome every objection or how to follow up with the prospect.

It was because I knew how to connect with people.  

 I was curious to see if there was a logical explanation for this "connectedness" I was able to form.

I started studying the greatest influencers and communicators of our time.

I studied people like Winston Churchill, Abraham Lincoln, Henry Ford and Martin Luther Kind Jr. among many others.

But there was one man who fascinated me more than anyone.

His name was Dr. Milton Erickson.

Erickson is believed to be the most influential hypnotist that ever lived and the "father of modern hypnotherapy".

Among many other things, he was a master communicator.

He was able to achieve results with his clients that other hypnotists simply could not because his approach was much different.

 Erickson was very aware that most people were naturally resistant by design.

And he also knew that someone could not be hypnotized unless they lowered their resistance.

So his main goal above all was to lower the resistance of the subject before he attempted to hypnotize them.

You see where 'classical' hypnosis is authoritative and direct, and often encounters resistance in the subject, Erickson's approach was accommodating and indirect.

For example, where a classical hypnotist might say "you are going into a trance", Erickson would say something like "you can comfortably learn how to go into a trance".

In this way, he provides an opportunity for the subject to accept the suggestions they are most comfortable with, at their own pace, and with an awareness of the benefits.

The subject knows they are not being hustled, and takes full ownership of, and participation in their transformation.

One of his trademark tools was storytelling.

You see instead of bombarding people with data, facts or arguments, Erickson would wrap his entire "presentation" in a story so the subject wouldn't feel like they were being persuaded.

It's not hard to understand why he did this..

He knew that..