Throwback! This is one of my earliest interviews about my book “The Jackrabbit Factor” with Rachelle Disbennett-Lee, PhD. If you are frustrated about the way your life is going, this episode highlights points and principles that can change your reality as quickly as you intentionally apply them.
TRANSCRIPT
ANNOUNCER: Welcome to the Rare Faith Podcast, where the solution to every problem is only an idea away, where the same activity with just a little more awareness always yields better results. Award-winning bestselling author Leslie Householder brings some of her best information to this inspiring series of life-changing episodes that you won’t want to miss. Show notes for this episode can be found at ARareKindofFaith.com.
COACH LEE: Today, my guest is Leslie Householder and Leslie is the author of a great book The Jackrabbit Factor – Why You Can. Leslie has been a seminar leader for Bob Proctor. She’s also been featured in several of the Chicken Soup for the Soul books and has a great newsletter. You can find out more about Leslie at ThoughtsAlive.com or TheJackrabbitFactor.com.
Today, Leslie and I are going to talk about reality is not what you think, what you think is reality. It’s what we’re going to talk about and what Leslie is going to explain to us is that changing our thinking is a matter of consciously making the effort to think differently and create new thinking habits in our life, therefore create a new life for ourselves. Leslie, it’s great to have you.
LESLIE: Thank you, I’m glad to be here.
COACH LEE: I’m so excited because I love the book. I thought oh, it’s, it’s 80 some pages or whatever on the download and I thought well, I can read this in a couple hours and what inspired you, Leslie to write this book? Because it really seems like it comes from your heart.
LESLIE: Well, it did, it did. In fact, the reason I wrote it, well, a little bit of history. My husband and I were married in the early nineties and we literally went to more than 100 seminars over the next seven years or so, trying to figure out how to get on top of things, how to. Somebody spoiled us by telling us that you know, it’s possible for both the mom and the dad to be home from work and we thought, well, shoot! How do you do that?
So we went to seminar, after seminar after seminar, trying to learn wealth principles and how to succeed. You know, positive thinking, all these things and they were all good and fine but nothing really changed in our life except that we got into really deep debt, going to all these seminars which was part of the problem but after seven years, I was just fed up. I was in a depression so bad that I called the cops on the kid who broke my broom, I mean literally! How bad do you have to be?
COACH LEE: That’s pretty bad, Leslie.
[Laughter]
LESLIE: And I said you know, eventually there was another seminar coming up, and my husband and I were going to go and I said “you know what, I can’t go to any more of these. I can’t do this again, this is the last one. This is it, this is it” and that’s the one that clicked, and we looked at each other and we said “holy cow, that’s all it is? That’s all it is?” and in three months, we tripled our income.
And it just made such a huge difference in our life just to understand the principles, and finally ‘get it’ on a deep emotional level where, where you know, we didn’t have to force ourselves to think and do what we were supposed to do. It just became part of us, and that’s when I started teaching this stuff and, and but I’ve got a lot of kids and I can’t keep up that kind of pace.
So I wrote the book so that it could teach the message for me, even when I’m just at home with my family. And in fact, you know once we finally got it, and we look back on all those other seminars and all the other books that we’d read, we thought well, why didn’t they just say it like this? And so that’s what the book is.
COACH LEE: Yeah, why didn’t they just tell you?
LESLIE: Yeah.
COACH LEE: Wouldn’t that have saved you a lot of time? And you say, I love how you say, I’ve got a lot of kids. Leslie, you have seven children.
LESLIE: I do.
COACH LEE: The youngest being a four month old baby.
LESLIE: Mmm mmm.
COACH LEE: Wow!
LESLIE: Yeah, they keep us busy.
COACH LEE: Oh yeah, and but still you have time to write, and do all this wonderful stuff and get it out in the world.
LESLIE: Well, you know when I wrote the book, I wrote it about two years ago. It was, you know, you’ve seen “Cheaper By The Dozen”?
COACH LEE: Yes!
LESLIE: Ha ha. I can’t say we were the most orderly family while the book was coming out but I just could not not write it. It was, it was in me, it had to come out. I couldn’t sleep if I didn’t and literally as I wrote it, I sometimes I would just be in tears thinking about the families I knew that would be affected by the message of the book, and the moms that would be able to come home from work if that’s what they wanted. Or the marriages that might get saved if that’s what needed to happen because how many marriages out there are under stress because of finances?
COACH LEE: Right.
LESLIE: It doesn’t have to be that way.
COACH LEE: Mmm and it’s really, it’s really interesting how you weaved all of that in there. If you look for it, it’s in there.
LESLIE: Yeah.
FCOACH LEE: It’s, it’s not just… it’s, it’s like what you think is important but the relationships and communication, and all the things that are going on around us that we sometimes don’t even notice or pay attention to.
LESLIE: Right. You know what, I also knew that not everybody’s going to pick up a how-to book, and there’s all the people out there like us who picked up a lot of how-to books and just couldn’t quite get it into our heart. And that’s why I wrote it in a story format and the story is, it’s a, it’s a fiction but like you said, it wraps in all the principles that I thought were important to contain in the book and literally, it’s the principles that we had to learn over those seven years one at a time through the hard knocks. I thought if I could save somebody seven years of the pain we endured, if they could get that out of a story in a couple of hours then, then it’s worth a little mayhem while I put it together.
COACH LEE: Yes. Thank you for, thank you for going through that mayhem because it is, it’s really, it is very, it’s a good book because it isn’t, it isn’t like the normal how-to. You get, you get the message through a very interesting and intriguing story.
LESLIE: Right and you know the, the message in a lot of the other books come across very New Agey and I consider myself just kind of a normal person. I’m a mother, you know. I, I don’t know maybe, I guess everybody thinks they’re normal but I consider myself normal, and I wanted people to see how the principles aren’t way out there. They’re, they’re very real, they’re very down-to-earth. They’re very a part of us and we’re actually affected by the principles as we are right now. It’s just we can use them to our advantage to create the kind of life that we really want.
COACH LEE: Right, and in, in fact you actually in the back of the book give the points to ponder that actually outline what the important points were and what we should do with them. So what are some of the points to ponder? I think because maybe some people are out there going okay, so she’s talking about the book and saying all these great things are in there but what’s in there? What should I, you know, what am I going to get out of it?
LESLIE: Well, for one thing you’re going to discover how important it is and why to decide exactly what you want. It really is cliche to hear “well, you have to decide what you want” but by the time you’re done reading the story, um, did you, were you motivated to write something down?
COACH LEE: Yeah, it becomes very clear that it’s important to know what you want because you could, you could chase after a lot of things if you’re not clear.
LESLIE: Right, and also you’ll learn from the book why it’s important to write what you want in present tense.
COACH LEE: Mmm.
LESLIE: You know because if you were to say “I will be a millionaire by the year 2009” then in the year 2009, you said that you will be a millionaire in that year and in that year, you could say “I will be” because it hasn’t arrived yet. “Will be” is always in the future. You need to put it in terms of “I am” and the reason behind that is because your subconscious mind is really what is keeping your circumstances the way they are.
You’re on a sort of autopilot and, and you may try to force yourself into a different kind of lifestyle, or a different kind of relationship or whatnot but if your subconscious mind has not changed, then you will continue to experience the same kinds of experiences that you have been.
In our case, it was in debt. You know, bills piling up. More money needing to go out than is coming in and those were the kind of things, and the first thing is deciding what you want and learning how to turn it over to your subconscious mind and, and the book goes into that too.
Choosing your words carefully in your goal statement. For example, if you want to lose weight, you need to be careful with that because when your subconscious mind hears you have lost something, it’s going to work overtime to help you find it.
COACH LEE: Mmm, oh and yeah, we don’t want to do that.
LESLIE: We want to lose weight.
COACH LEE: We don’t want to lose it because we’re not ever going to look for it again.
LESLIE: Yeah, you have to release it, let it go!
COACH LEE: Mmm.
LESLIE: Weight, you know that’s associated with weights and measures and so if you’re, if you’re so focused and, and bent on losing weight, you’re spending a lot of energy finding heaviness and I’m sure that some of the listeners can attest to that. You know, the book will go into that a little bit too but it’s just a fun story.
I tell people get lost in the story. Just enjoy it because it’s a tool to helping these principles reach your subconscious mind. If you can enjoy it and feel the emotion that the characters are feeling, and let it move you because it was designed to do that.
COACH LEE: And it does and there’s like I said, there’s a lot going on and there’s different people and different things happening, and their perspective of what’s happening.
LESLIE: Right.
COACH LEE: And so I think it’s very real life. It was something I could really relate to and that’s what I liked about it. I also like in the book and you talk about it in the back, how you write down your goals or you know, what you want and you use, you use a phrase “I am so happy and grateful now that… .”
LESLIE: Right.
COACH LEE: How would, how would you use that in the process of creating what you want in your life?
LESLIE: Well, if I want to be home from work, if I’m a mom that would like to be home with the children and I’m not yet, then I would write a date at the top like a journal entry and I’d say “I am so happy and grateful now that I am home with my children. I love to spend time with them. I love doing crafts with them” or whatever it is that you would like to describe your ideal life to look like, and you feel it now.
As you write it, feel it as though it’s true and I’ll tell you the first time I stumbled onto these principles. I mean, I had been going to these seminars and reading these books forever, and they’d been saying this all along and, and honestly at that time when I called the cops on the kid who broke our broom, I was in such a depression that at this point, I decided I was going to go to bed and I didn’t care if I ever got up.
The kids could find their own food and I was just going to check out and literally, I went to bed and I thought about all the seminar instructors and all the authors who had said “picture what you want” and literally I, I think I even said it out loud. I said “picture what you want! Fine, I will!” and I was going to escape in my mind to a fantasy world because if I can’t be at peace where I am in reality, then I’m going to live it in my head and I did it to spite the speakers. And at that point we were living in this little apartment, you’ll see a picture of it on the website.
COACH LEE: Mmm mmm.
LESLIE: Two bedroom and I checked out and I just pretended like I had a home of my own. I pretended that it had, you know, I walked in the front door and it had this runaround which means you know, if the kids are going chase each other into one room, there’s an escape to come out the other side. That was important to me. My mom taught me that, that was important for children to have.
So I pretended that you know, this is what I have and, and I don’t know how long I spent in that fantasy but I felt it. I literally allowed myself to believe that it was real because it was for me, a remedy to feel better and what’s interesting is within a year, we were living that.
Things started to change. Things started to happen, to move our way, to bring my husband different opportunities that would not, I mean he, he landed jobs that he was not qualified for. You know, it’s just things started happening for our benefit and yet it took another two years for me to realize what I had done.
COACH LEE: Mmm.
LESLIE: And it was you know, that two years later that we went to that “last seminar”. Of course, I’ve been to many since but it was about two years later that I realized “oh my gosh, that’s exactly what I did, and now I know why it works and now I know how it works. Now I can do it on purpose!” and… .
COACH LEE: Yeah, instead of in spite.
LESLIE: What’s that?
COACH LEE: Instead of in spite.
LESLIE: Instead of in spite. I could because, because I’m really creating a life for myself.
COACH LEE: Mmm mmm.
LESLIE: And you know, it’s not just going into a fantasy world and expecting everything’s going to work because you did it, and the book explains what the other steps are but it’s not as hard as you think. It’s oh, I just, I just wish I could convey to those listening how, how powerful it is and how simple it is, and how close the life they want really is to them if they, if they just learn these principles.
COACH LEE: Well, and one of the things and the points to ponder you say “when I have a choice, I choose to believe” and that’s really what you were doing, whether you believed it at that very moment or not, but you created that.
LESLIE: And you know, I believed that I was there right then. I didn’t believe that it was going to do anything in my real life.
COACH LEE: Mmm.
LESLIE: That wasn’t what was, that’s not what’s important really.
COACH LEE: Yeah.
LESLIE: What’s important is that I believed that I was already there.
COACH LEE: Yep and you visualized it, you talk about that. You saw, you saw it happening and you created, I think, real important that feeling and you talk about how important that, that is. I also like how you say there is more than enough for everyone.
LESLIE: That’s true. You know, you get off of the competitive plane when you start to understand these principles. There is more than enough for everyone. If you’re looking for a particular kind of job and you have one in mind that you want for you, there is no competition for that position. If that’s not the one you get, then the one you do want is probably being created for you right now.
Do you realize that all it takes for a new job to be created is for some business owner to need a little more help in what they’re doing? That’s all it takes for a job to be created. And so you could even attract the kind of job you want by choosing what kind of job it is, what your salary would be, what your commute might be, anything!
COACH LEE: So you can choose that. You can create that in your mind, visualize it, believe it, feel it.
LESLIE: That’s right and, and while you’re doing that, stuff is happening outside of your, outside of your immediate influence, and when you understand the principles, you can understand why that works.
COACH LEE: Mmm, I love it. I also like how you say you have all you need to get started and that’s all that matters. Now I can imagine, some people and I can imagine there was a point in my life, I would have gone “Leslie, I’m like that can’t be true! If I had all I needed, wouldn’t I have it, what I want right now?”
LESLIE: It’s easy to lose confidence in your dreams if you look at what it would require to have it. You know, I need all this money or I need all this capital, or whatever. Or I need all this time, I just don’t have it but what you can do is plant the seed like the book describes, and then when you start to move your feet in that direction, you’re going to be acting on people and things in your immediate circumstances.
A lot of times, all you need is just a phone call away and once you’ve tuned in to that idea. Here’s the thing, imagine a radio. If I were to put a radio in the room, and turn it on and tune it to a station, does it pull the music in the room? Does it create the music?
COACH LEE: No.
LESLIE: Why?
COACH LEE: The music’s already there.
LESLIE: The music’s already there. The radio just made it audible and literally you know, the solution to every problem that we face is really only an idea away and we are like a radio. And in order to tune in to the one idea that would be the solution to our problems, we have to literally put our mind onto a different frequency, a different thought frequency. And we do that by thinking of the result that we want and feeling the emotion surrounding it, that we expect to feel when we’re there. That’s how we tune in to the frequency, and you start to do this and ideas pop into your head that you never would have thought of.
COACH LEE: Mmm, because they’re already there. You’re just opening up to them.
LESLIE: Exactly. The solution to every problem is already there. In fact, it’s already in the room with you on a thought frequency and you tune in to that by applying these principles.
COACH LEE: Mmm, I love it and Leslie, if we want to learn more about you and how to tune into these principles, what should we do?
LESLIE: I would suggest going to JackrabbitFactor.com. There’s an immediate download, you can get it and read it today if you don’t mind a digital download, or you can order a paperback – both are available. So that’s where I would start and it’ll put you on a path that will open your eyes like never before. It’s amazing! I, I’m amazed, you know this is bigger than me, much bigger than me.
COACH LEE: And that’s what it’s all about, isn’t it? And they can also go to Thoughts, Thoughts T H O U G H T S Alive.com. Sign up for your newsletter which is really great. I get Leslie’s newsletter, always enjoy it. Leslie, thank you so much. This has been so good.
LESLIE: Thanks for having me, I’ve enjoyed it.
COACH LEE: Great, thank you. Keep in mind that you can do this on your own but you don’t have to do it alone. Visit www.ThoughtsAlive.com and get a copy of her book, visit www.JackrabbitFactor.com.
ANNOUNCER: This concludes today’s episode of the Rare Faith Podcast. You’ve been listening to Leslie Householder, author of The Jackrabbit Factor, Portal To Genius and Hidden Treasures – Heaven’s Astonishing Help With Your Money Matters. All three books can be downloaded free at ARareKindofFaith.com. So tell your friends and join Leslie again next time as she goes even deeper into the principles that will help you change your life.
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