This weekend my life was transformed.
I want to tell you about it.
For months now a very close friend (who is also one of my coaches) has been trying to get me to do the Landmark Forum. And I had been very effectively resisting. Behind all the usual ‘I’m too busy’, ‘The time’s not right’, ‘My nanny’s ill’ excuses.
But (after booking and cancelling no less than three times before) this weekend I finally – and rather indignantly – DID IT!
When you enrol in the Forum you have to write on the form three things you want to get out of it.
Mine were:
- To endure the entire three days (I’m notorious at getting bored/irritable and bailing out of courses/projects/commitments when things get uncomfortable - so it was a personal challenge for me to actually stick with something to the end - and notice my use of the word ‘endure’!)
- To clear the ‘blocks’ which seemed to be standing in the way of all my ‘cosmic orders’ from working
- To try to understand why I had such an addictive personality – i.e. everything to excess
And so I sat there on the first morning, one of 150 in the audience, thinking ‘There’s no way I will last this’ ‘These aren’t my kind of people’ ‘I’m not broken – so there’s nothing to fix!’ and ‘What the hell am I doing here???’
But I had set myself a challenge to stay with it – 9am to 10pm over three days – no matter what happened! A HUGE commitment for busy old me…
As a trainer who runs my own workshops I’m also fascinated to see how others do it – and I was instantly impressed by our Forum leader David Ure. His loud and over-bearing manner seemed to be irritating a lot of the audience, but it felt to me as though he was totally in command – and that there was much exciting stuff to come.
After the first three hours of being told about how our lives were playing out currently, the fact that we had never been properly listening up to now, the fact that we were never truly present to situations, we were then invited to leave if we wished to (with a 100% refund) – but if we stayed it would be with a commitment to fully participate (rather than just sit as an observer) in the process.
No one left!
The whole weekend simply consisted of people getting up to the microphone and then David giving his observations. In the beginning, people were invited to say what they wanted to get out of the Forum or what they wanted to know, and then as we progressed through the exercises we were set at every break and at the end of every day, we were invited to say what was unfolding for us.
In the exercises, we were invited to be authentic with people close to us, to write letters to people truly expressing how we felt, to make those phone calls that up to now we had been frightened of making.
And as each person came up to the microphone to share their experiences, certain stories were just incredibly emotional and moving. And every time you were truly moved (to tears) by someone else, you started to realise it was touching something very deep inside about YOU.
My first big breakthrough came at 5am on the second morning when I suddenly woke up with a realisation about my childhood which was truly an ‘Oh-My-God-that-was-so-obvious-why-did-I-never-see-that-before’ moment.
My letter that first day was to my children – apologising for not being a good enough mother to them (I’d been too busy chasing money fame and fortune all my life), and then later I had emotional conversations with two of them which I’d never had before.
By the end of the second day I fully understood what had been driving the ’Soap Opera’ of my life. When you get to that point of realisation, the ‘Soap Opera’ collapses. It simply falls away.
I knew from my previous transformational work that it was important to ‘hold the space’ to see what else was going to happen – it’s so easy to think ‘I got it, now I’m fixed & sorted’ and switch off – so I stuck with it. By the end of Day 3 I finally understood the ‘Meaning of Life’.
Yes I really got it!!!
I’ve spent the past five years reading all the self-improvement and transformational books going – plus attending lots of courses and seminars and experiences around the subject, including meditation and all the rest of it, but I can truly say that I have not experienced anything as powerfully tranformational as the Landmark Forum.
It is not a teaching, or something to learn, so much as a process – a tranformational experience.
It’s not about getting to a better improved version of the old you, it is about getting a totally new perspective on life. And it addresses parts of you which you had no idea whatsoever existed – let alone needed sorting!
As part of the course, at various points we were invited to ‘enrol’ others on the Landmark Forum. The idea being, once you have ‘got it’, it’s easier to make life work when the others around you ‘get it’ too. But every time that message came up, it was interesting to observe the huge resistance which started to fall on the room.
As a marketer I think I understand practically every marketing technique and sales process there is going – and I too have sat through those inspirational/motivational events which are simply about trying to upsell me to the $10,000 programme.
But this was no such ‘upsell’. It was simply asking us to consider who else we knew out there who might also benefit from going through the process – particularly all our loved ones.
Isn’t it strange that we can easily go out and think nothing about spending £300 on a new handbag or TV, but when we are invited to spend the same money on completely tranforming our lives somehow it is a ‘sales con’?
Isn’t it strange how we attach so much importance to ‘cost’ in life and so little to ‘value’?
On the Sunday evening, previous ‘graduates’ of the programme who had got their loved ones on to the Forum were invited along. People on the course were invited to come to the microphone and give a message to that person.
One woman was in tears, telling her husband how much she loved him, how she was sorry for being a self-righteous selfish cow up to now, and how she was now going to commit to making their marriage work.
Old cynical me would have written that off as vomit inducing schmaltz.
New transformed me sees that as something truly magical.
It’s only a day since the intensive part of the Forum has ended, but already I have seen some incredible changes in my life.
I am starting to ‘show up’ in a totally different way in every situation. My relationship with my children, and how I am when I am with them has been completely transformed. And my energy must certainly somehow have shifted – as suddenly complete strangers are opening up conversations and having little jokes with me! I even sat having a conversation with the man opposite on the train from Birmingham to Manchester yesterday - and that would certainly NOT have happened in my old life!
The Forum ends with a ‘graduation’ evening tonight at the Holiday Inn at Regent’s Park in London.
I would like to invite you to come along, as my guest, so I can share my incredible experiences in more detail. The evening starts at 7.30pm and ends at 10.45pm – and you’ll also get to hear all about the Forum for yourself.
Yes it is totally FREE, no I have NOT been brainwashed – and NO I don’t get an affiliate commission for every person I sign up!!!
It is simply an invitation to experience something which has already had the most incredible effect on my life.
There’s no need to register – all you have to do is show up at the Holiday Inn, say you are there for the Landmark Forum evening, and at check-in say you are my guest. I’ll be there from 7pm so seek me out!
I really do hope that you can make it.
Have a wonderful day.
Rachel
