So let me share a little story about myself. You may have heard this in my origin story. Many, many years ago when I was a young man, actually when I go all the way back to about the age of 11, I remember being in my bedroom as a young boy and I was very sad. I was quite depressed, quite anxious, just about life in general. And I just felt really, really bad for no particular reason. And it was at that moment I made this scary yet empowering revelation I guess in my own life and very, very scary at the same time that nobody was coming to save me. Nobody was coming to heal me. Nobody was coming to help me. At that age, I realized as an 11-year-old boy that I was alone. Yes, I lived at a home with my parents but this in the turmoil that I was going through my mind I realized that nobody or nothing was gonna come on a white horse or a motorbike or a helicopter or that car from "Knight Rider" which is a matter of interest I'm actually gonna see in a couple of months in Las Vegas. However, nobody was coming to save me. I was all alone and it was terrifying.
Yet there was a strange level of empowerment as well in that moment. I realized for my life to be the masterpiece that I wanted it to be I had to be my own savior. I had to save myself. I had to take full responsibility of my life for the things that were working and more importantly the things that were not working. And I thought to myself, "Who did I need to come and save me? If I could magic, abracadabra, alakazam someone to come and save me at this area of my life who would this person be?" And at the time as I still am a big resting fan and a superhero fan so I was...it had to be a guy. It had to be this strong guy that had his own will, that walked to the beat of a different drummer, a man that was indifferent to the validation other people would give or withhold from him, a man that was not afraid to go left when everyone around him was going right, a man that was strong not just with muscles, not just had this outward appearance of being cool with tattoos and leather jackets and he wasn't somebody that was just doing something. He wasn't just doing a bunch of techniques. He wasn't just playing a character for a TV show, for a movie in front of an audience or in front of a camera. He was somebody that was being that person. That's who I needed to come and save me.
And it took many, many, many years and in fact decades for me to meet that man. In fact, for me to be that man. You see, I've done lots of techniques, I'd done lots of changes in my body and in my life and I was doing this man but there was a disconnect as in people around me did not buy it and on an unconscious level I didn't quite buy it because I was realizing that I was doing something. I was doing somebody rather than being him. And the interesting thing is over the last few years again overcoming more challenges in my life and I don't say that to blow my horn about how magnificent I am and, "Oh, look at me." No, no, no. It isn't about that.
But when I look back on my life and as a 38-year-old man now that has lived all over the world and had many experience both positive and not so positive, the ups, the downs of health, the ups and downs of romantic relationships, the ups and downs of being in the public eye, the ups and downs of being successful in business. The one thing I look back at who I am now and what makes me most proud is the man that I am now is the man I created as that little 11-year-old boy who was alone in his bedroom. Now it wasn't a conscious thing that I was trying to do. Well, to create this guy I need to put on 20 pounds of muscle, I need to get 21 tattoos, I need to speak with colorful language, I need to call people on their bullshit. Most importantly me and my bullshit. I actually didn't sit down and list these things but it was all of those things.
For my...miraculous thing happened that as I look back to the man that I am today, I unconsciously created this savior. I unconsciously created this character, this character of Hypno Punk. This character of Luke Michael Howard is the man that I needed to create in order to save my life. And make no mistakes about it. It is who I am now. Whenever I'm hosting this podcast, whenever I'm doing a session with a client, whenever I'm with my girlfriends, whenever I'm with my friends, whenever I'm just sitting at home, whenever I'm walking down the street, I am the same asshole. And one of my problems was I would go to these conferences with many of these famous gurus in personal development and I'd see this image on stage of this godly-like person, very, very powerful. Amazing charisma, amazing charm, extroverted. Yet when they were off stage they were a shriveling wreck. They were nothing. They were nothing compared to that person on stage.
And that always kind of upset me and I...and it always rubbed me the wrong way. And I know sometimes we create these characters. We have someone at work, we have someone with a wife or a husband, someone with our kids, someone with our parents, someone with our friends. We have different hats that we wear at different times. I acknowledge this. I get this but the day and night difference I'd see for many, many famous motivational, inspiration gurus from them being on stage to them being off stage, it was completely different and I'd felt that, I'd been sold a crock of shit. I felt I'd been sold something, that somebody was peddling something but they were talking the talk but not walking the walk. And I like to talk. This is why I have a pet podcast. Trust me. I like to talk but equally I like to not be a fucking hypocrite in my own life. And if I ask my client to do something, if I ask anyone to do something I would be willing to do it myself for my own salvation.
So this character with the 21 tattoos, with the muscles, with the big beard, with the leather jacket, with the ripped jeans, with the T-shirts with wings and skulls on them, with this badass attitude, this was a man, an avatar I created as a young boy unconsciously because I realized nobody was coming and I had to create this person. I had to make this metamorphosis, this transformation, if you will, because otherwise I wasn't gonna get out of this thing alive. And that was tested for many, many years. I tried different concepts, different looks, different personality traits but again I was doing stuff rather than being somebody.
Stay tuned for part 2 next week.
Always Believe,
Luke Michael Howard CHT
Clinical Hypnotist
