The "CAUSE" state VS. The "EFFECT" State

A couple of years ago I took some workshops with Combat Expert Tim Larkin.(go to http://www.targetfocustraining.com) For those of you who do not know who he is, he is undoubtedly one of the BEST experts and teachers on combative fighting tactics than can save your life. More importantly, Tim focuses on teach people the difference between living your life in the "EFFECT" state,or the "CAUSE" State. What's the difference between the two?

When you are living in the EFFECT state you are allowing people, circumstances and external influences to EFFECT you in whatever way they want to. For example, let's say a gang banger walking down the same alley way as you pulls out a knife and walks quickly towards you. The EFFECT state naturally would mean you would run the other way or retreat. Maybe not such a good idea if you are in a dead end alley way. So in essence what is happening is that the action of the man with the knife (CAUSE STATE) is making you retreat (the EFFECT STATE). A person in the CAUSE state might have never been in the alley way to begin with. Or, he would have immediately realized that by retreating he is giving his power away. Thus he would have charged the attacker (something the attacker would never guess would happen) and would have put the gang banger in the EFFECT STATE.

Hopefully you can clearly see the cause / effect relationship here. The problem with living in the EFFECT state is that you lose your personal power and thus are left to the devices of fate, or worse yet, the non-ethical and immoral actions of a sociopath. How many people are walking around the streets, beaten down, emotionally destroyed, victimized, and only because they were never taught to realize that they do have a choice, and that living in the EFFECT state is voluntary.

There are so many areas of our lives where if we are brutally honest with ourselves we will be able to see how we have been living in the EFFECT STATE. For example, let's take food as a potential area of recurring problematic behavior for you. So you decide to go on a diet and clean up your eating habits. One week into the diet you attend a party where there is unlimited amounts of sweets, alcoholic drinks and junk food at your disposal. A person who chooses to live in the CAUSE state would be pro-active and take action as to not give in to these temptations. What might they have done?

Well, for one they might have thought ahead and known that the party would have had bad food options and instead eaten healthy food before the party began. This would have made them resist the temptation because they would have been full while at the party. I have experienced that going to a grocery store or a party while super HUNGRY can spell total disaster. The person living in the CAUSE state would be pro-active and prevent the dietary sin from taking place. The person living in the EFFECT state would have gone to the party hungry and given into his weaknesses and totally derailed himself from his true goals.

Personally, I can think of many areas of my life right now where I intentionally and often unintentionally choose to be a victim and life in the EFFECT STATE. So ask your self, what areas of your life are dominated by the EFFECT STATE? Where have you chosen to live in the CAUSE STATE? One of the things I learned from Tim Larkin is that people living in the CAUSE state prevent bad things from happening in the first place. If you think ahead and are always aware of your surroundings, you will avoid potential attacks from predators, whether they be real people or behavioral problems such as eating poorly and laziness.

Now that I am a parent, I see the wisdom in living in the cause state as opposed to the EFFECT state.

Read the following words by Tim Larkin:

"The sad fact is that teaching a child to physically
fight an adult "predator" is woefully ineffective and
very misguided.

If a hyena were stalking a lion cub none of us would
expect the cub to be able to fend off the hyena. Yet
we somehow wish that our children would be able to do
just that.

Effect State will not only get you killed -- but also
(tragically) those loved ones you are responsible for
like children and elderly relatives. We'd like to
think that there's some special training we can give
our kids that will relieve us from our responsibility
should we falter in our vigilance...

--- THERE ISN'T... it's ours until they are past that
vulnerable stage of life."