Houdini and the locked safe- Beliefs/Mindsets

This was the story I shared with my girls during our Friday Story Night (last night). Hope you will enjoy the story and lessons...

Houdini and the locked safe- Beliefs/Mindsets

Harry Houdini, the famous American escapologist, had become so accomplished in his art, that he started to issue challenges to people to find him the strongest box, or cage or water barrel, and the most secure or complex systems of chains and locks, so that he could show off his prowess.

A bank in England had made a safe that they claimed was impenetrable, and they contacted Houdini to dare him to try and break out of it.

Houdini could not resist the challenge. He went to England to prove the safe-makers wrong.

After he was bound and locked in the safe, Houdini went through his normal routine. He had developed the process to such a fine art over the years that he was supremely calm and confident that he could pick the lock of the door.

But after the first hour, Houdini was not feeling quite so calm. He had used up all his normal manoeuvres without success. With sweat now pouring off him, he began to struggle and pull at the locks. But no matter what he tried, the lock would not budge.

After two hours, Houdini was totally exhausted. He fell against the huge door of the safe… which moved and swung open. The door had never been locked in the first place!

But in Houdini's mind that door was more secure than it ever could have been if it had been locked.

LESSONS/ MORAL OF STORY

Henry Ford said:

If you think you can, or you think you cannot- you're absolutely right!

If something is true for us then it's true, no matter what other people might tell us. If you want to change your behaviour, start first with changing your beliefs.

Mental models are very powerful. Your behaviors and actions are determined by what your mind tells you. So, all change and improvements begins with changing what you think. What you think has a profound effect on what you do and how you do it. You can only achieve anything if you believe in it! If you don't think you can do it, you never will.

I'll end this week's blog with another short sharing by Paul Vivek quoted in "The Best Advice I Ever Got," Fortune, March 21, 2005, p. 100.

"The best advice I ever got was from an elephant trainer in the jungle outside Bangalore. I was doing a hike through the jungle as a tourist. I saw these large elephants tethered to a small stake. I asked him, 'How can you keep such a large elephant tied to such a small stake?' He said, 'When the elephants are small, they try to pull out the stake, and they fail. When they grow large, they never try to pull out the stake again.' That parable reminds me that we have to go for what we think we're fully capable of, not limit ourselves by what we've been in the past."

Hope you will find this week's sharing useful. Jim