Interview With Eldon Taylor

by Eldon Taylor
(United States)

Q: I know you tell us what we can do about this limited thinking in your book, Choices and Illusions, but can you give us an example right now?

ET: We need to realize that most of our lives we have been choosing as though we were taking a multiple-choices test, choosing between A, B and C when in fact there exists an entire alphabet that we could have chosen from. I love to illustrate this point with one of my favorite stories. The story is called the Flower Pot story and I’d love for your audience to check it out on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYYtU6RaK-U It’s a short 3 minute video but well worth the time.

Q: Did you have any heroes or influences on your work?

ET: In the large sense, everyone who has contributed to the knowledge that we have today is one of my heroes. Everyone who has paved the way for more civility and greater freedom is one of my heroes. Everyone who takes a moment to go to the aid of another human being is one of my heroes. I think we improve our world one person at a time and the best way for each of us to begin is to help one another. That said, I have the larger than life heroes such as Martin Luther King, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Mother Teresa, Albert Einstein, Abraham Lincoln, Nelson Mandela, Aristotle and so forth. And I have my close heroes, Roy Bey, my partner in business who believed in what we might be able to do if we made giving back our primary motive, and my partner in life, my lovely bride Ravinder, who for over twenty five years has been my constant source of encouragement and my reservoir of strength.

Q: What exactly is mind programming?

ET: I could be a bit of a smart aleck and answer by simply saying, “The title to one of my books.” The truth is, we are all programmed in some degree. The science behind our programming is so sophisticated today that it bares the name, Neuromarketing. Literally billions and billions of dollars have been spent learning how to motivate you to act in a given way, while making you believe that you made the choice to behave accordingly. This is truly big business today, and whether it is a product or political platform, it’s all about choosing your choices for you.

The irony is, the research data reveals clearly that once you make a decision, you will vigorously defend it even if you must make up reasons to justify it. That may sound absurd on the surface, but believe me, it’s quite true! Take for instance this scenario. We know that if we place a bottle of hand sanitizer on a table with a questionnaire designed to measure your beliefs according to a scale of conservative verses liberal values, that the bottle of sanitizer will skew your answers toward the conservative side. Once you provide the more conservative than usual answer, you will defend it and thus become even more conservative. The fact is, this sort of “prime,” as it is called in the business, is quite often used to influence your choices in all areas of life. So we must really begin to ask ourselves, especially if we’re like most people and believe that these things can influence others but not ourselves, “What was our last truly original thought?”

Q: How can we uncover our true potential? Is mastering our mind the key to our happiness?

ET: The Buddha is credited with saying, “We are shaped by our thoughts; we become what we think.” Science supports this assertion today wholeheartedly. Indeed, not long ago I attended a CEU for healthcare professionals dealing with the latest in neurological research. There were some powerful concluding remarks, but the bottom line take away is one that is particularly relevant here. Let me digress just a bit first. When I attended University, the prevailing thinking asserted rather axiomatically that personality became fixed early in life, ages 4 to 6, IQ was fixed, brain cells begin to die and do not replace themselves somewhere beginning in our thirties, and so forth. All of this is patently untrue! Today the research shows us that among the best things we can do to improve our lives is change our personalities. We know IQ is not fixed and indeed, the brain is amazing! Voila, today we become excited about the possibilities inherent to neuro plasticity. So now, fast forward to those concluding remarks and the big take away: YOU ABSOLUTELY CAN CHANGE BUT YOU CAN ONLY CHANGE WHAT YOU BELIEVE YOU CAN CHANGE!

Q: How can we find out more about your work?

ET: I am pretty easy to find. My web site is www.eldontaylor.com. My books are available at all fine bookstores and online. My work with InnerTalk can be found at www.innertalk.com. I host a two hour radio show each week called Provocative Enlightenment, and you can learn more about it at my web site, www.provocativeenlightenment.com.