The cartoon drawing that explains your bank account

In partnership with

Hey friend,

Yesterday we talked about success being a journey, not a parking spot. Today, we need to look under the hood.

If I asked you to think of your front door, an image pops onto the screen of your mind. If I asked you to think of your car, bam—there it is. But if I ask you to think of your mind, what do you see?

Most people see the brain. But the brain is not the mind any more than your fingernail is your sense of touch. The brain is just the switching station. Because we lack an image for the "mind," we tend to get confused. And as the old saying goes, "confusion leads to chaos." You cannot fix something if you don't know what it looks like.

Enter Dr. Thurman Fleet. Back in 1934, he realized the medical community was treating the body but ignoring the source of the problem. So, he drew a picture. We call it the "Stickperson."

It looks like a stick figure drawn by a toddler, but don’t let the simplicity fool you. This diagram is more valuable than a pile of gold bars.

The large circle on top represents the Mind. The little circle on the bottom is the Body.

The top half of the big circle is your Conscious Mind. This is the captain of the ship. It’s the thinking mind. It can accept or reject ideas. It has a sense of humor. It can choose to focus on a pepperoni pizza or the secrets of the cosmos. This is where your intellect lives.

The bottom half is the Subconscious Mind. This is the engine room. It has no sense of humor. It cannot reject anything. It accepts everything you impress upon it as absolute truth. It doesn’t know the difference between what is real and what is imagined. If you watch a scary movie, your heart races—not because you are in danger, but because your subconscious accepts the scary image as real.

The body? The body is just the robot. It moves into action based on the orders from the subconscious.

Here is the kicker: You are likely trying to change your life using only the top half of the circle. You are using logic, will, and brute force. But your results are controlled by the bottom half. It’s like trying to steer a cruise ship by running back and forth on the deck.

When you understand this, you realize why smart people often get terrible results. They have brilliant conscious minds, but their subconscious is programmed with limitation.

I know this might feel a bit abstract, but trust me, the more you read these emails and study this model, the more success becomes your default setting. You are literally rewriting your operating system right now.

I’ve included a breakdown of this concept in the links below. Trust your gut—you will be so grateful you clicked those links when you see how simple this really is. It’s like finding the cheat codes to a video game you’ve been losing for years.

The subconscious is powerful, but it’s also a creature of habit. It loves a routine. It loves the status quo. And that brings us to the biggest villain in our story. It’s not the Joker or Thanos. It’s something called a "Paradigm."

We are going to tackle that beast tomorrow.

For now, I want to know:

What is one habit you consciously want to break, but you keep doing it anyway?

Hit reply. Let’s bring it into the light.

Best,

Bradley Woods

P.S. The "virus" in your mental computer is stronger than you think, but I have the antivirus software ready for tomorrow.

Build real AI and tech skills, faster

Udacity helps you build the AI and tech skills employers actually need—fast. Learn from industry experts through hands-on projects designed to mirror real-world work, not just theory.

Whether you’re advancing in your current role or preparing for what’s next, Udacity’s flexible, fully online courses let you learn on your schedule and apply new skills immediately. From AI and machine learning to data, programming, and cloud technologies, you’ll gain practical experience you can show, not just list on a résumé.

Build confidence, stay competitive, and move your career forward with AI and tech skills that are in demand.

Learn More