Geoff Thompson Quotes

To change your mind you have to change your thought habits, and you do this by spending time each day correcting faulty internal dialogue. Every time you think negative, stop yourself and make yourself think positive and continue doing so until the negative thoughts have been starved to death and the positives have grown strong on a diet of regular use. To think bad thoughts is very easy, they float into your mind uninvited. To think good thoughts, however, takes daily practice and constant vigilance.

Again, no higher moral ground is being taken here, I still to this day have to check myself to make sure that I don’t end up in conversations that pull others to pieces. It can be so infectious and often you are in knee-deep before you even realise it. I make as many mistakes as the next man and what I tell you, I also constantly tell myself. As a rule of thumb always ask yourself, ‘If so-and-so were sat next to me would I be saying the things I am saying?’ If not put a gate on your mouth. Or even try this little trick – it always works for me – when you feel like saying something bad about another person, deliberately make yourself say something good instead.

Before we can change the world we first have to change ourselves – we need to localise our first-aid. This often means having to mend our own faults, but before we can do this of course we have first to admit them, if only to ourselves. Many of us cannot bear to see the truth; the brightness blinds us so we look away. We hide from the truth by using unconscious defence mechanisms (as explained more precisely in my book Small Wars). We often qualify our weaknesses by rationalising them, projecting them, displacing them, suppressing or repressing them etc. This has to stop. Looking at ‘us’ without the rose-tinted spectacles of Freudian defence mechanisms is not a pretty sight at times I have to tell you. But it is only when you accept the weaknesses of ‘self ’ that you can exorcise them and build strength and integrity where weakness and frailty once reigned.

We can only grow as big as our thoughts, we are defined by our thoughts, and we are the result of what we think about all day long.

Take responsibility for your own world and never project blame. If you do you lose your power.

Have you ever heard the story of the Elephant and the Twig? In India they train obedience in young elephants (to stop them from escaping) by tying them to a huge, immovable object, like a tree, when they are still very young. The tree is so large that no matter how hard the baby elephant pulls and tugs it cannot break free. This develops what is known as ‘learned helplessness’ in the creature. After trying so hard and for so long to break the hold, only to be thwarted time and again, it eventually believes that, no matter what it does, it cannot escape. Ultimately, as a fully-grown adult weighing several tons, they can tie it to a twig and it won’t escape, in fact it won’t even try.

Abraham Maslow called it the ‘Jonah Complex’, the fear of success. He said that we are generally afraid to become that which we can glimpse in our most perfect moments, under the most perfect conditions, under conditions of greatest courage; we enjoy and even thrill to the god-like possibilities we see in ourselves at such peak moments and yet, simultaneously, shiver with weakness, awe and fear before the same possibilities.

If you don’t like the mind you’ve got, change the thoughts in it for better ones and your mind will change all by itself.

Even great men like Gandhi and Stephen Hawkins and others throughout history have had to contradict themselves because increased knowledge has shown their old and true concepts to be old and untrue. Much of the war going on throughout the world now is being fought by two sides that both believe, categorically and without question, that they are right and their opposition wrong. Their growth to a newer truth is jammed by anger and fear and many deaths and personal losses will result before they are liberated and a new paradigm is born.

We are here to serve, but the beauty is that when we serve others we also serve ourselves, what we give out is what we get back. The best way then actually to get what you want from life is to help others to get what they want. So why not help more and why give out rubbish when that is exactly what we will get back?

I will persist until I succeed. I am not delivered unto this world in defeat, nor does failure course through my veins. I am not a sheep waiting to be prodded by my shepherd. I am a lion and I refuse to talk, to walk, to sleep with the sheep. I will hear not those who weep and complain, for their disease is contagious. Let them join the sheep. The slaughterhouse of failure is not my destiny. Failure I may still encounter at the thousandth step, yet success hides behind the next bend in the road. Never will I know how close it lies unless I turn the corner. I will persist with the knowledge that each failure to sell will increase my chance for success at the very next attempt. Each ‘nay’ I hear will bring me closer to the sound of ‘yea’. Each frown I meet only prepares me for the smile to come. Each misfortune I encounter will carry in it the seed of tomorrow’s good luck. I must have night to appreciate the day. I must fail often to succeed only once. I will persist until I succeed.

Giving to others is where most of our energy is generated, when we give it comes back tenfold and allows us to give more and to channel the self-perpetuating energy into our life goal. ‘The most sublime act is to set another before you.

The Advantage of Long Range Technique and Why Close Range Is Deadly Let's be clear: you always want to maintain distance. For the long stick, long range is the optimum strategy. At long range, the opponent must reach out with his hand to hit you. At the farthest range, he can only hit you with that hand: the other hand is too far back to touch you, and his feet are planted as he stretches. If he extends to kick you, his hands can't touch you, while his other foot is planted. In either case, at this longest range only one hand or foot threatens you. With the big stick, you want to maintain a range where you can blast him, but he can't touch you. This is the safest range. As the opponent gets closer he enters a range where he can hit you with both hands and kick you with both feet, so you now have four potential weapons to contend with. At even closer range he can hit with the hands, elbows, knees, head, so the number of threats grows larger still. At this range if he has a knife, he can use one hand to hold you while he stabs with the other, which is easily a fatal attack. At close range an opponent can bring a concealed gun or knife into play, and you may not see the weapon until it is too late. While long range is the desired range, you must realize that you can't always maintain that range, so you must be prepared to fight in close. You not only want to be able to hit at very close range, but be able to drive the opponent back out into the kill zone. Countering the Closing Opponent 1) Recognize the Danger Avoid overconfidence, the delusional thinking, “If anybody tries to tackle me I'll knock him out.” It's not that easy. As long as you're standing, running is always an option, but once an opponent has clinched or tackled you, you lose that option. If you get taken to the ground spectators can very easily kick you in the head, a very powerful, inconspicuous kick that is like kicking a football off a tee. Martial artist Geoff Thompson knew two men who were killed in just such a fashion. A gang tactic is to assign one member to tie you up, sacrificing himself if necessary, so that the rest of the gang can pick you off. Against multiple opponents your primary strategy is mobility, fleeing if possible, but once you're clutched or tackled you've lost that option. A clinching assailant with a knife is your worst nightmare, posing a highly lethal threat.

Some people need a poke in the eye to show them the right direction, others simply need pointing in the right direction. It is a question of having the wisdom to know when to point and when to poke.

There has never been a greater illusion than fear. Fear exists only whilst you believe in it - whilst you fear it. So...stop believing, stop fearing. Set up a shadow inventory, write down all your fears and set out on your warrior path. Make this your life purpose and gold will be smelt from your terror

Unele lucruri nu pot fi rezolvate in instanta, din moment ce adevaratii vinovati inca umbla, si cei nevinovati infunda puscaria. De asta vreau si sa scriu cartea, ca daca as fi avocata, as vana la sange pedofilii. Dar nu stiu daca ma mai tin nervii. Urmez modelul lui Geoff Thompson: “Cand i-am spus, in sfarsit, agresorului meu ca il iert, nu a putut rabda, si peste 3 zile, s-a sinucis”. Sa fii cu adevarat puternic, inseamna sa fii capabil sa ierti.

Cunosc un baiat care a fost exmatriculat. In perioada in care nimeni nu vorbea cu mine, parea cel mai uman dintre toti. Canta in fiecare dimineata la ora 5, si isi trezea vecinii. A fugit de acasa, din cate am inteles, avea probleme cu parintii. L-au exmatriculat pentru ca a desenat ceva obscen pe o hartie in timpul orei. Niciodata nu l-am judecat, mai ales cand am auzit ca parintii lui consumau vodka. Asta pentru ca unii sunt exmatriculati, pentru ca sunt sinceri, altii se comporta ca niste jigodii, si ajung sa aiba o diploma, examene copiate, pile. Si nu canta dimineata la ora 5, pentru ca sunt prea ocupati sa fure. Daca cuiva ii pasa cu adevarat de baiatul acela, nu ajungea, probabil , la inchisoare sau in alt mediu depravat acum. Tare ne place sa judecam….