Seeds of Self-Help

 

 Chapter 2

Seeds of Self-Help 

This chapter tells the story of my introductions to and experiences with the self-help and personal development fields. It chronicles a journey that began when I was just a boy and would eventually lead to the development of the SAL Theory and Model and the creation of this Life Leadership textbook.  

I was 14 years old when Warner Books published my Uncle Hyrum's book, The 10 Natural Laws of Successful Time and Life Management, which would eventually sell over a million copies and complement the massive success Hyrum was already enjoying with the Franklin Day Planning system.

During the summer of that same year (1994), I worked as a lowly field hand on Hyrum and Gail's sprawling ranch in Gunlock, Utah, and environs. 

A ranch hand's work is physically strenuous and low-paying. I earned $4.25 per hour for my labors that summer, which was the minimum wage in 1994. Summer days in southwestern Utah were hot, dry, dusty, and long. Temperatures often exceeding 100-degrees Fahrenheit (38 degrees Celsius) and rain was rare. Our daily commute usually included a ride in the back of a white Ford pickup truck. 

One week, we were assigned to build a fence up in the mountains, many miles away from the bunkhouse where we ate and slept. Facing a long, bumpy ride to work each day that week, I decided to take along a book to read. I had brought several books from home to read and study that summer. The book I chose on this particular occasion was: The Magic of Thinking Big, by David J. Schwartz.

Once I started reading, it was hard to stop, and not just because I enjoyed reading more than digging post holes in the rocky desert soil; but because the seeds of hope, possibility, and vision that the book planted in my mind and heart. I enjoyed that book so much that I would sometimes read at lunchtime and after work was over. I kept reading until I had read, marked, and annotated the entire volume. 

As I read, studied, and pondered Schwartz's hopeful and positive message, his words sunk deep into my soul, spawning rich daydreams about my personal and professional potential. I grew increasingly motivated by the realization that I didn't have to be a ranch hand for the rest of my life. I was further inspired by the idea that I could actually design my life largely according to my own desires if I was willing to pay the price. 

When I read the words: when you believe, your mind finds ways to do, (1) I was inspired by the personal power and capacity I possessed to accomplish difficult and meaningful achievements in my life and career despite any obstacles that might stand in the way. 

This was the point in my life when a nascent conceptualization of the SAL philosophy gradually began to form in my mind and heart. 

Over the next several years—throughout my teenage and young adult life—I increasingly took advantage of opportunities to read and study books and listen to audio tapes and CDs in the self-help and personal development fields.

Hyrum W. Smith
1943-2019

The books and/or authors from whom I supped included:

• Dale Carnegie
• Norman Vincent Peale
• Napoleon Hill
• Og Mandino
• M. Scott Peck, M.D. 
• Hyrum W. Smith
• Stephen R. Covey
• Anthony Robbins
• Brian Tracy
• Zig Ziglar
• Et al. 

I'll always cherish my dad's personal copy of Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People. He had purchased the book in England in the mid-1960s while serving as a young missionary and it had that wonderful "old book" smell. 

When I was in eighth grade, my mom started buying Gary Smalley's relationship videos. Smalley's trainings focused on family relationships, and more particularly on marital unions. Though it would be years before I would start looking seriously at exclusive dating or marriage myself, I enjoyed watching these programs with my mom and learned a great deal about personality differences, communication skills, and successfully cultivating healthy and successful relationships.  

When I was a junior in high school, my oldest brother, Paul—a successful salesman and manager who shared my passion for personal development and self-help—sent me a videotape training by Jim Rohn, a famous business philosopher of the late twentieth and early twenty-first century.

Rohn had some GREAT stuff! 

A half-decade later, as a direct salesman myself, I was reintroduced to Rohn's work. While I ultimately found little aptitude for or interest in sales and marketing, Rohn's timeless talk on CD, entitled: Building Your Network Marketing Company, was filled with general truisms about long-term success that enormously influenced my thought processes as I set out to build Freedom Focused, develop the SAL Theory and Model, and compose iterations of this Life Leadership textbook.

To this day, I hear Rohn's voice in my head more than most others because of how concise, incisive, and memorable of his personality and teaching style.    

In high school, I attended a couple of Peter Lowe-organized day-long success seminars, where I had the chance to hear an impressive collection of high-profile speakers address personal development topics related to self-improvement, health and wellness, and success.

These speakers included:

• President Gerald Ford
• General Colin Powell
• Zig Ziglar
• Karl Malone
• Et al. 

My personal copy of The 7 Habits
Annexed from my parent's home library

Shortly after graduating from high school, I read my Uncle Hyrum's book, The 10 Natural Laws of Successful Time and Life Management, wherein I made a commitment to be more conscious about planning my days moving forward. 

Later on, in college, I took a course in leadership from Brigham Young University (BYU) as a visiting student and a course in organizational behavior from Utah Valley University (UVU). 

These classes reintroduced me to Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People and led me to carefully study Stephen R. Covey's bestselling book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. I voraciously consumed Covey's classic work, which planted a potent and plentiful patch of additional SAL seeds in in my mind, heart, and soul. 

More than any other personal leadership-oriented or self-help book I had ever read, the 7 Habits left a deep and lasting impression on me. After reading the book, I obtained the same material on CD—taught by Covey himself—and listened intently to the entire program. The more familiar I became with the material, the more convinced I became that I didn't want to just practice what Stephen Covey had taught me; I wanted to become the Stephen R. Covey of my generation. 

My personal copy of Og Mandino's
The Greatest Secret in the World

In addition to carefully studying Covey's work during my college years, I also read books by Og Mandino. In particular, I carefully studied and completed Mandino's 45-week challenge outlined in his book: The Greatest Secret in the World, which invites a reader to not just read the Success Scrolls from his classic: The Greatest Salesman in the World, but challenges him or her to apply those scrolls in a concrete, dedicated, and systematic manner over the course of nearly a full year. 

This particular self-help exercise was, by far, the most ambitious and labor/time intensive personal development project I had ever undertaken—before or since. Og himself stated in his book that the probability of someone actually completing his ambitious challenge was about one-in-75. (2) I was absolutely determined to prove to myself—and others, including Og, even though he died nearly a decade before I undertook his challenge—that I would be one of the 1.3 percent of people who would actually finish the entire program. 

Forty-five (45) weeks after I started, I succeeded in this, my objective—an accomplishment that provides me with a residual source of personal confidence, esteem, and inner security to this day. 

William James
1842-1910

Suffice it to say, over an extended process of association, the nascent seeds of SAL were planted deeply in my mind, heart, and soul. Over time, as I continued to cultivate, fertilize, water, and otherwise nurture those seeds, they began to grow up in the form of the SAL Philosophy.  

"Sow a thought, reap an action; sow an action, reap a habit;

sow a habit, reap a character; sow a character, reap a destiny."

—William James

Thus, over a long period of time, I gradually developed and refined my own thoughts and ideas about personal leadership—notions that would, in-time, develop and evolve into the SAL Theory and Model. I recorded many of these thoughts in little black-and-white, pocket-sized "Marble Memo" notebooks.

During my early-to-mid-twenties, I filled over 20 of these books with ideas and inspiration—as it came, piecemeal, one entry at a time. My mind was exploding with ideas during this time and it was not uncommon for me to have an idea strike my brain at all times of the day, including when going to sleep at night or driving my car. At such times I was conscientious about getting out of bed, turning on the light, pulling out the little Marble Memo notebook I was filling at the time, and recording the thought—or, if I was driving, I would pull my car over to the side of the road and record the inspiration in my little notebook before proceeding on my journey.

Over a long period of time—20-plus years and counting now—I gradually developed, refined, and revised all my thoughts and ideas that would become the SAL Philosophy.

At age 25, I began constructing the SAL Theory and Model. At age 26, I self-published my first book: I Am Sovereign: The Power of Personal Leadership. It was a personal leadership guide for teenagers and contained the first version of the SAL Model, as well as early vestiges of the SAL Theory.

It was my first attempt at writing a book and contained many markings of an amateur. 

But it was a solid initial effort that would eventually go through SIX additional iterations over the course of the following two decades.

The third of these seven iterations came in the form of my doctoral research, where I further honed the SAL Model and introduced a full version of the SAL Theory for the first time. The Life Leadership textbook you now hold in your hands is four (4) iterations removed from my dissertation, published in 2013. It is the result of 40 years of informal research, 24 years of formal research, organizing, writing, editing, revising, and continually polishing. 

It is a project literally tens of thousands of hours in the making.

It is my magnum opus as a thinker, writer, organizer, and leader. 

Indeed, I do not foresee, nor do I intend, to write or create anything more important or significant in my lifetime than this single, comprehensive work. Suffice it to say, it has been an incredible adventure and an exhilarating journey—a journey that is, in many ways, still just beginning.  

In Your Journal

• Prior to being introduced to SAL, what self-help media (books, tapes, podcasts, etc.) positively influenced your life, actions, and Existential Growth? 

• Which of these tools did you enjoy the most?  

• Which of these tools did you find to be the most inspiring and/or helpful?

• Which of these tools would you most highly recommend to others?

• Which of these tools most closely resembles the message contained in the SAL Philosophy? 

—Dr. JJ

Wednesday, January 15, 2025

Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, USA

Author's Note: This is the 427th Blog Post Published by Freedom Focused LLC since November 2013 and the 235th consecutive weekly blog published since August 31, 2020.   

Click HERE for a compete listing of the other 426 FF Blog Articles 

Click HERE for a complete listing of Freedom Focused SAL QUOTES  

Click HERE for a complete listing of Freedom Focused SAL POEMS   

Click HERE to access the FULL TEXT of Dr. JJ's Psalms of Life: A Poetry Collection

Click HERE for a complete listing of Self-Action Leadership Articles

Click HERE for a complete listing of Fitness, Heath, & Wellness Articles

Click HERE for a complete listing of Biographical & Historical Articles

Click HERE for a complete listing of Current Events, Cultural, Philosophical, & Miscellaneous Articles

Click HERE for a complete listing of Dr. JJ's Autobiographical Articles

.........................

Tune in NEXT Wednesday for another article on a Self-Action Leadership related topic.  

If you liked this blog post, please share it with your family, friends, colleagues, and students—and encourage them to bookmark this blog to access a new FREE article every Wednesday.

Click HERE to buy the SAL Textbooks  

Chapter 2 Notes

1.  Schwartz, D. J. (1995). The Magic of Thinking Big. London, UK: Pocket Books. Page 122.

2.  Mandino, O. (1972). The Greatest Secret in the World. New York, NY: Bantam Books. Page 2.

Self-Action Leadership Training for Individuals

What if You Could Squeeze Nearly THREE Decades of Knowledge, Experience, Study, and Research into ONE Comprehensive Self-Help Book and Personal Leadership Guide?

Self-Action Leadership by Dr. Jordan Jensen

ANSWER: You'd have in YOUR hands a copy of SELF-ACTION LEADERSHIP, the Premier Self-Help Guide of the 21st Century.  

This week's post introduces Self-Action Leadership training for individuals.  I am extra excited about this week's article, because writing it has taken me on a pleasantly nostalgic trip down memory lane to some of the greatest joys of my childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood.

I have always loved the printed page.  I was blessed to be born into a family that valued books—especially my father.  This love was fueled no doubt by whatever children's books my parents or older siblings read to me as a little boy.

But it seemed to me to go beyond that.  It seemed to be innate—as if my love of reading and writing and studying had been developed spiritually before I was even born—and that these proclivities had naturally accompanied me on my journey into this world as well.

As such, I felt unusually drawn to books and other written material from before I could even read.  For example, I remember a childhood neighbor friend coming over to my house one day. I was in kindergarten at the time and could not yet read myself.  She, however, was a big first grader and could read.  Enamored by her special skill I had not yet accrued myself, I admiringly directed her into our little playhouse under the stairs in our home, sat her down, took out a report of some sort that looked extra important and sophisticated (which I had retrieved from my Dad's office waste basket—my office supply shop for playing "office") and admiringly asked her to read it to me.  I don't remember what she read off of whatever it was I handed her (chances are good she couldn't read much of it) but I do remember being impressed!  I could hardly wait until the day arrived when I could finally read on my own.

Later, after I had learned to read and write myself, my perspective opened up to the wonderful world of books.  This introduction and discovery opened up a veritable Heaven on Earth to me.

First, there was my own growing collection of books (by the age of 23, I had amassed a library of over 500 volumes).  Then there was the scattered collection of books throughout my home, the mother load of which was ensconced in my Dad's personal office library, which he kindly allowed me to peruse at my leisure (including permission to read his personal journals).  Beyond that, I was introduced to school and public libraries, and the expansive University library at BYU where my Mother attended school during summer terms to finish her Bachelor's degree in between the years 1988 and 1992.

The grandest private library I had access to was in my maternal Grandmother's home.  Grandma and Grandpa Smith's library dwarfed my own father's sizable collection, and I spent some of the most cherished hours of my childhood there—alone—in the midst of those thousands of books, many of which were older and emanated that pleasant "old-book smell."  Grandma kindly allowed me to search her stacks to my heart's content.  In addition, she generously allowed me to borrow those I found to be most wonderful of all.

Upon her passing, there seemed to be a lack of clarity about how the books were going to be apportioned.  Worried that this ambiguity might stretch on for some time, I wisely secured a stack of my favorites before the moving truck arrived.  In hindsight, I should have taken more than I did.  I never saw the rest of those books again.  I heard that they initially went to a storage unit.  I do not know where they are today.

Jensen Family in 1989
I am the little boy on the bottom right

I come from a large family.  Of my six siblings, I am the youngest of five boys.  My four older brothers are all at least 8 years older than me.  Because of this salient separation in our ages, my brothers were, in many way, more like uncles or surrogate fathers to me than brothers.  This was not a bad thing because they treated me kindly and with a lot of respect, especially in light of how many typical older brothers treat their kid brother.  This tender regard for me only strengthened the near-worshipful veneration I admiringly bestowed upon my brothers.  The pedestal upon which my young eyes placed them caused me to want to know and do everything they knew and did.  This translated into many different hobbies and behaviors, the foremost of which was to take interest in the sports my brothers competed in and the books they were studying at school and church.

"Doing" my trigonometry homework in
our backyard on a warm, sunny,
Arizona afternoon.

One of my most beloved childhood practices was to borrow my brothers' textbooks to look through and then copy out of—pretending I was doing the same advanced high school homework they were.  As such, I became acquainted (at least in name) to calculus, chemistry, physics, English and American literature, trigonometry, economics, theology, etc.

One of the most satisfying single moments of my entire boyhood occurred one Friday evening after returning from a high school football game to find the books Hamlet and Othello sitting on my desk in my bedroom.  I had been begging my brothers to get them for me from their high school library (which I could not personally access).  They kindly acquiesced, and forever after viewed their lending of those two books to me (which I could hardly read and not in the least bit understand as a second grade) as a precious token of brotherly love and affection.

As I matured in both age and reading ability, I began to actually study books more seriously.  As I grew into my teen years, I discovered that I especially liked books related to personal development and self-leadership.  The seeds of this passion were sunned and watered by my reading of Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People and Dr. David J. Schwartz's The Magic of Thinking Big—both outstanding self-help books of antiquity from deep into the last century, and both of which I found on the bookshelves in my own home.  This was followed by my introduction to the work of my uncle, Hyrum W. Smith as well as Stephen R. Covey, Anthony Robbins, Norman Vincent Peale, and others.  I was hooked!

Teaching action shot of Dr. Jordan Jensen from 2012

While serving a 2-year mission for my Church, I discovered that I loved to teach as much, if not more, than I loved to read and write and study.  This natural blend of pre-sown personal proclivities, wonderful opportunities to nurture those seeds, and my growing chance to apply what I was learning led me, in time, to choose a career in education, and more specifically in the fields of self-help and personal development.

Along the way, I devoured additional self-help books and found that my interest was always piqued when my coursework included literature that possessed literary self-help or philosophical value (for example, as an English major, I made the fortuitous acquaintance of writers like Donne, Franklin, Emerson, Thoreau, Frost, etc.).  My passion for such literature was borne not just out of the joy and satisfaction that study itself brought to me, but because I needed the wisdom and help these authors afforded in my quest to overcome my own weaknesses, build upon my strengths, and work through perplexing life challenges I was facing—like my battle with OCD.

Click HERE to read about Dr. Jordan Jensen's battle with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

Click HERE to read Part II

One book in particular—The Greatest Secret in the World by Og Mandino—I used on a daily basis for 45 straight weeks in a religious effort to work through my OCD and other challenges I was facing at the time.  To this day, that book—filled with all of my notes of progression, setbacks, and insights along the way—serves as a sacred reminder to me the value of investing great time, energy, passion, effort, and the will to do whatever is necessary to overcome oneself to reach greater heights and states of being in the future.

Within a few years of my Mandino experiment, I had figured out that one of my missions in life was to write my own book that could help other people in a similar way that all of these other books I had read had helped, inspired, and lifted me in my own life's journey and helped me to transcend or manage my own life's obstacles.  Recognizing I had already amassed a great deal of knowledge and insight on the subject, I set to work.  In 2005, I published my first book—I Am Sovereign: The Power of Personal Leadership.  It was directed to a teenage and young adult audience.  It was not commercially successful, but it was a building block in my early career that bolstered my confidence and opened up doorways of additional professional opportunity.

Back cover of Dr. Jordan Jensen's book, Self-Action Leadership

Ten years and a lot of reading, studying, research, and life experience later, I published what I intend to be my seminal work on the subject of personal leadership.  I call the book Self-Action Leadership: The Key to Personal, Professional, & Global Freedom.  No matter how old I live to be, and no matter how many books I write during the course of my career, I hope that this one book remains my seminal work—and is never surpassed in its eventual commercial success.

Why?

Because this ONE book provides a synergistic accumulation and unique presentation of everything I have ever learned that has benefitted me in the field of personal development and self-help over the course of the last three decades; and because I believe that this one book will be more helpful to a broader swath of society than any other book I will ever write.  Any additional books I write in the future will merely be an appendage to this seminal text.

The past several weeks I have written about how Self-Action Leadership training (along with the book) can benefit corporate and business audiences as well as educational groups (i.e. schools and classrooms).  In weeks to come, I will write about how civic leaders, parents, and persons dealing with or treating mental illness can benefit from studying the material, as well as sharing the information and providing training for their constituents, dependents, and patients.  But in the last analysis, Self-Action Leadership is, was designed to be, and I hope always will be, used primarily as a personal manual—an all-in-one comprehensive self-help guide and workbook that can bless the lives of those who read it, study it, and do the homework assignments contained therein.

Speaking of the homework assignments contained therein, one of the unique and most beneficial features of the text is a personal leadership challenge that we at Freedom Focused call The Self-Action Leadership (or SAL) Master Challenge.

This challenge consists of 25 concrete exercises that invites YOU—the reader—to do more than just read the book.  It encourages you to study the material, learn new vocabulary words, begin a personal journal and complete other relevant writing assignments, set goals, engage in activities of self-discipline, and eventually to write your own Self-Declaration of Independence & Constitution where you will begin to identify your life and career vision, mission, values, standards, goals, etc.

Click HERE and scroll toward the bottom of article to read more about writing your own Self-Declaration of Independence & Constitution.

Click HERE to watch a video of Dr. Jordan Jensen explaining the principle of writing a Self-Declaration of Independence & Constitution.

Those who undertake and complete the SAL Master Challenge will receive a special diploma (non-accredited) and medal to commemorate their achievement.  Their names will also be recorded on the Freedom Focused website where they will remain as long as Freedom Focused stands as The Center for Self-Action Leadership.

The SAL Challenge is NOT an easy challenge.  You will not be able to complete it quickly—and that is the point!  After nearly 30 years of studying the subject of personal development and self-help, and more importantly, after nearly THREE decades of working tirelessly to improve myself in the process, I have acquired the expertise necessary to create a comprehensive guide that will provide you—in one volume—with all of the essential principles, practices, and other elements contingent in the process of human existential growth and development.  And the good news is you don't have to spend nearly 30 years figuring it all out because I've already done it for you.  All you have to do is get the book, read it, complete the SAL Challenge, and then forever benefit from the blessings that come from the acquisition of vital knowledge in concert with the dedicated pursuit of self-work, self-sacrifice, goal setting, and personal discipline.

Click HERE to buy Dr. Jordan Jensen's book — SELF-ACTION LEADERSHIP

After you have finished reading the book and have completed the SAL Master Challenge, I invite you to email me to tell me about what you are learning and share your experiences.  I look forward to hearing from you!  You can reach me personally at jordan.jensen@freedomfocused.com

Note: This article is one of SIX articles in a special series dedicated to different AUDIENCES that Freedom Focused specifically targets with Self-Action Leadership training. We invite leaders and managers of these different audiences to click on links below to read the articles pertaining to your field or constituency.

Click HERE to access article for  BUSINESS PROFESSIONALS (Leaders, Managers, & Workers)

Click HERE to access article for  EDUCATORS  (Administrators, Teachers, & Staff)

Click HERE to access article for  STUDENTS & INDIVIDUALS

Click HERE to access article for PARENTS & FAMILIES

Click HERE to access article for ELECTED OFFICIALS, LEADERS, & ROLE MODELS

Click HERE to access article for PERSONS dealing with MENTAL ILLNESS

Self-Action Leadership  ~  The Book

SELF-ACTION LEADERSHIP is the key catalyst for initiating transformational leadership that lasts in any organization. The truth of the matter really is that simple; and the transformation of organizations through the holistic development of individuals really is that difficult—yet altogether possible for anyone willing to invest the time, effort, and sacrifice required to achieve authentic, transformational results.


Unlike any training program that has ever preceded it, Self-Action Leadership provides a single vehicle wherewith individual self-leaders can discover—and then act—upon the great truth that HOLISTIC personal development and growth spanning the mental, moral, spiritual, physical, emotional, and social elements of our individual natures is within the grasp of each one of us.

Back Cover of Self-Action Leadership, the Book

Note: Freedom Focused is a non-partisan, for-profit, educational corporation.  As such, we do not endorse or embrace political figures.  We do, however, comment from time-to-time on historical or political events that provide pedagogical backdrops to illuminating principles contained in the SAL Theory & Model.

Click HERE to learn more about the SAL Theory & Model.

To receive weekly articles from Freedom Focused & Dr. Jordan R. Jensen, sign up with your e-mail address in the white box on the right side of this page where it says "Follow by E-mail."

Click HERE to buy a copy of Dr. Jordan Jensen's new book, Self-Action Leadership: The Key to Personal, Professional, & Global Freedom.

Click HERE to read more about Dr. Jensen's book, Self-Action Leadership, and to review what experts in the leadership field are saying about this groundbreaking new personal development handbook.

Click HERE to learn more about Dr. Jordan R. Jensen.  Click HERE to visit the Freedom Focused website.







  

How I Came to Develop Self-Action Leadership

The Seeds of Self-Help

This chapter tells the story of my background with self-help literature and chronicles the journey that led to the development of the SAL Theory & Model.

Hyrum W. Smith,  FranklinCovey Co-founder

In 1994, Warner Books published my Uncle Hyrum’s, The 10 Natural Laws of Successful Time and Life Management, which eventually sold over a million copies. The summer of that year, I worked on Hyrum’s ranch in Southwestern Utah. I was 14 years old.

What Happens When I Fail?

When personal leadership pundits, like myself, write on the subject of goal setting, we typically focus on the importance of setting goals, as well as the satisfaction and benefits that result from accomplishing them. But there are other lessons to be learned from the process. These “other” lessons are sometimes counterintuitive to the virtues of traditional goal setting. Today’s post is about some of these less-heralded lessons.