Unbox Your Life. Tobias Beck

there’s one takeaway from this chapter, it is that you should spend as little time with energy vampires and their panic-inducing media as possible. Incidentally, this negativity also claws away the valuable blue “life particles” you can never get back. If you’re wondering exactly what these are, keep reading.

      I have rather a personal history with these life particles. Rita and I were in southern India a few years ago and found a magical place, home to a group of people who had made personal growth their life’s goal. They helped the local community and distributed books on the street to educate people about personal development. After we talked to them for some time, they took us to a temple with a huge mural. It told the viewer an important story.

      When we are first exposed to the light of the world, we are full of little blue globules, the so-called “life particles.” Energy vampires feed on these particles. Every time we come into contact with an energy vampire, a small globule moves from us to the vampire and is lost forever. As a child, we have lots of these blue globules and are full of energy and visions for life. But our number of globules is limited, and if we consider how many times we surround ourselves with negatively-minded people, it becomes clear that we need to take great care of ourselves and our resources. What’s more, whenever we are negative about ourselves or another person, one of these globules bursts. No wonder some people feel so tired and fed up—their supply of life particles is probably depleted.

      How long is the list of energy vampires in your immediate environment? Write down the names of five people who do not add value to your life and are most effective at depleting your life particles:

      Rita and I were at sea on a cruise ship, where my task was to train the staff and get them ready for the upcoming holiday season. You might assume that being a member of the crew is a relatively easy job. If you did, however, you’d be failing to take into account the guests themselves, who bring their own quirks and do not suddenly become new people by virtue of being on vacation. Do you see where this is going? Yes, energy vampires on board!

      After talking for a whole year about this ostensibly wonderful time—finally, a proper reason not to go to the office!—energy vampires begin to complain with gusto about anything and everything on board. They stand on the deck and discuss loudly how proud they are to have claimed nineteen dollars back from the tour operator because the ship departed ten minutes late. The food is always cold, and the fight for chairs is a nightmare. So it goes on.

      It was on such a ship that we found ourselves now, and we sought refuge on the furthest deck, where only very few passengers ventured. Out at sea, I observed a seagull, wings motionless, floating effortlessly on the breeze. “What a great photo op,” I thought. I fetched my camera, adjusted the lens, and focused it on the bird. Before I could click the shutter, a shrill cry came from the right: “Careful! They’re dangerous, these seagulls! If you get bird poo on the lens, you’ll never get it off again!”

      The seagull and I were startled, and we peered into the eyes of a stout, embittered woman whose face had been visibly weathered by life. Sometimes, when you meet a person, their wrinkles alone make clear that they have zero sense of humor. I was speechless. Following the seagull’s lead, I absconded from the scene as quickly as possible to avoid further conversation. I told the staff and Rita the story, and we amused ourselves richly with the amount of effort that some people invest in talking down the most enjoyable time of the year and seeing the negative in everything.

      Two days later, as our ship cruised across the Mediterranean, we made ourselves comfortable with a cup of coffee in an area overlooking the pool. Six hundred or more people basked in the blazing sun around an area of water barely larger than a paddling pool. Among them was my new, bird-shy friend. As we people-watched and enjoyed the moment, Rita touched my arm lightly. “What a coincidence that would be!” I followed her gaze and spotted a lone seagull gliding slowly over the ship. “Yes,” I answered, “that would be hilarious, for sure!”

      We followed the flight of the seagull, and as it flew, its expression changed. Its eyes bulged slightly, its beak opened and its entire body momentarily tensed up. With a soft cry, it relieved itself. A large helping of shimmering, yellow-brown seagull poo shot toward the deck. We watched, stunned, to see what would happen next. Splash, it went, and out of all six hundred people around the pool, the bird’s excrement landed precisely on the belly of the woman who had ruined my photo session a few days earlier. She jumped into the air and immediately began objecting loudly to the bird, the tour company, and even the sea itself.

      What caused this chain of events to transpire? Esoterically-minded readers might cite the Law of Resonance. A worker in a chemistry lab, to whom I told the story later, had a different theory:

      mass x seagull x plump woman equals…well, the inevitable.

      As far as I was concerned, it was much simpler than that: negative attracts negative.

      Make a list of the “diamonds” who help to hone and polish you, or those who have the potential to do so in the future:

      At this juncture, I want to tell you a story. Did you ever have to change schools as a child? Did you ever have to do it more than once? I certainly did—and that included two different kindergartens! The result was that, at the age of fourteen, my mirror neurons and I ended up at a comprehensive school, where I’d later go on to meet my first ever “superstar.”

      I stood in front of my class on the first day. “Hello,” I said matter-of-factly, “I’m Tobi, and I have a certified learning disability.” I held up my certificate as evidence (laminated, by that point, because I needed it more and more frequently). If my school career thus far had taught me anything, it was to make light of your weaknesses and wear them on your sleeve. The certificate was like my personal trademark.

      This school was where everything would change. A single statement shifted the course of my whole life. The teacher slowly and deliberately opened a drawer, took out a big pair of red-handled scissors, took the certificate from my hand, and cut it in half. I remember her exact words: “Tobias, if you accept this label, this label will become your story. What becomes your story becomes your life, what becomes your life becomes your identity, and what becomes your identity becomes you. Starting from today, we’re going to learn math differently.”

      From that moment on, my mirror neurons and I learned math in a way suited to right-brain, creatively-minded learners. Much to the relief of my parents, I even passed my high school exit exams.

      Why am I am telling you this story? Well, I want to show you that there are people who change the lives of others. They don’t necessarily do so consciously, but rather by simply living their own passion. There are people for whom work is not work, because they do exactly what they love; they give something back with their whole being and their whole heart. For me personally, that’s what makes me a successful person. Success is not what’s in your bank account; it’s not having a job where you feel important and can hide behind an impressive title, either your own or your parents’. Success, in my world, is what comes from you. Success is when you are passionate for a cause and make yourself deaf to the negativity in your environment. Success is when you enjoy every breath of life; when you wake up with the realization that you have the potential to play a part in the stories of many others. Most wonderfully of all, you can be successful by doing exactly what you love. On the following pages, I’ll tell you how to pursue this path.

      Take the Personality Test

      Before we go any further, I want to give you a little freebie. Do you want to have more influence on other people? Would you like it if people would do what you tell them to do? Every human being is special in his or her own way! However,