Anthony Robbins - Unleash the Power Within Review

Over the weekend, from Friday to Monday, I attended Tony Robbins' Unleash the Power Within (UPW) seminar in Toronto. It was a fun event. Having read two of Tony's books and worked through his Personal Power II program, I was quite familiar with his work. I was looking forward to it and had a great time.  Tony spoke on Friday and Sunday, while Joseph McClendon ran the event on the Saturday and Monday.

Energy

This was a very high energy seminar.  There was a ton of jumping around, dancing, clapping, yelling etc.  For some that prefer a more cerebral, low-key approach, UPW may not be for you. There were some participants that felt uncomfortable with this type of atmosphere - and subsequently, they didn't a lot out of it.  Those that were able to let loose and have fun had a great time and learned a lot more. Again, if you are the more reserved, conservative type this seminar may not be right for you. 

For someone like me who enjoys a high energy environment, the jumping up and down and dancing was great. In fact, they helped me keep my energy level up during the long stretches.  Even though I tend be very analytical at times, I enjoyed getting pumped up.

Keeping your energy up is vital for this seminar because the days are long.  Very long.  Saturday and Sunday were approaching 15 hours.  Fortunately, Tony is such a dynamic speaker that you hardly noticed the time.

Tony as a Speaker

Tony Robbins is an exceptionally gifted speaker.  He is high energy and dynamic while clearly enjoying his time on his stage.  He has a very expressive style with his varying tonality and strong hand gestures.  Content aside, he is just someone who is fun to watch speak.

He has excellent storytelling skills.  At one point in the seminar, he was telling a story of how he started to play polo and had the entire audience in stitches and really drove home the point he was trying to make in a fun manner.

In contrast to how he can appear sometimes in his infomercials and audio programs (rigid and somewhat fake), he came across very genuine during the seminar.  He seemed like he was being himself - dropping 4 letter words wherever he felt like it - and communicating from the core as opposed to trying to project some sort of image.

Selling

Like most seminars, there were times during UPW that Tony or Joseph would promote another seminar or product they were offering.  This can often turn people off - especially if you can clearly see the sales tactics they are trying to use.  It can often feel very slimy. Fortunately, they kept the sales talk to a minimum.  They simply described the seminar they were promoting and detailed all the benefits of selling.  They didn't try to use any high pressure tactics. They simply encouraged all the attendees to continue their pursuit of personal growth whether it was another Tony Robbins event or with some other personal development company.

The Content of the Seminar

Day 1

• The emotional triad: physiology, focus and language
• The six human needs
• Anchoring
• How to process fears
• Firewalk

This day was centered around the firewalk.  It was quite an ingenious way of doing things.  In order to successfully complete it, you needed to apply the techniques of controlling your emotional state.   Although it was scary for a lot of people who attended, I really enjoyed it. This day was long: going from 1 PM to 1 AM with no breaks.

It was also great to watch Tony do change work with some of the members of the audience.  For example, he helped one young lady from needing a lot of significance to appreciating the little things.

Day 2

• The ultimate success formula
• 3 steps for lasting change
• 3 beliefs for lasting success
• Utilizing momentum
• Finding your passion
• The power of contribution and building a team
• Building rapport through matching and mirroring

Saturday was run by Joseph McClendon.  He is a good speaker but not quite as high energy as Tony is.  Part of the day included videos of Tony explaining some of the concepts.  One part that I particularly enjoyed was a rapport exercise that was done near the end of the day. By perfectly matching the physiology between two people,  the two people went into exactly the same state.  In a few examples, they ended up picturing the exact same things.

Day 3

• The pyramid of mastery
• 3 pillars of an extraordinary life
• Strategies
• Submodalities
• Values and beliefs
• How to change beliefs with the Dickens pattern

The highlight of Day 3 was the completion of the Dickens pattern.  It's a process to change a belief in the course of an hour or so.  The only downside is that it can be quite emotionally painful - by the end of the process there were many people crying profusely.  However, once the process was completed it was easily to replace the disempowering belief with an empowering alternative.

Day 4 - Health Focus

• Philosophy of health
• 8 gifts of a vital life
• 4 poisons to reduce or eliminate
• The 10-day challenge

The final day of the seminar focused exclusively on health since, according to Tony, it is the foundation for a happy and successful life.  For those who have been very health conscious for a while now, the information provided will serve as a reinforcement while giving a few new ideas.  For example, it was good to know which supplements were recommended.  On the other hand, for those previously on a Standard American Diet, this day will basically challenge everything you know about health.  The response to this day was quite polarized: many people liked the information and were prepared to start the 10-day challenge while others got quite defensive.  Overall, this was the lowest energy day of all but did provide a lot of information.  I liked how they included references to all the scientific studies that support their conclusions about health.

Criticisms

During the times when we were watching Tony on video, the seminar had a tendency to drag every now and then.  This was especially true during the health portion of the seminar since it involved the citing of particular studies and included a significant amount of biological jargon.

The breaks during the seminar were few and far between.  We would short (less than 5 minutes) breaks to stretch quite frequently.  However, we only had one meal break each day.  For those that did not bring food to the seminar, this could have posed a problem.  Fortunately, I brought my own food to the seminar and just snacked during the talk.  For others who didn't, they either went long periods without eating (up to 9 hours) or missed part of the seminar so that they could go out and eat.

Another shortcoming of the seminar was that it was extremely large.  There were approximately 3000 people attending this event.  This lead to a one-to-many type of communication style. If you had trouble understanding some the concepts that were being taught, the opportunity to ask questions was not there.  This is one of the tradeoffs of holding such a large seminar.  On the one hand, it affords the speaker an opportunity to have a large impact on a lot of people.  On the other hand, not every individual person will get a lot out of the seminar.

Recommendation

So, should you attend this seminar?  If money is not an issue, then yes (the seminar can cost between $700 and $2000 depending on your seating).  If it is, then before choosing to attend, I recommend you grab a copy of the books, Unlimited Power and Awaken the Giant Within, and work through them.  From there, I would suggest that grab a copy of the audio program, Personal Power II.  Work through the content of these and you will be able to make massive progress in your life with minimal cost. A lot of the concepts he teaches in the seminar he also covers in these info products.  The challenge is you will have to have to discipline to use what you learn since there will be no one to guide you through it. However, the advantage is you will be able to reference them whenever you want.

For someone who is already heavily into personal development, a seminar such as UPW is another step along the road.  You will receive benefit from it, but it won't be a magic pill (because magic pills don't exist).  It will give you a few new ideas while reinforcing a lot of the ideas that you have picked up in your self-development journey.

However, if you are new to self-help or would like to introduce someone else to personal development, UPW provides an excellent introduction.  They will learn some great tools and the firewalk experience will provide validation. It could get someone you know hooked on self improvement and, subsequently, significantly improve their life.

The verdict: for those already heavily interested in personal development, get the books and audio program mentioned above, first.  They should keep you busy for at least a few months.  After that, you can choose to attend UPW if you want to.  For those new to personal development, I would suggest attending UPW in order to get your reality completely shattered.  From there, to continue your journey, I would pick up Personal Power II at the seminar at a reduced price.