Applying The 7 Skills to impress™: Skill 5 The Elevate Formula
Previously…
By this stage, I’d set my Outcomes, managed my nerves, built Rapport with the squad, and worked out the Persuasion Pathways I’d use.
Now we return to a tool that shaped both my preparation and the way I carried myself in that room.
The Elevate Formula was the thread running through everything I did before stepping in front of that squad. It shaped how I thought about the task, how I handled my nerves, and how I saw myself in the moments that mattered.
And it subtly fuelled the inspiration in my talk.
What the Elevate Formula Really Does
At its heart, the Elevate Formula helps your subconscious mind take on board three things:
- The challenge is briefly present, and it will not last forever.
- Your strengths are real, reliable and useful: they will carry you through.
- Your Identity is built on your strengths, not your fears.
In practice, it leads you to believe:
- That your Lasting strengths outweigh any Fleeting difficulty
- That it’s you, not the problem, who defines the moment
- And that your subconscious can trust your SQAs when things get tough
For my inspirational speech, these ideas were the backbone of my preparation.
How I Used the Elevate Formula for This Talk
To achieve my Outcomes, I needed my System 1 to believe the following:
- The task wasn’t endless.
My nerves had painted the talk as a looming crisis with no endpoint, a wall I couldn’t see past.
I needed to see it instead as a single moment, one that would soon be behind me. When I reframed it that way, the event instantly felt more manageable.
- I had the strengths to handle it.
I needed to believe I could perform at my best and deal calmly with anything unexpected.
To do that, I had to draw on my Lasting strengths, not my fears.
- I was capable, confident, and the right person for this job.
And just as importantly, the challenge was Other. It did not define me. However the talk went, I would still be the same decent, capable human being afterwards as I was before I walked into the room.
At that stage of my life, it was easy to slip into thinking my nerves defined me. If I felt scared, I assumed that meant I was weak.
The Elevate Formula helped reverse that.
I needed my SQAs, my strengths, qualities, and attributes, to sit at the centre of my Identity, not my fear.
I wanted to see myself as a strong, determined, capable person stepping into a challenge.
This shift changed everything.
Review and Preview: The Tool That Embeds the Elevate Formula
Today, I use a powerful technique that embeds the Elevate Formula into your subconscious mind: Review and Preview (R&P).
It’s strong, effective, and creates lasting change.
I even used R&P to help heal my PTSD.
But at the time of this rugby speech, Review and Preview was only beginning to form, evolving out of the work I did with my clients.
For this event, High-Performance Imprinting (HPI) did the job for me.
HPI Contains the Elevate Formula
HPI works beautifully because the Elevate Formula is woven into its structure.
A. Outcomes + Realisation
When you set an Outcome and do Realisation, your subconscious begins focusing on where you’re heading rather than what you fear.
This activates your Towards motivation.
B. Seeing Beyond the Event
In the last phase of HPI, you imagine what happens after the challenge.
This shows your System 1 that the event is time-limited, not permanent. A Fleeting moment.
C. Using Your SQAs to Succeed
In HPI, you visualise yourself using your strengths to achieve a positive Outcome. Your System 1 begins assuming your SQAs are Lasting and Broad.
D. Showing Up With a High IDQ
Seeing yourself succeed allows your subconscious to believe you can bring a High Identity Quotient (High IDQ) into the moment. From this flows confidence, composure, and self-belief. And they have become part of who you are, Self.
And because a strong IDQ makes challenges feel less personal and less threatening, HPI naturally frames them as Other and Narrow.
That perspective all flowed from HPI, helping my subconscious treat the speech as a separate, contained moment rather than something overwhelming.
Every part of HPI echoes the Elevate Formula.
The Elevate Formula in Action
Looking back, this Skill was one of the biggest reasons I transformed from a shaking bag of nerves into a confident, assertive presenter.
The challenge had been transformed by changing how I saw myself walking into it.
And that is the power of the Elevate Formula.
Skills 6 and 7: Crafting a Hypnotically Inspiring Speech
Now that the psychological foundation was in place, I was ready to deliver at my confident best.
In the next chapter, we turn to the language, flow, and structure of inspiring speeches, the tools that shaped the words I used with the squad.
→ Click here to continue to: Skill 6 & 7: Crafting a Hypnotically Inspiring Speech