The Bent Pole Story

Let me tell you the story of how it all started. My name is Anton Cela, and I was a complete failure. After college, I decided to go to Houston and found a job as a kindergarten teacher. Even though I liked children very much, I didn’t enjoy my job too much. I just didn’t see myself in a teacher position for the rest of my life. After the first year, I started to become depressed very often. My relationships were not working, with my colleagues, my friends and my girlfriend, and my family was very far away from me. At that time my brother was teaching in high school. That is all that I knew about him. We didn’t talk too often and when we did, we always argued about something. Things kept going down when my girlfriend abandoned me for another man. And I found relief in the hands of alcohol. I drank one or two beers a day, which eventually turning to the sixpack, just to go to sleep.

One day, I decided it was time to make a change, so I thought, why not start going to the gym? It was very close to my house, about 10 minutes in car, and I needed the exercise. On the second week of going to the gym, something happened. An extraordinary event that would change my life.

I remember the date. It was May 30th, 2006. I was exiting the gym, after a one hour workout with weights. The thing I remember the most was the sky. It was completely blue and I don’t know why, I just stared at it. I had walked about 50 steps outside the doorway, and I was walking in front of a parking space for handicapped. I didn’t even see it coming. A car was going to park in that space, and instead of pushing the brakes, the driver´s foot got stuck in the accelerator pedal. A side of a car hit me at full speed, and also hit a pole and a bush. It left the pole bent, almost rip off the bush, and broke my legs.

The staff in the gym heard a noise and immediately call 911. I was taken to the West Houston Medical Center, without anybody to take care of me. I think I wasn’t crying for the pain, but for being alone.

I was asked who I wanted to contact, and the first person I thought of was my brother Phil. He told me that the moment he heard the news, the first thing he remembered was when we were kids and he used to protect me and always holding me in the photographs. He called my parents, and they took the first flight to Houston.

When I saw him entering my room at the hospital, I broke down in tears. He held me and said everything was going to be ok. During the first night in the hospital, he was there with me. We talked about how wrong we were about our attitudes and behaviors to each other, and how many wasted years we´ve let pass by. I started to realize the fact that I had two broken legs, and I didn’t know if I was going to be able to walk again. I started to cry again. Phil tried to console me, but I was mad and angry about everything and I started blaming everyone and everything, I even thought God hated me.

The doctors gave me something to sleep, but that night I couldn’t get the much needed sleep, then Phil tried to wake me up and told me to watch this show on TV. It was a bold old man in a show, with a sweet voice and a message. He was Dr. Wayne Dyer, an author of many self help books. He was talking in a PBS show, about one of his books, “How to Really Really Really Get What You Want”. Phil and I didn’t talk at all while we were watching and listening to each word of Dr. Wayne Dyer. At the end, we talked about how we can use this, and how to learn about it.

In the next morning, Phil went to the bookstore, and bought all the books by Wayne Dyer and a few others about philosophy. The book that intrigued me the most while I was recovering was the Dao Teh Ching. Written by Lao Tzu, more than 2000 years ago, it is one of the most important books on Taoism philosophy. On the verse 22, I found something intriguing:

Bend and you will be whole.
Curl and you will be straight.
Keep empty and you will be filled.
Grow old and you will be renewed.
Have little and you will gain.
Have much and you will be confused.
Therefore, the Sage embraces the One,
And becomes a Pattern to all under
Heaven.

I kept thinking about the pole. My brother went where the accident happened and showed me the pictures. While I broke my legs, the pole bent. While the pole can be fixed rapidly, my legs would take months to heal. But the issue was not my legs. It was myself. I had been broken for a long time, because all the events in my life I kept carrying with me, and which were hurting me. I realized that if you can bend to the circumstances, to the world, and to your thoughts, you will never break. You will then be unbreakable, and even when problems appear and what you want doesn’t go as you want, you can bend to all that and keep trying. This is one of the first lessons Phil and I learned on self development. We call it the Bend Method.

After a year, my legs were healed and my life had changed. I decided to quit my job and start doing what I wanted for a long time, that was starting a business. Phil also changed. He didn’t quit his job, but went back to school to get an MBA, and when he graduated, he started teaching college students in a local institution. Even though everything was going great, we started to see some gaps between the books from the so called “gurus” and reality. We realized that we had changed because we developed our own transformational tools. Yes, they showed us the road, but we found ways to not only walk it, but to run it.

Phil and I decided to apply all our knowledge to help others. We started helping some of his students, and teaching them how to change their lives too. With each course and class we taught, people were getting more interested. They approached us to help their family members or friends. We actually were overwhelmed by so many requests. We just couldn´t help everybody in this way.

That’s when we created The Change Your Life Phenomenon. It was a transformational movement to help people change their lives, using motivation, education and tools, Phil and I learned, to achieve change and life improvement. And the best way to share it was through the Web. Going beyond our community and helping people all over the world was a huge task, but it is necessary. We want to leave something in this world, and beyond monuments or statues, we want to leave an idea. Everyone can change their lives to what they desire, with the right motivation, tools and education.

We can´t do this alone. That’s why we need you. Share this story with your friends, family or colleges, and help them to change too. Join the CHYL Phenomenon and become part of this great idea of change.

Anton and Phillip Cela
Change Your Life Phenomenon

About Us

Anton Cela is a member of the Association for Comprehensive Energy Psychology, and has participated on private sessions, seminars and conferences on personal, relationship and leadership development. Anton is about to publish his first book on self development and change.

Phillip Cela is university professor. He has taught over 1000 students in colleges on US and Mexico for 6 years, on topics such as motivation, self development and life management. Phil is also an expert in leadership, giving conferences in different colleges around the world.