Your beliefs have the power to influence your feelings, which in turn dictate your actions, which create your results. So if you’re not getting the results you want in any area of life, begin to create change by examining your beliefs.
Throughout the journey of life, people experience events that lead to the development of limiting beliefs. If a little boy doesn’t make the cut for the baseball team, he may internalize that to mean something about him, such as “I am not good enough”. If that belief goes unchecked, he may bring “I’m not good enough” into his approach to school, work, relationships, and more throughout his life.
People who believe “I am not good enough” aren’t likely to set big goals or take the steps to achieve them, so limited thinking leads to limited living.
1. Identify the Source of the Belief
Go back as far as you can to identify where you first picked up a pattern of negative thinking. For most people, these beliefs were developed as the result of an event in childhood.
Identifying the source of the belief can help you separate the event from the story you told yourself about what it means. You’ll begin to recognize that you may still be operating under the assumptions made by your six-year old self!
2. Develop Awareness
When you click an icon to open an application on your computer, you’re telling the computer program to run. It doesn’t question why; it just does it every time. Your beliefs influence your actions in the same way. A girl whose father left the family may may interpret that to mean she wasn’t lovable. She’ll grow into a woman who doesn’t believe she’s lovable and will consistently choose men who reinforce this belief.
Once you are aware of the program that is running, you have the power to stop it. You have the power to think for yourself and make your own decisions.
3. Replace Negative Beliefs with Positive Ones
Don’t underestimate the power of positive affirmations when used consistently! In PSI Seminars, we call this the “I AM”. What are your I AM statements?
Once you’ve identified those beliefs which do not serve you, you can begin replacing them with ones that do through the power of suggestion. Start each day by declaring the man or woman you aspire to be and end each evening grateful for having been that person and within 30 days, you will notice a change.
A simple way to accomplish this is to list I AM statements and say them out loud. Saying them isn’t enough though; you also have to feel them. Take a moment to feel what it’s like to be courageous or beautiful or successful or any of the other I AMs that will support you in becoming your best self.