“What we can or cannot do, what we consider possible or impossible, is rarely a function of our true capability. It is more likely a function of our beliefs about who we are. “
Tony Robbins
I spend time with my clients teaching them how to be mindful of what they think and believe, because all of our actions are driven from our thoughts, beliefs and past experiences.
If you want to create your best life, you want to understand what you believe so that if it’s not working for you (what you have now in your life – your relationship, your home, your financial life or your work), you can change it.
[Tweet “Transformation = awareness, understanding and behavior change.”]Each of us has been conditioned by our parents, peers, institutions, culture, and the media to have the beliefs we have today.
Our subconscious mind is so powerful that it controls 95% of our behaviors and habits.
So even our will power won’t help us if we have beliefs about money, work, weight loss or relationships that are at odds with a belief that’s in our subconscious that’s at odds with our conscious mind.
You must get in touch with what you believe.
What I’ve learned is that I can do anything even if I have not be trained to do it (such as writing a book).
If I believe I can do it, and I’m willing to put in the effort and take action towards my dream, I know I can do it.
This is a key ingredient of success.
I want to introduce you to do my favorite life coaching tool I learned from Martha Beck called Whizzing on the Electric Fence. It’s from her book Finding Your Own North Star.
This is one of the exercises Martha taught us to use to help clients blast through their internal limitations and reconnect with their dreams. These exercises won’t do you much good if you’re still in Square One of her change cycle (melt-down or you went through a catalytic event – death, divorce, or job loss). They’re most effective after you’ve begun experiencing spontaneous hope.
The first step in recovering your dreams is to memorize and repeat the Square Two Mantra:
There are no rules, and that’s okay.
If this doesn’t ring quite true to you, you may use the Deluxe Industrial-Strength Square Two Mantra. Screw the rules. This doesn’t mean that you take all constraints off your behavior; it means that you begin operating out of the curiosity and passion of your essential self, rather than the fear and propriety of your social self.
EXERCISE: WHIZZING ON THE ELECTRIC FENCE
The rules in your mind are like psychological electric fences that keep you from consciously engaging your real dreams. Instead of railing at them, Martha says to start treating them with profound disrespect, and ultimately trampling right over them (Martha is one of the funniest people I’ve ever met). To start, please complete the following sentences.
- “If I didn’t care what people thought, I would…”
- “If I were sure I’d succeed, I would…”
- “If I had the nerve, I would…”
- “If I could be certain it was the right choice, I would…”
- “If I weren’t worried about the future, I would…”
- “If I had the freedom, I would…”
Martha recommends that you choose one of your answers that is neither illegal nor physically dangerous, and do it. Right now, before you’re sure that it’s fail-safe, or acceptable, or risk-free. When you’re finished with that item, pick another one, and do that one too. You’ll be breaking the Rules. The needs for certainty and permission are the electric fences in your mind. Which would be worse: whizzing all over them or permanently forfeiting all of the things you wrote on the list above?*
*Excerpted from Finding Your Own North Star by Martha Beck
What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail?
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