Make the Most of Your Thoughts & Beliefs

“As a single footstep will not make a path on the earth, so a single thought will not make a pathway in the mind. To make a deep physical path, we walk again and again. To make a deep mental path, we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our lives.”—Henry David Thoreau

Thoughts are things.  Thoughts are energy.  Thoughts are the precursor and prerequisites for action and action is a prerequisite for success.  Every waking moment, our five senses send messages to our subconscious. Every time we have a conscious thought or feel an emotion, it is stored somewhere within that amazingly complex universe called the mind.  Your thoughts can supply you with unlimited energy, which will take whatever form you put to it, whether negative or positive.

Every action and emotion comes from thought but emotions go a bit deeper.  Emotions stay with us. That core being that is our personality is based on our emotional reactions to life.   We have the emotional, internal, thought processes (which, as everyone knows, are not always logical) which reside in our “inner brain” and we have our logical thought processes, which allow us to create, invent, and become whatever we want to become.

There is a difference between conscious thought and sub—conscious thought.  Thought that is generated in your logical brain (your neo—cortex or gray matter) and the resulting actions or emotions is far slower than thoughts and emotions that originate in your subconscious or inner brain (the mammalian or reptilian brain), which may be one of the reasons that people in general make so many mistakes.  The old “think before you speak” goes much deeper than you think.

“There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”  — Shakespeare

Not being a scientist, and still not understanding physics or the concept of neurons, atoms, and the biology of the brain, I spent six months studying everything I could find on how the brain works and I have to admit, I still do not have a clue. The three pounds or 1.5 kg that is the human brain is a wonder.  It remains one of the vast mysteries of the universe.  There are thousands of studies on how the brain functions and the use of various highly sophisticated scanning and measurement technologies have provided scientists with insights into what parts of the brain react to various stimuli.  The infinite powers and possibilities of our minds have yet to be fully understood or tapped.

Reducing it to its simplest,  we have an inner brain that controls our subconscious, our reflexes, our visceral emotions, our deep fears, our instincts,  and we have our lovely grey matter, where our conscious mind resides.

In rock, paper, scissors, your subconscious mind will win over your gray matter just about 100% of the time.  The inner brain, such a tiny little part of the physical whole, has a tendency to bully the bigger conscious brain.

Think of it a little like this, your conscious brain is the class geek, and your subconscious the bully.  The geek says, “Yes, I can, I know I can, I know how to do it and I know it can succeed, it’s a great idea.”  The bully brain (your subconscious) says, “Bullshit, I remember everything that hurt me”. The bully sticks the geek’s head in the toilet and laughs at him with his buddies.  He calls the geek names and tells him he’s going to beat him up if he even thinks of going near that idea.  He reminds the geek of past failures, and pops up at inopportune times, hiding around corners and under the bed so the poor geek freaks out, takes the long way home, hides in the basement, and does generally anything he can to keep the bully either away or appease him.

There is a constant battle going on, “ yes I can”  , “no I can’t” “ yes I can”  , “no I can’t”. The ugly “no I can’t” is insidious and while it may be a great survival mechanism in situations of danger, it can be a serious detriment when something poses only perceived danger.  The problem is that the primitive part of our brain that triggers “fight or flight” doesn’t seem to know the difference between real threats and those we have created in our minds over the years.

“A man is but the product of his thoughts what he thinks, he becomes.” – Mahatma Gandhi

Thoughts become emotions, emotions influence thoughts, and the chemical factory that is our brain sets about making us feel happy, depressed, angry, elated, optimistic, pessimistic, energetic, lethargic.  Emotions, surface, or deep—seated, have a lot more power than logical thoughts.

We become addicted to our emotions in the same way that we become addicted to substances, it may not be good for us, but we become addicted nonetheless.  On top of that, some of us are apparently genetically pre—disposed to optimism or pessimism, happiness or depression depending on genetic makeup.

The only answer to the conundrum of subconscious versus conscious, self–limiting versus self—actualizing lies in using all the resources we have to transform negativity into positivity.  There has to be a meeting between your minds, the intellectual and the emotional, the believer and the doubter, the child, the adult, the female, the male, the lover and the fighter.  The community in your brain is very much like the community you live in but you get to decide.

Who will be the citizens of your inner Utopia, who will be in control, who will lead and who will follow, who are the foes and friends and who will you place in prison or send into exile?  What belief systems are you going to impose?  What will motivate you and inspire you?  Your citizens are your thoughts and emotions, so choose wisely. You are the only one that has control over your thoughts and emotions, your brain and your body are yours and yours alone to manage and control.

“Watch your thoughts for they become words. Watch your words for they become actions. Watch your actions for they become habits. Watch your habits for they become your character. And watch your character for it becomes your destiny. What we think, we become.”― Margaret Thatcher

Thoughts, beliefs and emotions translate to actions, responses, and reactions.  Reactions, responses and actions in turn impact thoughts, beliefs, and emotions. It is an endless cycle, part of the circle of the life as you decide to live it.

Your thoughts and beliefs will determine your sense of power, your willingness to take risks, to do or be what you want to do or be.  What you believe is your truth, and your truth is based on your how you process and perceive events and where and who you perceive yourself to be and others to be.

There is a fine line between feelings, thoughts and beliefs.  It is all a bit of a mash—up when all is said and done and there are no clear cut answers, indeed, the answers are different for each of us.  You do not need to accept anyone else’s beliefs, what one person may see as the ultimate steps to success may not work for you, which is why there are thousands of self-help books on the market and why so many of them are bestsellers.

“The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.” ― Albert Einstein

Change is never easy, and the jury is still out over how to best change thought patterns, control emotions, and foster positive belief systems.  We often cling to negative patterns because they keep us in our comfort zone and we don’t even realize we are doing it.  One part is saying, “I will achieve wealth and happiness”, and the other part is nostalgic about the good ol’ days, even if those good ol’ days were lived in poverty or strife.

The movie, “Good Will Hunting”, is a great example of how we sabotage ourselves, through our beliefs, through clinging to the past, by hanging onto anger and feeling guilt.  At one point, Will’s best friend, Chuckie says to him, “Every day I come by to pick you up. And we go out we have a few drinks, and a few laughs and it’s great. But you know what the best part of my day is? It’s for about ten seconds from when I pull up to the curb to when I get to your door. Because I think maybe I’ll get up there and I’ll knock on the door and you won’t be there. No goodbye, no see you later, no nothin’. Just left. I don’t know much, but I know that.”  Will could not let go of the past so he could not move into the future.  He didn’t believe in his own worth, despite everyone else believing in him.

Sound familiar? Give yourself permission to believe in yourself, to grow, to be the person you want to be and to accept what works for you and throw out what does not.  Know that it is possible to control the quality of your thoughts and thereby change your feelings.  Your thoughts can change your feelings and once you change your feelings, you can get rid of many of the negative emotions that haunt you.

“I don’t want to be at the mercy of my emotions. I want to use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them.”—Oscar Wilde

Studies put the number of thoughts an average person has per day at between 12,500 and 50,000 and many as high as 60,000 thoughts per day for the average person.  The majority of daily thoughts we have are repeated from the day before, and as much as 80% of repeated thoughts are negative.  That is a lot of negative thinking.  Our thoughts control us, and sometimes we cannot control our own thoughts, our own programming.

We do not always know what reality is.  We respond to experiences and not reality itself.  Imagine a map based your experiences, beliefs and senses.  This map cannot be accurate because it is missing key elements like choice and perspective.  The better perspective and the more choices you have, the better you can navigate through life.

Generally, we make the best choices we can at any given time.  Problems arise when we don’t have enough choices or know the best choices to make.  The maps in our minds are incomplete.  The mental GPS system is broken and needs to be reprogrammed with new directions.  It is not that any given person is broken or inadequate; it is simply a matter of knowing what the options are and achieving a positive result with our actions.

“You are what you do, not what you say you’ll do.” ― C.G. Jung

All actions have a purpose and are rarely random.  We want to achieve something that benefits us.  One key is to separate intention from actual actions.  We are not our behavior and if a better choice than what we have made in the past presents itself, most people will take it.  Essentially, the subconscious mind balances the conscious and vice versa.

You have all the resources you need, and if you do not have the resources, you have the power to create them.  Communication results in responses and feedback so you need to take responsibility for the way you communicate with others and with yourself.  If you are not getting the results you want, you need to change what you are doing. No one is without resources but your state of mind can make you blind to the resources available to you.

You have to use the resources you have in mind and body.  If you make a change in one the other is affected and influenced.  With thoughts, you can change your body and with actions, you can change your thoughts and feelings.  Use your senses because that is how everyone processes information, work on making your senses more acute so you are able to optimize your own personal resources, think more clearly and act more positively.

Model successful performance.  If someone else is doing something that works, you can do it too.   You can learn from successful people, take from them what works for you.  Learning is in doing, in taking action to achieve the results you want.

The combination of emotions and physical feelings and awareness can be a powerful tool in changing your thought patterns and feelings.  Essentially, the ability to use the senses to evoke good emotions and use emotions to heighten senses is instinctual but actually taking advantage of these combinations of sight, smell, hearing, touch, and emotions can be a learned skill.

Each of your five senses responds to memories and imagination.  Learning how to use all of your senses and your brain to the maximum effect in a flexible way will lead you to more creative thinking and solutions to problems.  Remember – none of your senses or emotions operate in isolation.  They are all connected by an intricate web of memory, patterns, responses, and learned and visceral reactions.

“All the knowledge I possess everyone else can acquire, but my heart is all my own.” ― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Don’t put unrealistic demands on yourself.  Have realistic expectations and remember, shoulda woulda coulda is all in the past.  You should have done this, you could have done that, you would have done it differently if you had only known.  If you truly want to do something, make a plan and work the plan to achieve your goals.  You can do what you set out to do.  If you want something badly enough you can make it happen with planning and work.

When something happens and you find yourself feeling hurt or assuming the worst, take a deep breath, and ask yourself what other possible logical or positive reason could there be that this negative thing happened?  Maybe the other person was preoccupied, ill, or had something going on in his life that you have no knowledge of.

Be compassionate, empathic and thick skinned, remember you are not necessarily the priority in the other person’s mind, they may have a lot of other stuff going on you know nothing about.  Maybe they are simply jealous because you are so wonderful.  By diffusing the situation and not taking everything too personally or too much to heart, you can protect yourself from oversensitivity or the onset of sadness, hurt feelings, or feelings of personal inadequacy.

Emotional states can be broken down into two major categories, associated and dissociated.  When you associate, you feel all the feelings that go with any given experience.  When you dissociate, you have feelings about the experience but do not feel it as it is happening.  Essentially, if you are dissociated, you are probably a bit out of it, feeling as though you are “not all there”. When you are associated you feel:

• in the experience
• all there
• in the thick of it
• with it
• caught up
• in the flow
• in touch

When you are dissociated you feel:

• out of it
• laid back
• on the side—lines
• not with it
• not all there
• not quite yourself
• out of touch

There are advantages and disadvantages to being associative or dissociative.  When you are associated you are in the here and now, you are absorbed in what you are doing.  You are engaged, your senses are heightened and your energy levels are high.   Association enhances pleasant experiences and memories.  It is good for practicing skills and paying attention, resulting in more productive behaviour and learning.

When you dissociate yourself, you are thinking about something but not really engaged with it.  You are distanced from what you are doing and you see yourself in your imagination.  Time goes by slowly and you become less aware of your bodily sensations.  Dissociation helps in reviewing experiences and learning from past experiences.  It can aid in keeping track of time and taking a step back from unpleasant situations or experiences.

Generally, being associated is a more positive state. You are more in touch with your physical and emotional feelings and can better enjoy positive situations.  Dissociation, on the other hand is good if you want to distance yourself from negative experiences and memories.  In short, associate yourself with the positive and dissociate yourself from the negative.

Try to seek out experiences that make you want to be associative and use dissociation to evaluate and review negative experiences and memories.  We all know people that are perpetually engaged, passionate about what they are doing and enthusiastic.  Their enthusiasm is contagious and because they are associative, other people enjoy being around them and get caught up in the energy they give off.  Conversely, the dissociated person sits back, may speak a bit but is not really in the moment, they distance themselves from the situation and therefore, the engagement with others is minimal.

Engage in life.   Practice good attitudes and good thought hygiene.  Clear out the negative to make room for the positive.  Learn how your thought patterns work and what your most pervasive thoughts are.  Get to really know your thought patterns and how they affect your life.  This is an on—going process but once you learn to be aware, it will become second nature.

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SEEBEDO Your Thought Patterns and Belief Systems

SEE and know what your thought patterns and belief systems are and how they affect your life

BE aware of your thoughts and beliefs and your behaviour because of those thoughts and beliefs.  Be associative as much as possible.

DO take charge of your thoughts and engage in life – Take action on your thoughts and beliefs

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