Regardless of whether we are aware or no, limiting beliefs are so powerful to keep us in a painful trap.
Everyone is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid. (A. Einstein)
Have you ever thought about your beliefs? I have many times recently. And I have realized that it is not the events that happen to us that influence our lives, but rather the beliefs that we gain from interpreting what happened to us.
From birth, we have been taught how to behave, what rules to follow, what we must and must not do, what to say, and what not to say. This information has shaped our personality and behaviour.
However, some of these beliefs are inappropriate for us and even harmful: they limit us, weaken us or humiliate us. It is essential, therefore, to recognize harmful beliefs to learn to overcome them and to be able to believe in things that are right for us and useful for our future
What are beliefs?
There are three kinds of beliefs:
- Mental Schemes
- Generalized Beliefs
- Personal Beliefs
Our beliefs are the conditioned perception that we have formed from the memory of situations of pleasure and pain. These memories are built on how we interpreted the experiences we had and how we lived them emotionally.
Our beliefs are assumptions we make about ourselves, others and the world around us. They are filters through which we judge, catalogue and interpret the world around us.
Our beliefs are the bricks with which we build our expectations. What we believe conditions what we expect from ourselves, from others and life.
Many people are limited by wrong beliefs, which stem from bad memories, fears, negative experiences.
It is therefore essential to understand that beliefs are not unquestionable, indisputable and incontrovertible facts. They are simply the conclusion of our interpretation or the result of what has been handed down to us and can, therefore, be changed.
We need certain beliefs to face reality at a given moment. Later, they may no longer correspond to our needs, but if we insist on following them, if we consider them sacred, they will create difficulties for us. They become an obstacle because they no longer correspond to the circumstances that have been created in our lives. What we must do is abandon them.
Beliefs shape our egos; influence every aspect of our lives; determine what we expect. They filter our perception of reality and guide our choices. Therefore, understanding how they condition our lives provides us with an advantage to regain harmony between our essence and our expressive and emotional capacity.
How To Overcome Limiting Beliefs
It is essential to understand that all limiting beliefs have a purpose. They’re there because they protect us from something. This “something” often manifests itself in the form of pain, suffering.
However, this does not mean that all our limiting thoughts have a reason to exist in the now. It just means that at the moment they formed, they had a positive intention, that of protecting us from pain. But they often do so in a misleading way. They protect us from immediate pain, but they lead us into even more intense suffering in the future.
To free ourselves from these thoughts, we must learn to ask ourselves a few questions:
- What advantage do I have, at this moment, in clinging to this limiting belief?
- What value do I receive today in holding that belief?
Following this analysis, we must, from time to time, abandon bad beliefs to make way for a new empowering thought. How? When we realize that the old belief no longer has excellent advantages, then we eliminate it. And we are ready to embrace a new belief. Easier said than done! True, but there is a way out.
How to Transform Limiting Beliefs
Most people analyse and understand what the limiting beliefs are, and then stop there. They think that the mere awareness of their perceptual modalities is enough not to be victims of them. A thought that is correct, but does not give the final solution.
Being aware of what is hindering us in life is the first step, the one that leads us to think about the world differently than before. However, our limiting beliefs have, over time, gathered numerous confirmations that justify their presence. We must, therefore, continue to work to untie so many deep emotional knots, it takes time and patience, and, above all, we must be willing to adapt to new circumstances and prepare for change.
Here are, in summary, the 9 points to guide us to this analysis:
- Set The Result To Achieve
- Put Your Limiting Thoughts into Discussion
- Consider the Consequences of Your Limiting Thoughts
- Decide What Your New Powerful Belief Must Be
- Strengthens Your New Powerful Belief
- Making a Final Decision On What Must Change
- Progressively Conditioning Your New Belief
- Make Room For This New Belief In Your Life
- Start Putting Your New Powerful Belief into Practice
Overcoming bad or limiting beliefs, therefore, means analysing and reconsidering our past. It means emptying our mind of the problems, and stopping thinking about them all the time. In short, it means locking these beliefs in the past; that’s where they belong! We shall work in the present, looking to the future.
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BIBLIOGRAFIA
Richard Bandler
Sabrina Bush