The person that can best help you is you. Yet, old behaviours, beliefs, and feelings seem to cling on and run parts of your life for you, beckoning the question: ‘why can’t I change?’.

I’ve wrestled with this question for a long time, and I have two radical arguments — arguments that can give you a confident blueprint to finally change. As when we question the possibility of change itself, the actual change becomes out of the question.

1. What we believe is possible for ourselves has an enclosing effect on what is possible
2. All behaviour is functional behaviour, in that it serves a purpose

What grounds both statements is the notion of Beliefs, beliefs can be conscious or unconscious, manifesting emotionally, mentally, and in our body and actions.

Your Life is Like a Garden

In our gardens, there is the topsoil where the plants and weeds grow — we like the plants and grumble at the weeds (especially when they get out of control). These symbolise our outer circumstances.

Beneath the plants and weeds are their roots, the true causes of the growth. Mirroring the inner world, these roots are hidden externally but sustain the plants.

So, when we create a successful business or great family life alike, what we are and believe manifested those. Likewise, poor relationships, finances and overeating are also manifesting in accordance with our inner beliefs.

Limiting beliefs come largely from so many factors, but many of them boil down to experiences. Our personality structure exists and does bias us to do and value some things more than others; the issue though is that we’re looking at our individual potential and asking: ‘why am I here and not getting there?’

Limiting beliefs are in proportion to our comfort zone; wherever we step out of it and find fear, anger and shame, then it is likely this step is also tugging on an embedded emotion-linked belief, creating a feeling-tension. How do we put that tension at ease? There are two valid approaches:

• External: The advice to ‘step out’ of the comfort zone in the outer world to 1) get a more accurate perspective and 2) change how we feel about a situation, person, or idea, is really valid. Experiences have the effect of re-moulding our beliefs, feelings and conduct in our life; the issue is our comfort zone pulls us to reinforce the same old behaviour patterns.
• Internal: Going back to the garden, getting to the root of a limiting situation and holding it in the light of compassionate understanding, also has a powerful effect of dissolving and reforming the relationship that we have with our circumstances and ourselves; this inner change inevitably alters the outer dynamics of our life.

As a causal point, the change always registers internally — we express satisfaction by saying ‘I know better’ ‘I’m doing better’, or ‘I feel better’; something changes inside when we find resolution in our lives, and this can even be in spite of our situation remaining the same!

In any case, the net effect is this; a greater space, balance, and flexibility for all that life has to offer is found when we look more at our beliefs. How do we do this?

Changing beliefs to create a better life

Our inner beliefs and deepest traits frame and condition our emotional and logical responses and capabilities. Here are some ways to change them:

1.Embrace oppositional thinking

If something is good, see how it can be bad as well. If something is gained, what is lost? This kind of thinking balances cognitive biases and brings new perspectives into your ingrained awareness; this ability naturally brings about more empathy and acceptance for all that is, including the hidden beliefs and reasons rooting those weeds in your garden.

2. Learn from your dreams

The unconscious compensates for the conscious attitude. What you’re conscious mind represses, lives on in the unconscious which expresses itself notably via dreams. So the opposite side to who we’re trying to be and say we are, come out in this realm of the psyche.

For instance, if you’re avoiding something but don’t want to acknowledge it, there may be dreams of being chased. If you’re too avoidant of conflict, you might get into fights in your dreams. And, if you’re rather disposed to sadistic tendencies, then you may be disturbed by dreams of petting cute bunnies…Oh no!

The unconscious contains buried treasure waiting to be discovered, it calls out to be honoured and integrated so that you can regain psychological wholeness. Your dreams will help you to integrate your shadow, which is the cause of a great deal of the weeds in peoples’ gardens.

3. Accept your negative emotions

An unfortunate thing about schools is that they do not equip children to ride the emotional ups and downs of life; no wonder mental illness, obesity, and addictions are so rampant. So much shame, doubt and concern gets tangled up with how we respond to difficult emotions.

The solution is simple, when you feel anger, shame, sadness, and any of their siblings and cousins, you let yourself be still and feel it. It is so tempting to start thinking them away, reaching for food, or starting a fight on the spot, but those won’t get to the root, and that means that these feelings and symptom-solutions will be prone to repeating themselves.

Do yourself and your emotions a favour and give them (and you) the gift of attention and presence, as if they were a cherished loved one.

4. Meditation

Oh boy, if I had a penny for every time I recommended meditation…

Meditation is a very holistic method for healing, it gradually cleanses the mind, the body, and in doing so creates a calmer, slower, more enjoyable mind and mental experience, as well as a greater ability to be present and see things as they are. This is because meditation encourages us to do exactly those two things, whereas the mind takes us elsewhere.

Is meditation easy? Yes and no.

Yes in the sense that indeed, you can activate your monk-mode by simply doing something like sitting down, closing your eyes and focusing on your breath; but also no, as when people start it can feel hard to stay still even for just a few minutes, and the thoughts will probably start perversely partying up in your noggin’ even though they’re meant to be in curfew.

So it’s good to know to expect to start slow, to know your mind will keep creating thoughts but all you have to do is keep redirecting your attention to the present moment as soon as you realise your attention has went astray. As with anything, the meditative practice and its benefits will compound with time and lead to awesome changes.

Conclusion

Elsewhere in my articles looking at beliefs, I give extra tips and tools for moving our lives into a more desired direction. I hope you found this useful, let me know your own thoughts and tips so that we can all help each other to improve!

Thank you for reading,

Kyle