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HOW YOUR BELIEF SYSTEM INFLUENCES YOUR LIFE

EXERCISE | ELIMINATE IRRATIONAL, NEGATIVE OR SELF-LIMITING BELIEFS

Unless we focus our minds on the task of challenging our beliefs, our subconscious mind simply
accepts unchallenged irrational, self-limiting beliefs as real. An example of this is unrealistic fear.
Whilst not advocating reckless actions, most of the fears we allow to affect our thoughts has lit-
tle or no validating evidence to support it. When fear arises in your life, question its validity, is it
real or imagined.

In most cases FEAR = False Expectations Appearing Real.
The following process works well:

1. Identify the irrational, restricting beliefs and the negative assumptions that reinforce them.

2. Challenge the validity of those beliefs by challenging the assumptions under them. In what
ways could they be wrong or incomplete? The more challenges you can develop, the
weaker the ties will be to the restricting beliefs.

3. Explore positive beliefs that would challenge your negative ones. Find validation for
empowering, rather than restricting, beliefs. Again, the more you can reinforce
empowering beliefs, the more lightly you will be attached to restricting beliefs.

4. Adopt a statement you are willing to work with that turns a restricting belief into an
empowering one. Each time your habit pattern starts to move toward reinforcing the
restricting belief, go back to your written statement. That statement is your guide for turning
around restricting belief systems.
With determination and repetition of thought processes, it is as simple to replace a destructive
belief with a constructive, positive one, as it was to form the original irrational belief.

Start with a single irrational belief. Don’t make your goal so ambitious that you sabotage
yourself. One of my favourite authors on the subject, Tony Robbins, in his book, “Awaken the
Giant Within”, writes about breaking old belief systems by visualizing a negative situation in
ways—often comical—that minimize its power.

The UK’s most famous expert on hypnotherapy, personal change expert and author Paul McKen-
na introduced similar principles. In his book “Change Your Life in 7 Days” he details his “Movies of
Your Mind” process which suggests closing our eyes to imagine a large cinema or tv screen on
which to project images of the person or circumstances, and then using our imagination to
change how the person or location appears.

· If your belief involves a person, freeze frame the picture so it is still.
· If the image is in colour in it, drain it down to black and white.

· Shrink the image until it’s tiny.
· Move the location of the image so it’s further away.
· Give the person a clown’s nose, pink hair and Mickey Mouse ears
· Imagine the sound of their voice. Then alter it by giving them a deep, sexy voice.
Change it again until they sound like a squeaky little mouse.
If the source of the restricting belief is a person, see that person reduced in size, just as your
dimensions grow. Place the person far away, or locked in a container, or only as a cartoon with a
squeaky voice. If it’s a place, play with size and structure so that its qualities become less than life
-sized.