Upgrade your internal software by internalising this simple process. . .
How do the things that happen in our lives come about?
Why do we get the results we get?
Our actions and results are a direct consequence of the things that we think about and the decisions we make based on those thoughts.
Is it fate? Is it all set out, pre-planned and whatever happens is beyond our control?
That’s a very lazy belief to hold.
Thinking about things in detail and being prepared to question your own thoughts and decisions, will in turn change the decisions you make, and the outcome you end up with.
If you believe in fate because you find it easier to just let things happen, you will not be consciously in control of your life, your life will control you.
As the famous thought leader and psychologist wisely stated
“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate”
That means, unless you are willing to delve into your mind to figure out why you make decisions a certain way, you may as well just call it fate and let your life happen to you.
So why is our brain programmed to do the things we do without thinking, and why isn’t it programmed to do the things that we really want it to do?
Why are other people’s brains programmed to do the different things they do? Why does it seem so easy for other people to get the success that we really want for ourselves?
It’s not because they are more privileged than us, it’s because they think differently.
We have been subconsciously programmed by our experiences and environment to make certain decisions without thinking.
Were we born with this software installed?
No. Our software is made up using the following framework.
Our results are created by our decisions, actions & behaviours.
Our decisions are controlled by our thoughts.
Our thoughts are directly influenced by the way we feel, and our emotions.
Our emotions are triggered by the beliefs we hold.
Our beliefs are based on our personal values.
Our personal values are the truths we hold and the moral compass that we all have internally that indicates what’s most important to us.
So what does Rewired mean?
It’s about taking what you believe, examining it, making a decision of whether it serves you or not, and then making changes accordingly.
“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate”
Re-programming your software otherwise known as your belief system.
In order to do that, you have to be prepared to dig into your subconscious mind and find the beliefs that are holding you back from what it is that you truly desire.
Your mind will hold 2 types of beliefs. . . Limiting beliefs, and Empowering beliefs.
Each type of belief will be the driver that determines your feelings about a situation or opportunity.
Follow the framework above to see how your beliefs control your feelings, that influence your thoughts and then your decisions.
The key to your personal and business success is not about knowledge, a top-level education, being born into a financially privileged environment, or having a high IQ.
It’s all about awareness.
More importantly, self-awareness.
You can’t manage and improve something you’re not aware of.
So being aware of your own beliefs is the logical place to start if we are going to rewire our minds and install better software in our minds to change our results.
The purpose of this article, is to help you become a conscious architect of your personal and professional life, rather than the unconscious passenger.
Taking Control of Your Mind
A mind that is stretched by a new experience, never goes back to its old dimensions – Oliver Wendell Holmes.
Once we have learned something, especially something ground breaking, our minds are bigger, we are more informed, more intelligent, our knowledge has grown and we are more than we were before.
We have more awareness.
In order to become the conscious architect of your own results, you’re going to need to be disciplined, and hungry for the success you’re aspiring to achieve.
During this process, keep your mind resilient to the negative self-talk that might creep in, telling you that this is a load of rubbish, this is the “self-saboteur” at work.
The Self Saboteur is your belief system, and it’s talking to you, and it’s going to do it’s best to protect and shield you from danger (in the form of growth).
The Self Saboteur wants to keep you safe.
It wants to keep you in a place where nothing changes, no risks are taken, and no growth takes place.
Everything stays the same. Nice and safe………Unless what you really want are improved results!
Also remain resilient to the influence of your environment and social network.
Your family, friends and work colleagues, are probably not going to understand this unless they too have opened up their minds to the infinite potential available to them and made conscious efforts to figure out their own software and how they can upgrade it.
That’s not to say you have to go and dump all your mates, but just be aware that they probably won’t get it, and they’ll dismiss it because of that reason.
They want you to stay the same too.
Your growth and expansion is going to hold up a mirror to them and remind them that they are not growing. They will be fearful that you are moving away from them, and their belief system will do it’s best to dissuade you from following the path towards your own growth.
This is your journey, your success, unless you’re sure they’ll get it, beware they don’t put you off even trying.
So, let’s start by looking at a simple diagram that shows us exactly how we generate our results and grow.
So, it all begins with your personal values. What do you stand for?
Values are what makes you tick, and equally what turns you off.
Being aware of what your values are also plays a large part in getting clarity on your beliefs.
Typical values of entrepreneurs like us would be integrity, hard work, achievement, commitment.
These will usually be driven by our desire to provide for our family so values such as love, contribution, connectedness and family will also be present.
Having a life that’s consciously structured around your values, often isn’t a natural event for most people.
Most of us aren’t even aware that we have values, so knowing what they are isn’t even a question we ask ourselves.
So, to be totally consciously aware of your values, and to purposely create a life based on them, can be an effort, it’s not likely to be a natural habit.
To plan and build your life around your values, will be the closest you will ever get to intentional living.
A value is a measure of the worth or importance we attach to something.
Values are inherent and rarely change. They are our cultural operating system. A set of internal principles, our moral compass.
Values define “how” we act rather than “what” to do.
Values are “who” we are.
Values are our own personal “knowing” radar.
Our values influence what we believe, which directs our thoughts and feelings to create our decision-making function.
Outside Influences
Societal beliefs can often create mass mindsets of scarcity and fear which lead to disempowering behaviours that stifle growth.
Phrases like, ‘money doesn’t grow on trees’ is possibly the worst limiting belief that many of us hold after hearing it said so many times while growing up.
This belief can keep someone firmly in the working classes forever, because they’ve seen their parents and the rest of their family and social network do the same, while repeating phrases like that consistently.
We’re also quite often negatively influenced in this time of fake news, pessimism and media propaganda.
If you see it on the news, it must be accurate……right?
We also believe what we inherently “know” to be wrong or right and make a subconscious decision that this is our truth.
Our beliefs play a huge part on the way we think, and our thoughts are created based on the belief that we hold.
Consider the well repeated timeless quote, “What you think about, you become”, used by The Buddha and many thought leaders since
If you’re thinking poor thoughts, guess what you’re going to attract?
If you’re thinking successful thoughts, you will attract more success.
Knowing that your belief system is driving what you think is a very good reason to examine your own belief system, and take a conscious view on whether it is full of beliefs that serve you, or limiting influences that have been impressed on you by your parents, friends, family, education, the media and society as a whole.
How To Implement A Change In Your Belief System
Challenge everything you hold as true in a scientific approach.
Scientists will approach any experiment or truth with the intention of trying to prove it wrong or right.
Don’t make assumptions based on what you hope, be brutal about what you choose to believe because it’s the part of the engine that’s driving your end results.
Your beliefs and your thoughts are all subconscious-mind functions.
This means that these two functions are operating without you having to consciously think or instruct anything to happen.
So, what is the subconscious-mind?
It’s commonly accepted by scientists, psychologists, thought leaders, gurus, and the most revered teachers of the past, that our mind is based on 2 core parts.
The conscious mind – the part that does your thinking, the part that plans, dreams, builds strategies and analyses.
Your conscious mind is reported to be able to process between 40 and 135 bits of information per second.
So, what exactly does your conscious mind do?
It runs your will power, analysis, planning and your conscious decision making.
The subconscious mind is the powerhouse in the background that does all of your automation.
It makes subconscious decisions which power the majority of your actions.
The Power of The Subconscious Mind
Imagine having to consciously think about how to walk, drive or open a door every time you perform one of these actions?
Your subconscious mind learned how to do all those tasks when you repeatedly impressed the process onto it.
Now you don’t need to think when you approach a door, your arm automatically lifts and turns the handle.
In the same way, the subconscious mind will act on previous actions you consciously decided to take, to save you the time and pain of having to consciously figure out how to find your way home or find things in your house.
Those physical actions are less than 1% of what your subconscious mind actually does for you every day.
It also beats your heart, inflates and deflates your lungs and heals your body.
The subconscious mind processes an amazing estimated 2,000,000 bits per second and is reckoned to be 30,000 times more powerful than your conscious mind.
Your subconscious mind will not make any decisions that steer you toward your goals unless you program it to do so.
It will habitually repeat previous actions – RE – ACTIONS – Actions repeated.
Your subconscious mind steers your beliefs, imagination, intuition, emotions, and habits, amongst quite a few other functions.
Imagine what you could achieve if you could get the power of your subconscious mind working on your behalf taking action towards your goals and your vision, based on the new upgraded beliefs that you’re going to imprint on it.
The Conscious Mind
So, with a head full of false beliefs working away to ruin your plans of world domination, guess what kind of thoughts you’re going to think.
I’m not clever enough to achieve that
I can’t afford that
I’ll never be able to do that
She would never be interested in me
I’m not destined for anything special
I haven’t got time
It’s fate
There’s nothing I can do about it
What’s the point?
Based on what you believe, and what you’ve been thinking about because of those beliefs, is going to drive the way you feel about things.
If an event that aligns with your values and beliefs takes place, you’re going to feel good.
If it clashes with a value or belief, you’re going to feel uncomfortable, angry, sad or fearful.
These feelings and emotions are the gateway into the physical manifestation of what shows up in your life.
You’re now going to start to make more conscious-mind based decisions now based on your feelings.
This is where the subconscious mind and the conscious mind meet.
Perhaps the last main function of the subconscious mind is to form your attitude based on your beliefs, thoughts and feelings.
Your worldview is stored here.
The way you sub-consciously decide how things are, will determine how you consciously decide what to do next.
Your decisions, actions and behaviours will be directly influenced by your attitude or worldview.
What we do through the way we behave and the actions we take will have a direct bearing on what we get in terms of results.
But then what?
Your existing results are there to be examined again.
There’s no such thing as a bad result, just an opportunity to learn and change what you believe to serve you better next time round the cycle.
So, your results complete the cycle, and at this point it’s essential to really look at the results you got.
Use that information to feed back into your beliefs and make a decision if the belief that drove the whole process created a result that served you, or not…
This is an essential part of the cycle; without it this happens:
Without modifying your beliefs, the cycle repeats itself.
And what if you started right back at the beginning of that cycle with a bunch of limiting beliefs that you had carried since childhood?
Money doesn’t grow on trees
Only the rich succeed in this life
He’s loaded, he must be a crook
I don’t ever get any luck
I’ll never be slim
It’s just fate, I can’t control it
I’m not as clever as my brother
You go through the whole cycle again, reacting, on autopilot, doing the same thing.
But this time your attitude takes a hit.
You start to become frustrated because you can sense nothing is changing or improving.
It’s no surprise when the results are the same at best, most likely a bit worse.
Take responsibility.
Examine your limiting beliefs, then make a conscious decision to replace them with an empowering belief.
Programme your subconscious mind, consciously.
If you want to understand exactly how much your subconscious mind does, try a little experiment.
Spend a day using your weaker hand to do all of your physical duties except writing.
Opening doors, making coffee, buttoning up your shirt.
Next edition we will be looking at the cycle in more detail and explaining how to guard your mind from negative influences.
