Limiting Beliefs

How Limiting Beliefs may play against you.

At one point we have probably heard about Limiting Beliefs, but what are they and how do they affect our lives? In this article, we’ll take a look into this and much more such as what you can do about it. The first step is to understand what Limiting Beliefs are, and where they come from, and how to find them in your own life. Once we know where they are and how much they affect us, we can choose to do something about it. Let\’s look into the details. First off, what does Limiting mean? The short answer is \”something that limits our life\”. Very smart, ah? More times than not we may have decided to do something and for some reason or another, without even noticing, we fall into old habits, and our decision to change for the better simply vanishes.

We all have heard that New Year\’s resolutions are not very reliable, to say the least. Despite what many people think, it is not due to a lack of determination or willpower. It is because a decision such as a New Year\’s resolution is a rational decision that lives in the conscious while our habits and values live in the subconscious. As I covered in other articles, the conscious accounts for a maximum of 10% of the brainpower, while the subconscious keeps the rest. So imagine making a decision with 10% of your mind while the other 90% is against this decision. Inevitably, it is just a matter of time before old habits take over leaving willpower useless. However, we can overcome this!

Now that we understand why every decision to change olds habits seems to be an uphill battle, we can look into how to better our odds of achieving change. The main idea behind this is to align what we want with the new belief and have the other 90% of the brain help us to achieve this. This is not about habits vs. goals, but the truth is that the conscious is responsible for some functions such as short term memory, goals, rationale while the subconscious takes care of functions such as long term memory, values, and beliefs (including all our innate functions that keep us alive like breathing, maintaining a heartbeat, digestion, transpiration, and many others). So now we know where beliefs are stored and that the limit factor is when they are not aligned with our goals, but what are they?

Beliefs are like a map that helps us navigate life. Alfred Korzybski, a scientist, and philosopher, said at the beginning of the 20th century that the map is not the territory. To be a bit more straightforward, \”Beliefs are not facts\”. We go through life with a map in our hands thinking that most of our situation is composed of facts; but this is not the territory, it is simply the map. We program our beliefs based on our experiences and the people around us, but some are so deeply engraved in our brain that we consider them a part of life. But the truth is, these guiding principles are just beliefs that can be reprogrammed any time to reshape our life or our territory if you will.

For example, imagine a child that grew up hearing that money doesn\’t grow on trees and we have to work hard to earn a living (this is just an example and it is not meant to shame anyone’s upbringing; everybody did the best they could and loved the child and did what thought was best for the child to the best of their ability). Now, since the child heard that repeatedly he/she was likely programmed to believe that money is hard to get and working hard is the only way to provide for one’s family. Does this apply to everyone and everything? While we will not go into further detail at the moment, I urge you to continue reading to better understand the concept. 

Beliefs are like the example given above and it is easy to see why they are limiting, but the great news is that one can change them. In conclusion, beliefs are not facts. Rather, they are ideas that were programmed onto us that sometimes limit us by contradicting our goals. Although they come from very different influences, we can do something about it. The Life Unblocking method is just one way to reprogram your subconscious quickly and efficiently. In a nutshell, we explain what Limiting Beliefs are and what to do about them. Refer to other articles in our blog to learn more about the subconscious, life in autopilot, the Life Unblocking method, and much more! See you soon. I wish you a day filled with love and light!!