Be Who You Want To Be September 10, 2013
Posted by nrhatch in Health & Wellness, Mindfulness, Nature, People.comments closed
Who you are now is:
A. The product of a lifetime of choices you’ve made.
B. A habit, not a foregone conclusion.
C. A manifestation of unconscious implicit memories.
D. All of the above.
The answer is D ~ “All of the above.”
Who you are now is a collection of unconscious implicit memories developed over time as the result of choices you made and repeated so often that they became hard-wired habits.
If “who you are now is who you want to be,” take the day off to play while the rest of us roll up our sleeves to examine the roles we’ve been playing.
You can’t just tell yourself to stop.
No matter how tired you’ve become of being depressed, angry, anxious, impatient, or [insert other self-defeating behavior, emotion, or belief here], you can’t just tell yourself to stop.
You’ve already tried that and it didn’t work.
As soon as your conscious intention to “stop doing that!” slipped from the forefront of your thoughts . . . old habits crept back into the drivers seat.
Creating the intention to lose weight, write a novel, or laugh more often is not enough to create lasting change because your old wiring is still in place.
Don’t look now, but your old wiring is still firing.
If you erase a document from your hard-drive, it’s still there . . . lurking in the shadows . . . like a bad habit that won’t go away.
Instead of erasing an unwanted document, try replacing it. Character by character. Or, in the case of unwanted habits, character trait by character trait.
To change, you MUST believe change is possible.
To make any headway, you MUST view yourself as a “work in progress,” not as a “done deal.” If you don’t believe you can change, you can’t. It’s that simple.
Your stubborn unwillingness to entertain the possibility of change will stall you in your tracks before you’ve built up any steam.
The confining nature of your belief is the perfect example of a self-fulfilling prophecy.
You need a map to get from HERE to THERE.
Just as kitchens and baths can be remodeled, you can change “who you are” by re-wiring your brain.
The process starts like any remodeling project ~ with a set of blueprints that clearly depicts “who you want to be.”
Once you have a clear vision in mind, it’s a simple matter of knocking down walls (i.e., eliminating habits) that are not consistent with the more functional design you have visualized.
It’s OK to work backwards.
When visualizing your road map, it’s OK to work backwards, like Michelangelo did before carving David:
* Visualize who you want to be.
* Chisel away everything that doesn’t conform to that vision.
That’s it! You’ve created a virtual masterpiece!
Aah . . . that’s better!
Tomorrow ~> Creating Self-Sustaining Change
* * * * *
Our brain, which controls virtually every aspect of our lives, is as amazing a piece of equipment as you are ever likely to encounter.
Reading this post is akin to reading the Cliff Notes for a beloved classic ~ you’ll get the gist of the plot-line and learn about a few of the major characters, but many delightful nuances and well-turned phrases are missing.
To learn more about our miraculous bundle of synaptic intelligence, consider reading Evolve Your Brain ~ The Science of Changing Your Mind, by Joe Dispenza.
Changing your mind will change your life.
Quote to Ponder: We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an action, but a habit. ~ Aristotle
Spirit Lights The Way 