By Jenetta Haim
Often there are many things in our lives we would like to change but we don't quite knowhow. Basically we are creatures of habit and these habits over a period of time form patterns in our energy, beliefs, thoughts, and emotions and translate as behaviour. If the patterns are more negative than positive then the behaviour in our lives follows suit and we can end up feeling stressed, depressed and not achieving our goals.
This happens to most of us during our lives and it is often handy to learn tools to diffuse these old patterns.
Manifest your goals
It is important to know what we want so as an exercise write down on a piece of paper, right now, four things that you want to happen in your life. Not just 'airy fairy' dreams but solid things you would like to see manifest in your life and life would be so much better if these things happened. I am not talking about winning lotto. I am talking about things you can work towards as a goal to do yourself even if you feel there are obstacles to you achieving your goal. List them 1-4 across the page so the paper is facing landscape view as you are going to put columns across the page.
Now write down what is limiting you. What is holding you back on these four? For these four things to happen what must change NOW? And what is the cost to you if these four things never happen. What will you miss out on if things don't change? You can do this by setting up columns across the page so the answers to these questions are easily seen next to each of the four.
It is important for us to begin to focus on what pain is associated with not changing the things that are limiting us. If it costs us more pain to not change than to change then change becomes necessary and easier.
Now imagine how it would feel if these four things suddenly ‘just happened’ (manifested) in your life. They become a part of your reality. Write down how it would feel for each one of them to happen.
Overcome your limitations
It is important to interrupt the limiting pattern and the way to do this is whenever you automatically go into the repetitive behaviour from the past concerning these four things which led you to believe they were unattainable, do something different.
Program yourself to do something you would not normally do. Catch yourself and act in an unexpected way as soon as the old behaviour kicks in. Run through the scenarios of the limiting pattern in your head. See what you do. How you act. Now change all the colours, clothes, add some humour to it, play it backwards in your head, give people cartoon faces. Never mind so much the analysis or the whys and wherefores. Change the images in your head surrounding the limitations.
Now write down an alternative to the old pattern. What can I do that is new and would make me feel good? Change your behaviour and keep practising this conditioned new behaviour until it becomes a habit. Rehearse it with emotional intensity. See yourself doing it again and again and every time you act out the new behaviour reward yourself.
For example, if you are on a diet every time you give up a desert reward yourself with a magazine you like to read or buy yourself a small gift you have wanted for some time but never bothered to stop and buy. It can be as simple as a magazine or a CD. In this way the new behaviour becomes linked to pleasure.
Take stock of how this new behaviour has a positive effect on your life. It is important to link pleasure to the new pattern and associate pain with the old one. The old pattern however, even though negative, may have had a pay-off in some way for you emotionally and mentally. Check out what this pay-off was and be honest about it.
The negative pay-off
A negative pay-off is one that you get juice out of despite the fact it harms you in some way. It’s the scenario we may have learnt as kids: to maybe whinge until mum gave you the sweets or throw a tantrum in the supermarket for that new toy. We learn this as kids and although we may get a slap sometimes we get what we aimed for so we continue the negative behaviour into adulthood. So the pay-off, despite the fact there is pain associated is that you get your own way. Take a look at what the pay-off is for you and if in fact, there is one.
Keep on the positive side by creating a new pay-off that fits with your values and beliefs and slowly the old negative safety zone will disappear. Imagine the old trigger and make sure that it is leading to new behaviour not the old behaviour.
Keep reprogramming your behaviour diligently until this becomes a habit. If you are conscientious for about a month or six weeks nonstop you will find new habits have begun to form. Realistically that is not a long time if you look at the bigger picture of your life.
It is important that you realise that the decisions you make in your life will shape your actions. Look at what decision you may have made to accept this limiting belief. Now decide to form a new belief about the issue. Look at what it means to you to have this new belief and what you need to do to overcome your old limiting belief.
Take Back Your Power
It is important not to get caught up too much in the speedy flow of life and not be aware of the direction in which you are heading. Take control of your life and decide what you want. It's not up to other people to decide where you will end up. Whilst it’s good and healthy to have feedback and input from others ultimately it is YOU who decides where you want to be. Take back your power to decide NOW! You plan ahead and set a course for your future. What do you want? Where do you want to end up? What do you need to do to get it? How do you need to act?
Next it becomes important to actually take that action.
Wishing and dreaming will not get you there. You must be brave enough to actually take the steps. If at first the action you take doesn't work then try something else. Something different. Don't let things set you back.
Any old belief will become disempowered once you question it as you have brought into it the element of doubt. If you then replace it with a new belief and give this new belief some solidity, a basis with sound intellectual and emotional reasons to carry it out as outlined above, and then it becomes easier for you to succeed.
As a further exercise, write down a list of some empowering beliefs you now have about yourself. Pick the three most important ones and write down HOW these empower you. What do they do for you? Why is it good to have them?
Now write down your disempowering beliefs. Pick the top two of these. Write down how these two beliefs are untrue and look at the person you learnt them from. Were they worth learning? What kind of life did the person you learnt them from have? Did it serve them? Are these beliefs serving you? What are they costing you? What better belief can you replace them with?
In this way over a period of time you can slowly change any belief or limiting behaviour you feel is not serving your best interests.
It is good to do the above in a journal and look back on what you have written from time to time. It’s called a stock take on your life. Just checking in to see the direction in which you are going. Surprisingly if you follow this method you may find in 6 months or so that some of those goals have manifested. What to do? Replace them with 4 more. Do it for a year and your life will be very different by the end of it. Do it for 5 years and you can change your whole life. Do it for a lifetime and who knows what the possibilities could be. Now, that is very empowering and life changing isn't it?
Jenetta Haim runs 'Stressfree Management' at 36 Gipps Road, Greystanes and specialises in developing health and lifestyle programs on either a corporate or personal level to suit your needs. To contact Jenetta email info@stressfreemanagement.com.au or phone (02) 96094881/0414 680 713. For more information check out the website at www.stressfreemanagement.com.au
