How to Believe in Yourself
What would you do if you BELIEVED in yourself?
Quit your soul destroying job and start your dream business? Travel the world? Ask that cute guy out? Live the life you REALLY want to live?
So what is really stopping you? Not enough money? Not enough support? Not considered “proper” by society? Or any one of a zillion other reasons…
The truth is that the only thing stopping you from doing the things you really want to do is YOU!
Both our conscious and subconscious minds are wonderful and powerful tools! However, sometimes, they are also our greatest enemies! From the day you were born you started to collect beliefs about your world that you live in. Some of these beliefs are good for you… not to mention they keep you safe! But some of them are outdated and limiting and even self-sabotaging.
Some of these beliefs occurred as a result of what you learned by experience and some of these beliefs are thoughts that were instilled by your parents when you were a child. And some of these beliefs are standard society beliefs… some of which are useful and some that aren’t.
So what makes a belief limiting?
A limiting belief is one that is stopping you from living the life you really want to live. It is the belief that you won’t succeed if you try to start your own business or that the cute guy won’t go out with you. Basically, it is a belief that whilst essentially protecting you from being hurt, is actually sabotaging you from living your best life.
The most common limiting beliefs that most of us have held at some point in our lives are variations of the following:
No-one would like the REAL me
Love hurts so it is better not to fall in love
I don’t deserve it
Other people will hurt me
I’m not good enough
I don’t need to be successful so I am not going to try to be successful
It’s too late to change
Making money is hard
I’m not important
So how do you change a limiting belief that is sabotaging your happiness?
Identify your limiting beliefs
What are the common themes that are running in your life? The list above contains just some of the limiting beliefs that people pick up somewhere along the line - usually during their childhood.
Think about an area of your life that you want to change. On a piece of paper, write a list of all of the limiting beliefs around that issue that pop into your mind. For example, I would really like to fall in love. What negative self-talk jumps into your brain?
No-one will love me.
Good looking guys/girls are untrustworthy.
I would have to sacrifice who I really am.
I don’t deserve to be loved
You will probably be surprised by the beliefs that you didn’t realise that you even held appearing on your list but you will know by your own emotional reaction that it is in fact a belief that you have been holding on to. And now that you have been brave enough to identify them, you can consciously change them.
Challenge your limiting beliefs
Have a look at your list of limiting beliefs and think back to instances in your life that actually refute your belief. For example, “No-one will love me.” Well, is that actually true? It is more likely to be the case that you are currently loved by several people – friends, family, etc. In fact, it is also more than likely that you have been loved in a romantic relationship in the past. It may not have lasted (well obviously…) but that doesn’t mean that at some time that person did find you to be the most interesting and lovable person on the planet. But even though something happened to end the relationship, as a result you learnt valuable lessons about yourself and about relationships. But the bottom line here is that someone DID love you! So… it is only logical that if it has actually happened before, then there is no reason why you can’t be loved in a romantic relationship in the future!
So… write down the belief that you want to work with and then write down the reasons that this belief is untrue.
For example:-
I don’t deserve to be loved. Well... why not? What exactly have I actually done that is so terrible that I don’t deserve to be loved? I am loved by friends and family already. Whose job is it to say who is worthy of love or not?
The whole point of this step is to highlight how unrealistic the belief actually is.
How has this belief sabotaged me?
Write down all of the times that the limiting beliefs have negatively impacted your life. Could you already be in your dream job if you didn’t hold the limiting belief of “I’m not good enough”?
Take a moment to feel the emotions surrounding the impact this belief had on your life in the past. Think “How has this belief hurt me in the past?”
What emotions are you feeling? Embarrassment? Fear? Sadness? Anger? Really feeling into the experience. See the situation, hear what is going on. Feel how it made you feel. Experience that time as if it is happening right now.
Identify the Source
Once you are feeling the experience, consciously ask your subconscious to take you back to the first time that belief came into your life. Trust the very first memory that jumps into your mind.
For example, I had a limiting belief that only unattractive people could be truly world-changingly successful. This belief came from observing the likes of Bill Gates or Richard Branson. My belief stemmed from an epiphany that because they weren’t popular in high school, people like Bill and Richard focused on intellectual pursuits rather than partying and girls and therefore became more successful in life. As a result, I put on a lot of weight and became “unattractive”. And I wondered for many years why I couldn’t lose weight… sigh… Our crazy brains!!!
Big Picture Perspective
Once you have identified the source of your limiting memory, view it from the perspective of the person you are now. See how you misunderstood what was really going on at that time. In my case, I realised that there were plenty of attractive people who were just as successful in life! Once I acknowledged how limiting my belief was, I was able to transform it into an empowering belief. In my case, my new belief is “I am worthy of success”. Simple as that!
The most important thing to remember is that our beliefs are a product of our interpretations of the world around us. They are not necessarily absolute and need to be reviewed regularly so that we can be sure that we really are living our best life!
Click here for a tool that can help you identify your limiting beliefs.
If you are having trouble shifting a belief that you now know is really not doing you any good, hypnotherapy is a wonderfully relaxing way to help. Hypnosis is a state of mind that you experience naturally every day – daydreaming is actually one form of self-hypnosis. Hypnotherapy can be used to access deep into your subconscious mind in order to “reprogram” your thoughts and beliefs so that they become more aligned with the way you want to be in your life.
If you would like help identifying and then changing the limiting beliefs that are sabotaging your life, please do not hesitate to contact me for an appointment.
