Why You Need to Break Open Your Beliefs
"For some of our most important beliefs, we have no evidence at all, except that people we love and trust hold these beliefs. Considering how little we know, the confidence we have in our beliefs is preposterous—and it is also essential." ~ Daniel Kahneman ~
Celebrating a birthday over dinner the other night, two of us were reminiscing over bad birthday memories. We had each experienced ‘being dumped’ on our birthdays. Hers by text, mine by phone - long before texting was even a thing.It was my sixteenth birthday, a pajama party with my BFF’s of the time. I date myself again… the pain has faded, the memory vividly clear. The radio plays ‘It’s my party and I’ll cry if I want to’ - the announcer wishing me a happy birthday, just moments after the fateful call.Add a few more bad experiences around your birthday and BAM! “Everything goes wrong on my birthday”... belief formed and ingrained over time as we look for evidence to prove it true.Beliefs can be harmful, even destructive when taken for fact and left unchallenged. We need not look far in past or recent times to find truth in the good and the evil beliefs can emanate.Beliefs become our truths. We make decisions, behave and show up in alignment with these truths. Sometimes consciously and sometimes not. Beliefs left buried can keep us stuck, mired in inertia, unable to move forward.
How can you break open your beliefs?
There’s a story of Buddha being asked about the existence of God by 3 villagers, his answers different to each. When questioned by his attendant Ananda, Buddha advises ‘that which is not experienced is borrowed’ and “...all beliefs are barriers to knowing the truth”. He further surmises that a belief unbroken means never searching for truth and only accepting a belief as truth.Not all beliefs are as existential as one’s faith in God. The power they hold depends on our ability - our willingness to see them as they are. Not truth until we’ve experienced for ourselves and removed barriers keeping us from the truth. Searching for truth in our beliefs is not easy, ‘nothing worth doing is’… did you notice me slip that one in?
Are your beliefs holding you back?
Limiting beliefs are deeply ingrained in us, taking root in childhood and across life experiences. When we are able to discover our limiting beliefs - what they are and how they show up - we are poised to overcome them and experience limitless truths.
You can’t always get what you want
Is it just coincidence it’s also a famous song title? Fair enough, more famous perhaps than my earlier reference. It seems to ring a little true even for Mick Jagger. But is it?
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Money doesn’t grow on trees
Depending on what side of the tracks you come from, this may be deeply embedded in your belief system. One can certainly argue it to be true although there is such a thing as a money tree.
Never let them see you sweat (cry)
When I experienced for myself the ‘truth’ - trusting to let others see me cry. Courage replaced my fear, joy came through my tears… I found a new truth.
Rules are made to be broken
Somewhere deep in my past, generations beyond… slowly ingrained through trial and error. What I know is it has mostly served me well in life and career. I think I’ll hold on to this one.
"If you follow the rules, it will lead you where others want you to reach. If you break the rules, you will reach your own created destiny." ~ unknown ~
In my own search for truth many beliefs are revealed. Ones that serve me well, some mostly and others not so much. Of late, I’ve unburied a doozy. It caught me in the solar plexus, took the wind out of my sails… and then put it back in. It can happen when you don’t leave a belief unbroken.
I can’t be successful and loved at the same time.
Clarity comes with peeling back the layers. Where at first I am perplexed, the ‘proof’ slowly emerges. A conversation with my mom regaling my fishing prowess over the man I am dating. “How do you expect to get a man if you show him up?”Funny thing is, at the time it sounded ridiculous to me. Not so ridiculous when I look for further ‘proof’. My first marriage ended at a time of great career success, for me more than him. My second marriage - remember the fishing story?None of these are facts, but they are (were) my truths - until I break the belief ‘Outshining him, makes me unlovable’. There’s work to be done, it's still relatively fresh. My remedy… create a new truth - ‘I am surrounded by love, always’. I’m off and running.What beliefs have become your truths and need to be broken? Ask yourself, where does this belief come from? What evidence proves it to be true? Now! You are ready to break the belief, undo the truths you have borrowed and create new ones.If you’re open to sharing your own experience, I invite you to do so with me here. Hi, I’m Donna. I’m deeply passionate about helping you achieve more than you imagine possible; to overcome limiting beliefs and creating practices aligned with who you are so you may live an extraordinary life. I invite you to explore and discover how extraordinary life can be in your 45-minute no-obligation ‘Discovery Call‘.Full transparency… I do not collect affiliate income from any of the links provided — I share them with you solely as resources you might enjoy, learn from and grow or completely ignore.