How to Reprogram Your Subconscious Mind and Achieve Your Wildest Dreams
The theory of psycho-cybernetics and how it can give you an emotional facelift
Pop-quiz: what is the number one factor determining whether most people achieve their goals and live a happy and fulfilling life?
If you’ve answered luck — you are wrong. If you answered money — wrong again. And if you have answered favorable circumstances — guess what? You picked the wrong answer again.
While all of these factors certainly influence your ability to achieve your goals, none of them are the main limiting factor.
Your self-image is.
Yes, how you see yourself determines what you can achieve in life.
This is what Dr. Maxwell Maltz proposed in his book Psycho-Cybernetics, written in 1960. Regarded by many as the forerunner for many famous self-help authors, the book centers around the idea that “[a] human being always acts and feels and performs in accordance with what he imagines to be true about himself and his environment.”
Before he became a best-selling author, Dr. Maltz was a highly respected plastic surgeon — one of the pioneers in this then-new field of surgery.
Through his practice as a plastic surgeon, he noticed that some of his patients changed positively after removing their scars and went on to have a happy and fulfilling life.
Others, however, didn’t change.
They still thought of themselves as ugly and unworthy. This had led Dr. Maltz to believe that everyone has a self-image, a mental model of themselves.
Through further investigations and research, he developed his theory of psycho-cybernetics. You can use it to help you reprogram your subconscious mind and achieve your wildest dreams.
Your success mechanism and how to work with it
“Man is by nature a goal-striving being. And because man is “built that way,” he is not happy unless he is functioning as he was made to function — as a goal-striver. Thus true success and true happiness not only go together but each enhances the other.”
— Maxwell Maltz
The name psycho-cybernetics may seem odd or weird to you. I know it sounded strange to me. However, it makes perfect sense once you understand the theory behind it.
Maxwell Maltz was inspired by the term “cybernetics,” which describes the science of self-correcting mechanisms.
Norbert Wiener first coined the term in 1946, describing the flow of information in systems. He explained how animals and military missiles are goal-seeking mechanisms that can self-correct if they go off course by receiving feedback. If the feedback is clear, they will self-correct until they reach the goal. Dr. Maltz took this idea and applied it to human beings.
According to him, you need to have goals in life if you want to be truly happy and fulfilled. And you can only achieve your goals if you are truly happy.
Dr. Maltz regards the “subconscious mind” as a cybernetic mechanism that goes after any goal you set with your conscious mind. And this mechanism accepts any goal you give it. It does not know the difference between a positive and a negative goal.
Hence, the way you frame your goals and communicate with your cybernetic mechanism is important.
Give it positive goals and keep a positive mental attitude towards your goals. Your cybernetic mechanism will then work towards achieving those goals — Maltz calls this your automatic success mechanism.
The opposite is your automatic failure mechanism, which is switched on when you worry, doubt yourself, and imagine failure.
“Cybernetics has to do with teleology — goal striving, goal-oriented behavior…the brain and nervous system constitute a marvelous and complex “goal-striving mechanism”…which works for you…or against you…depending on how “YOU,” the operator, operate it and the goals you set for it.”
— Maxwell Maltz
You give your cybernetic mechanism feedback through visualization and self-talk, thereby turning it into a success mechanism or a failure mechanism.
Your self-image is of paramount importance for goal achievement. You will only achieve the goals you believe you can achieve.
Get to know your self-image and change it to your advantage
“The self-image sets the boundaries of individual accomplishment. It defines what you can and cannot do. Expand the self-image, and you expand the “area of the possible.”
— Maxwell Maltz
Every one of us has a self-image — a mental model of ourselves. Many people are not aware of their self-image. For most, it has been shaped through other people’s opinions and judgments about ourselves.
The bad news is that your self-image defines what is possible for you.
The good news is that you can reprogram your self-image and change it so that the person you think you are aligns with the goals you want to achieve.
For example, growing up, I thought I was terrible at math. I don’t remember when I started to have terrible math grades. Still, sure enough, my belief “I am bad at math” became a self-fulfilling prophecy. I began to hate math. I didn’t pay attention in class and “forgot” my homework frequently.
As a result, my math grades deteriorated even more, which reinforced my self-image as someone “who is bad at math.”
The funny thing is that I went to study environmental sciences and later pursued a Ph.D. in dendroecology — a field deeply rooted in statistics. And while I had a lot to catch up on, I successfully taught myself math and even came to enjoy working with numbers. So much so, in fact, that I considered beginning a second study program and becoming a mathematician 🤣.
Through learning and achieving success along the way, I slowly reprogrammed my self-image from someone terrible at math to someone who enjoys it.
Dr. Maltz gives a series of tips on how to strengthen your self-image. They vary from exercises to increase your self-esteem to visualization techniques.
Use visualization to reprogram your subconscious
“Experimental and clinical psychologists have proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that the human nervous system cannot tell the difference between an “actual” experience and an experience imagined vividly and in detail.”
— Maxwell Maltz
Imagination is more important than willpower if you want to achieve your goals.
Since your goal achievement is limited by your self-image, you need to have a positive image of yourself. Believe that you are the kind of person who can achieve the goal you set for yourself.
However, if you are holding a negative self-image, you can change it through the power of visualization.
Dr. Maltz describes a technique he calls “theater of the mind.”
You can use it as follows.
First, develop a script for your mental movie with you in the main role. What do you want to see? For example, suppose you want to get over your fear of public speaking and advance in your career as a corporate lawyer.
You would script a movie where you see yourself acting confidently in the courtroom. You see yourself speaking eloquently and with great confidence and calm. Assertive and self-confident, you move through the courtroom. Smiling as you go on to win the case.
Once you have developed your script, close your eyes and imagine everything in vivid detail. See yourself in the exact clothes you’d wear, sense the atmosphere in the room. Most importantly, feel your success.
Watch this mental movie every day. It should take around 10 minutes.
I sometimes played the same movie several times per day to demolish my limiting beliefs.
The process takes time, of course. But stick with it and see yourself differently in your mind’s eye every day. Soon you will act differently in “real” life.
Relaxation is your secret to goal achievement
” Scientific experiments have shown that it is absolutely impossible to feel fear, anger, anxiety, or negative emotions of any kind while the muscles of the body are kept perfectly relaxed.”
— Maxwell Maltz
Relaxation is vital for changing any unwanted behavior or negative beliefs about yourself. Relaxation is also key for letting your internal success mechanism work for you.
Your subconscious mind needs relaxation to work on your goals. When you can relax, you are open to new insights and creativity. You can easily access your intuition.
Stress and worry work against your success mechanism.
Once you stop worrying about the “how” and “when” and focus only on the “what” — the goal you want to achieve, your cybernetic mechanism will work towards achieving your goal.
Many creatives report receiving solutions to their problems after a nap or good night’s sleep. Others experience creative insights on their runs, doing the dishes, or playing with their kids.
When your mind is relaxed, your subconscious goes to work to bring you the answers you need.
Stay in the present moment and take one step at a time. Trust the process and stop worrying about the future or dwelling on past mistakes. Use relaxation strategies throughout the day.
Dr. Maltz describes picturing yourself sitting calmly next to your ringing phone. In your imagination, tell yourself, “I am letting the phone ring.” Feel how you can calmly just sit there and observe your phone ringing.
Then, as you go through your day and are confronted with situations that would make you anxious or upset, say calmly to yourself, “I am letting the phone ring.” Carry that attitude of calm and non-responsiveness with you.
There are various relaxation techniques you can try. If you don’t know where to start, do a quick google search. Experiment and find something that works for you.
Be happy now
“I have found that one of the commonest causes of unhappiness among my patients is that they are attempting to live their lives on the deferred payment plan. They do not live, or enjoy life now, but wait for some future event or occurrence. They will be happy when they get married, when they get a better job, when they get the house paid for, when they get the children through college, when they have completed some task or won some victory. Invariably, they are disappointed.”
— Maxwell Maltz
As stated earlier in this article, goal achievement and happiness go hand in hand.
You can not have one without the other.
Instead of postponing being happy to the future when you have reached a particular goal, strive to be happy now.
Happiness is a state of mind, a habit. While no one can be happy all of the time, many people complain too much, worry too much and forget how blessed they are.
Let go of your limiting beliefs and strive to achieve worthwhile goals. Learn to separate your opinion from facts. Instead of saying “I failed,” look at the situation rationally and list the facts.
Learn from your mistakes and move on.
Look to your future with hope and anticipation. But stay centered in the present and be grateful for what you have now.
As doctor Maltz would say: “Give yourself an emotional facelift.”
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