Personal Development|Stress Resilience|Emotional Health|Mindfulness Moment
Surprising, Hidden Reasons Why You Stay Stuck
Your past matters more than you may realize
You know you really want to make a change in your life, but no matter what you try, you’re still just stressed out, exhausted and stuck.
Maybe you find yourself unable to decide on what it is exactly that you want.
On the other hand, maybe you really do know what you’d like to change, but no matter how much you think about it, talk about it, make a plan to execute it, it always remains out of reach.
Maybe you’ve become aware of self-sabotage which leaves you feeling completely frustrated, disgusted and hopeless.
Perhaps you have tried saying positive affirmations before, but they didn’t seem to work. Maybe you even experienced negative emotions while saying them.
A lot of people I’ve talked to have reported feeling uneasy, stupid, or even fraudulent while trying to say something positive about themselves. Feeling worse or silly usually has us abandoning the positive affirmation route.
If you’ve had any of these experiences, just know that you are not alone.
There’s a really good reason you’re stuck here:
Not all parts of you are on the same page. Part of you wants the change. Part of you REALLY doesn’t.
…wait WHAT.
There is more and more information being published about our brains, our emotions and how our life experiences shape our lives. Our perspective is based on what we’ve been taught, what we inherit through DNA and epigenetics, and what we’ve experienced.
We are constantly making choices about what to believe based on the stimuli we receive. We’ve been making decisions about our self, our relationships, money, work, faith, you name it, for as long as we’ve been alive.
These attitudes and decisions make up our Belief System and while we don’t consciously remember all of these beliefs, our brain works to keep us in line with them, no matter how outdated or young we were when we adopted them.
Our brain endeavors to follow all of the “Rules” we’ve set up for ourselves as a result.
Here’s a simple scenario that someone I know had to work through. Try putting yourself into this situation and see what sparks for you.
Let’s say that the first time you walked to school by yourself in kindergarten you got lost.
While you are desperately trying to figure out where you went wrong, you are also having an emotional response. Fear, anger, embarrassment might all be a part of the mix…
You’re mad at Mom for not being with you. You are feeling stupid because this looked so easy last time you walked the route with her.
And then there’s the internal dialogue. Oh no, what if someone sees me looking stupid? What happens if I’m late? What happens if I can’t find my way to school or get back home?? These thoughts and feelings can be quite intense.
Now, eventually you do find your way and you do calm down, but the beliefs you stacked up about yourself, your mother and even those unseen “others”, did not disappear.
The many thoughts you have had ingrained themselves with the help of those intense emotions. They have become beliefs of how life is going to be for you.
For the person who experienced this scenario, some of these beliefs included:
Nobody helps me.
I always mess up the first time.
I always have to do things by myself.
I mess it up if I am left to do it by myself.
I’m not good at directions.
Everybody else is smarter than me.
…And the list goes On!
Amazing how an experience at 5 years old turned into a defining life pattern many years later!
We all have had experiences that caused an extreme emotional response. Even though we forget about them, our subconscious did not. We form beliefs around these events to help us make sense out of our lives.
Our belief wants to be proven true.
Those emotions want to feel validated, and therefore the brain is constantly looking for those moments to prove us right-and cement the belief by repeating the pattern.
Think about how much evidence you can bring up to prove how bad “________” is in your life. Or maybe you have a friend or relative who is always rehashing past grievances and there’s no way to break them out of their evidence loop. Yep, we’ve all been there.
Of course, it’s great when our beliefs help us thrive in life, but we all know those aren’t the only ones we have.
The problem arises when we want something in our life to change. Often what keeps us from accomplishing our goal is that original belief pattern, which is operating contrary to what we want.
That’s when we find ourselves stuck- when we realize we are between what we want and what we believe deep down must be our Truth.
These are the arguments that we must solve in order to gain peace and make the changes we want in our lives.
Helping our brain update the thinking, and the resulting belief, helps our system- the conscious and subconscious mind- get “on the same page”. Now we can execute a plan because the argument/fear/negative emotion/protectiveness has been addressed and cleared. Seeing and resolving the conflicts within yourself may just give you the traction you have been seeking.
Mindfulness Moment: Anytime you find yourself stuck between what you currently have and what you want as the end result:
- Slow down
- Ask yourself what is the emotion and the belief holding you back
- Listen for the answers
Can I send you something?
Would you like a DIY tool to help you decode and navigate your hidden belief systems? I’d love to send you my Block Buster Blueprint. It’s a great tool that can help you discover those pesky beliefs lurking out of sight that keep you feeling stuck, stressed out, and sabotaged!
Peggy Nazer is a Certified Coach in Emotional Release, Energy Psychology, Stress Resilience/Resolve and High Performance. She has been a life coach and teacher for 17 years, specializing in emotional health, stress resilience, and building healthy relationships to help people accomplish their personal transformation goals. She uses a combination of techniques including mindfulness, emotional release, energy psychology, stress resilience mastery and success habits in both private and group session settings. She created Success Dynamics Academy to help clients identify and effectively manage their mental and emotional perspectives that create conflict and stop progress pertaining to their personal and professional goals. Find out more at: peggynazer.com
