Limiting Beliefs: Investigating Your Goal—Is There A Downside To Your Desire?
PART ONE
“Okay, so I’ve done all the work, the statements, visualizing, meditating, focusing, I’m feeling positive most of the time, I feel like I’ve been doing this for years! But I still don’t have the thing I really want – why???”
This is yet another article on limiting beliefs. We put so much focus on this topic because it is the answer to the above question. Most of us will encounter this situation at one time or another in the process of conscious creation. Our limiting beliefs can interfere with the most dedicated attention and can derail us in the process of creating the life that we want.
This article details a process created by Frank Smith for getting at the nature of those limiting factors, and turning them around. There are several steps involved and they are all important, so this will be a detailed article with an actual example of someone going through the process, so you can see exactly how to apply it in your life.
Many of the books and programs that show you how to create what you want have you start with what you don’t want, as a springboard to pinpointing what you do want. This is a valid way to approach creating, but in this process let’s turn it around and start differently.
Step One: What Do You Want?
First, ask yourself, what do I want? This can be anything from a good relationship to a solution, to a health problem, to a new car, to a way to express your creativity. You can apply this process to the material things on your list, like cars and houses, but also to the less “tangible” things like health or relationships.
In our example, the person’s desire was wealth.
I have enough money to live comfortably, but I work hard for it. I’ve been trying to create abundance for a long time, but although things are better than they were, I’m not there by a long shot.
Step Two: What Is The Downside To Having That?
If you haven’t already manifested your desire, this indicates that there are aspects or elements of your desire that you really don’t want, that you fear, or that you have reservations about. We know this because if you didn’t have some reservations, then you would simply have what you want. If all of you were committed and focusing on having this, you would have it. So just by the fact that you don’t have it, we know that there is some limiting belief, hesitation, negative programming or something else that needs to be addressed. This isn’t going to be about blame, guilt, or dredging up your childhood, so you can relax about that! Addressing this is a fairly easy process.
So, you need to ask the question, “What is it about your desire that you anticipate will not be to your liking?” Let yourself really go into this, and see what it is that’s the real or perceived downside to obtaining your desire. Here are some examples:
If I get healthy, I’ll have to go back to working two jobs. If I find a relationship, I’ll lose my independence. If I make my business a success, my friends will be jealous and I’ll lose my social group. If I owned lots of real estate I’d have to do a lot of paperwork, and I hate paperwork.
These are single downsides to give you an idea of where we’re going; when you do this you’ll want to list all of them that you can think of. There might only be one or two, or there might be quite a list.
In our real life example, this is what the person came up with:
- Rich people are wasteful and that waste hurts the environment; I’d be tempted to be like this.
- I’m a person who deals with material things—houses, cars, fixing or repairing things or building them. If I could hire out for all this, who would I be? What would I do?
- I’d have enough money to go on vacations and I’d have to fly on commercial airlines. (This isn’t fear of flying, but dislike of the whole airport/crowds/security thing, and the discomfort of flights surrounded by movies I don’t like and screaming babies.)
- I’d be vulnerable to identity theft and fraud; rich people are bigger targets.
- There might be a controversy among my friends and family if I didn’t help them the way they thought I should.
Step Three: How Can I Eliminate, Neutralize or Handle That Downside?
By thinking about this, you can begin to get some understanding of why you haven’t created what you desire. You can see in our example all the reasons why this person hasn’t created lots of money—no wonder! It’s totally clear what’s going on. But there is one more thing that comes clear from doing this, and it is that the reason you have for putting these limits on yourself is a benign one. In fact it’s a protective one. If you look at our example you can see this clearly. It is part of this person’s process to protect himself from harm: identity theft, family conflict, inflicting environmental damage, the discomfort of commercial air travel. The “brakes” that we put on our creativity are about protection.
Realizing this is a great relief. We no longer feel like we are fighting against ourselves, that there is some perverse part of us that doesn’t want us to have what we so earnestly desire. In fact, the opposite is true. Our entire process is about keeping ourselves as safe as possible. The only problem is that this protection can come from false ideas and be applied in too limiting a way. Once we see what’s going on and where our attention needs to go, we can begin to address the problem.
So what’s the solution?
Begin by brainstorming ways that you can turn those negatives around, deal with them in advance, ensure that you are protected in other, more positive ways, or otherwise “neutralize” them. You want to ask yourself the question, “How can I make sure that this (negative aspect) doesn’t happen?”
Depending on what they are, some of these can be definitively eliminated (if your limitation is something like, “If I get healthy, I’ll have to do whatever anyone wants me to”, that negative aspect can be totally avoided); some of them “go with the territory” (if you want to be a real estate mogul, but never want to deal with any paperwork or the IRS, you probably can’t accomplish that one totally, though it can certainly be addressed in many ways). Whatever the downside is, the solution is to solve it ahead of time, so that its power is gone, you can release your energy from this protective maneuver, and you can enlist more of that energy in the creative process.
Here’s how our actual case study went with this step. The following comments are his responses to the 5 perceived undesirable aspects of his goal of being wealthy:
- There’s no reason why I HAVE to be wasteful, just because I could afford to. I know what my priorities are and I can be just as conscientious as I am now. In fact, I could do a lot of good if I had more money.
- This fits in with #1, actually, because if I were rich I could build proto-type “green” buildings and 100mpg vehicles, as an example of what could be done. I’d be able to be MORE of who I am if I didn’t have to work all the time!
- If I were really rich I could charter a plane. I could buy a camper and drive anywhere within the US. I could take a cruise ship overseas. I wouldn’t have to fly commercial if I didn’t want to. I could go first class.
- “This one was harder; first thought was, hire a financial manager but then the thought was, ‘What if s/he is dishonest?’ I kept going further into the problem instead of getting a solution; then I came to this…I already know lots of rich people that we trust and that are good friends; I could ask them what they do. This one let me really feel how this process works. As soon as I thought of this, I felt an energetic ‘letting go’ that seemed to mean the problem had been addressed in a real way.”
- “I could just figure out how much money I had to give away, divide it by how many people I had to give to, and give each one that much. Or I could give without telling other people about it; many of my friends that I’d give money to don’t even know each other or my family, so it would be anonymous that way. I don’t need to ‘get credit’ so there’d be no reason to tell anyone. And this would be like a divorce—you figure out who your friends really are. This can be a little painful, but is good information.”
Step Four: Rephrase Your Desire To Include The Solution.
Once you do this process and find these ways to protect yourself, and deal with the real or perceived downside of your desire, this needs to be incorporated into your creative process. The ideas that you gain from this need to be blended into your visualizations, your writings about your desire, and any other tools you use to inspire your creative process. Add relevant images to vision boards, collages or imagined scenes of the future. Here is a revised statement of intent from our sample case:
I am so happy and grateful now that I am wealthy enough to make a real difference for the environment; demonstrate to others how “green living” can actually work; that I can now travel in safety and comfort; that I have learned how to be financially safe; and that my family and social life is full of generosity and harmony.
As a statement, this is somewhat awkward and should be broken down into the different elements. The vision board and visualization processes can more easily accommodate such a diversity of ideas. A revised statement might be:
I am so happy and grateful now that I am living an abundant, generous life of safety, comfort and environmental service.
The details of travel, family, and so forth fall into the “generous”, “comfort”, and “safety” categories. The specifics can be used in your daily work of actually creating the picture of the reality that you want.
PART TWO
The processes in the first part of this article are powerful in and of themselves, and can be used as described. If you want a more multi-sensory way to supercharge your desire, you could try the following. The description will be somewhat complex, but you’ll find if you read it through and look at the graphic, that it’s not as complicated as the telling makes it sound!
Madison Avenue of The Mind
Okay, now you have lots more information and insight into yourself. This is really good, but so far has been mostly intellectual, with a little emotional response thrown in. Maybe you had an Aha! moment or two, as you realized something powerful. We hope you will have felt a shift of energy or an opening into a larger view of things.
There are ways to capitalize on this progress, however.
First, let’s talk about Madison Avenue advertising!
Did you ever notice that in the really compelling commercials, there is a particular dynamic going on? Think about some of the ones that hit emotional triggers.
The guys are in the bar, or at the beach. Some gorgeous women come along. Their eyes meet. Tension builds. What’s going to happen? The bartender brings a Bud Light!
Another example: The grandparents are shown playing with the grandchildren, going on vacation, playing on the swing set, the kids are riding new bicycles, they are all wearing clothes from LL Bean, there might be camping gear, fishing poles, shopping bags. Then at the end? Chase Credit Cards.
On the intellectual level we “don’t believe” that this kind of association is true, but these are very powerful images, and advertisers use them for that reason. After a few (or a few hundred!) repetitions, our minds automatically bring up those associations: Beer equals Getting the Girl. Credit card equals Family. We’re almost compelled along the path of consumption by those images.
So what’s this got to do with us here?
Well, what if there were a way to use this process for a better end than selling beer and credit cards? What if there were a way to make that kind of powerful association, but for our own reasons and in a way that ensures our success?
Let’s face it, the guy watching the ad can drink all the cheap beer he wants, he’s never going to get that girl. Not that way. And in a certain sense, the advertisers count on that. If it worked, once you had the girl, who would need the beer? Same with the credit card or any of the other ads; it is the constant lack of fulfillment, but constant hope, that keeps revenue up.
We can use these principles in a more constructive and deliberate way, however, and make some powerful associations using the principles of advertising, to energize our goals and “sell” ourselves on our own desires. If it’s done in this kind of deliberate way, we can make the kinds of links that will gain us the goal. We can bring together the power of that other level of mind that is so hugely creative, and harness it to our stated desire, in a way that brings a massive amount of energy to our process.
How Do I Ever Do This?
It’s not as hard as the description sounds! Let’s make our own commercials! Let’s take a walk down the Madison Avenue of the Mind, and really hype ourselves up about our goals, so that we are compelled by our own psyches to accomplish them! Besides working well, this is great fun.
Step One: What’s Important.
Here you want to start by looking at yourself and finding out what it is that you hold to be really important. We mean this in a soulful way, this isn’t right now a material question. That is, don’t answer food, shelter, nice clothes, or good job. This is about inner qualities, values, ideas—all the things that make life bigger than just survival.
So ask yourself the question: What’s important to me in life?
Keep asking.
Ask it 10, 15, 20 times. If you keep asking and sit with yourself, listening for an answer, it might surprise you what you get.
In our example, this is the list our person gave:
Environmentalism
Generosity
Honesty
Spirituality
Peace
Enjoyment
Health
Step Two: Condense it Down
Now you want to go through your list, which can be much longer than ours here (it’s okay if it is), and narrow it down to the two or three most important things. You may find, as this man did, that some of them overlap into categories; that makes it easier. But it’s okay if they don’t; you aren’t trying to eliminate any of them, just pick out the most “charged” ones to use for this process.
Here’s what our example person came up with:
Peace (this sort of includes spirituality, honesty and generosity to me); inner peace and world peace.
Health (this includes enjoyment)
Environmentalism (We encouraged him to come up with a more compelling word or phrase, and so he chose Green Living.)
So the new set is: Peace-Health-Green Living.
Step Three: Lights, Camera…
What is the purpose of this commercial? It’s to create a living vision board, an active visualization, a compelling drama that is so multi-sensory and so entertaining that you can’t help but run it over and over in your mind. It’s to program you to achieve your goal, and send such a strong message to the universe that it can’t help but deliver what you want.
So, where do you start? You start with your goal from part one of this article, and you equate it with your two or three values from step one and two in this part. In our example case, he starts with:
Wealth=Peace, Health and Green Living.
Now you want to let your imagination run with this equation.
Here is a way you could proceed:
Clear out a large area in one room of your house. You want to have a big enough area that you can move freely from place to place without tripping on furniture, or having things in the way. You’ll need about a 10 foot area at least 3 feet wide. A hallway would be great.
Now mentally mark out some big circles on the floor. You’ll need one area for Now, and one for each of your qualities (peace, health, green living) and one large one for your desired goal (wealth).
Now you’ll want to let your imagination run. The purpose of this is going to be to have each area represent a part of your process.
The first area will represent where you are now with this. What is the current status of your desire in your life right now? If you want a relationship, are you alone now? Are you in an unsatisfactory relationship? Where are you? If it’s money you want to create, where are you financially now?
In the next areas, imaginatively set the scene for each part of your equation being accomplished. See, hear, smell, and feel everything you can that is associated with the values you have listed as important. Use postures, gesture, pantomime, hum songs that come into your mind, whatever it takes to make this a truly multi-sensory experience.
In the last area, the area that represents your goal, really spend the most time here. Let your imagination take you to the most fulfilled vision of what that goal would look like in your life, again using gesture, posture, all the senses so that you get a true “feeling” for this. It should resonate on many layers of your being and not just be an intellectual exercise.
Become familiar with the total experience of each area, so that you can step into it and immediately feel the impact on all your senses. Practice stepping in and out of each circle and getting right into all the sensory images, sounds, smells and feelings that go with it. You want this all to be really familiar to you, so that when you go through the process it is more truly a visceral experience—you’ll want to really feel this in your body, not just understand it in your mind.
Once these areas are set up, you can start at the Now position and go through the circles.
At the end of the process, you’d want to briefly reorient yourself to the room, clear your mind, so that you are free to start again and feel the process work.
Step Four: …Action!
Now that you are really familiar with what all of your circles feel like, go through them one by one, starting with the Now position, and moving through all of your “qualities”, and ending with your desired goal. Take time on this first time through to really get into the feeling of each space. Once you’ve gone through it all, reorient to the current space and then start again.
Repetition is what works in the advertising world, and it is what works in the world of energy too, so let’s go through this many times. Continue moving from circle to circle, moving faster each time, but letting your body-mind fully experience the reality of each stage. Whatever it is, really go there. Let your body language express it. Use gestures and posture to express where you are. Move around, curl up, hang your head, whatever it takes. After 8 or 10 repetitions you should get a flow going with this. It will become more automatic, to feel the associations between these ideas and your stated goal.
Here is a simple graphic that illustrates our sample case and his steps through the process:
And Then…
After you have done this a number of times, you should feel a strong desire to get into action. It should feel natural to pursue this goal wholeheartedly. Ideas and energy will be flowing and energetic blockages will
have been released. You’re on your way to freeing yourself from those limiting beliefs and beginning to manifest what you desire.
The ideas in this article are based on the concepts of NeuroLinguist Programming, a way that is available to us to alter the associations that exist within our minds and energy fields; and therefore change the creations that we allow ourselves to make. The Madison Avenue of the Mind
process is the creation of Frank Smith, Life Coach, NLP Master Practitioner, and Facilitator for the Quintessential Guide to Conscious Creation. Written by Margie Waters and Frank Smith
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Thank you.