In our last article we began our discussion of limiting beliefs by looking at our minds and the subconscious.   We learned that our subconscious controls a large part of behavior and that this ‘control’ can be either a learned response (as in a fear of water) or a genetically coded response (one inherited). While the majority of these behaviors are beneficial to our daily lives (as you may have noticed while doing your homework assignment) these behaviors can also become detrimental to our well-being and happiness if they are ill-formed or simply outgrown. This is when these learned behaviors become limiting beliefs.

In this article, we continue our discussion by looking at learned behaviors and how they are formed.  Understanding this process is vital if we are to progress to a point where we can consciously alter, change and/or create new behaviors.

The Subconscious Mind

To best understand these learned behaviors, we need to understand where they come from.  These learned behaviors live within our subconscious mind.  But what is the subconscious mind?

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There’s been a lot of buzz lately in the Law of Attraction world about Limiting Beliefs, with everyone offering to expose, remove, re-program or otherwise eradicate them from your mind in order to allow you to have the life of your dreams.

But what are Limiting Beliefs?

Where did they come from?

Are they all bad?

Today we begin a multi-part series that delves into those questions in an attempt to provide you with a better understanding, not only of Limiting Beliefs, but of yourself.

To understand Limiting Beliefs, we first need to look at how our brain works.

The human brain is a complex organ, capable of performing multiple operations simultaneously. While you are reading this, your brain is processing the input from your eyes, converting the image into ‘language’, monitoring your heartbeat, regulating the chemistry of your blood, maintaining your breathing, keeping an ear out for the phone, and much more.  And all this is happening at the same time.

But consciously, you are only aware of the words you’re reading.  Everything else is happening in the background, without your conscious interaction.

But how does the brain know what to do when I’m ‘not there’?

This is where the subconscious comes in.  The vast portion of your mental activity is controlled by the subconscious part of your mind.  At birth, the subconscious mind basically functions based on genetic knowledge.  In other words, knowledge passed down genetically from your parents and their parents, and so on.

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As I was standing in line to pay at the market, I noticed the
display of magazines. Nearly all of them were screaming about the
latest diet, losing weight, getting into a bikini by summer.

A bit later, I realized that I was feeling really lousy. And it
dawned on me that as I mindlessly read those headlines, my
subconscious mind had taken them all as truth. It dutifully
concluded that I was unworthy, not good enough, and unacceptable.

Wow. What an eye opener!

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(This was originally posted on the Universe of Power’s Discussion forum, in response to a member’s two part question: what about the overwhelming input we get from everything around us that getting what you want out of life is always hard, time-consuming and a struggle; and, why do any of us deserve to have happiness or prosperity when so many in the world are suffering from poverty, illness or war.)

It’s certainly true that we were raised and are now surrounded by messages about how hard everything is. I think this is based on the idea of an intact external reality moving along outside us like clockwork, a reality that doesn’t need us to exist, barely notices our existance and has no urge or tendency to provide us with what we need. That seems to be the “science” of the world view we’ve been living under. On the other hand there’s the traditional Christian view that most of us are exposed to in the western world (whether we are Christian or not our culture and social ideas are based on Christian beliefs) which says that there is a judgemental God, again external to us, who is intact, pre-existing and complete without us; a God we have to somehow please or cajole into providing something for us.

With this as our surroundings it’s no wonder everything seems so hard. How can our single psyche and our frail body make an impact on a huge pre-existant universe that has it’s reality so intact and complete that we are just a blip in the dark? Read the rest of this entry »