Breaking the habit of being
yourself requires – dare I say it? – discipline. Daily discipline. And
once you embark on it, it’s the most wonderful process in the making. It
is exciting and fun, and it becomes easier and easier with every time
you practice, just like training a muscle. You do indeed create your
life! You’re in the driver’s seat, entirely. And if that’s not great
news, I do not know what is! You absolutely have the power to change
your life in any way you desire. You create your life every day, with
volition or without, on a nerve cell/brain structure and thought/quantum
level.
So why not actively create your life,
instead of mostly running in automatic-reactive-survival mode? Why wait
to change your life until crisis hits? A crisis can be a great catalyst –
yet we’re free to choose change now. So why not create out of joy
instead? We all can. And lasting change is not only possible, it is fun
to set in motion. The following article shares ideas from a fabulous
book by Dr. Joe Dispenza (see review below).
Interacting with the quantum field
Nobody is doomed by their genetic makeup
or hard wired to live a specific way for the rest of their lives. YOU
mold the clay that is the quantum field, and you do so by aligning your
thoughts, feelings and actions.
Says Dr. Joe Dispenza, successful
chiropractor with postgraduate training and continuing education in
neuroscience, biochemistry, brain function and memory formation:
“You… broadcast a distinct energy
pattern or signature. In fact, everything material is always emitting
specific patterns of energy. And this energy carries information. Your
fluctuating states of mind consciously or unconsciously change that
signature on a moment-to-moment basis.“
In essence, we influence the quantum field through our Being-states (and not only through what we want).
Vision and creative mode
A brain region called the frontal lobe
plays a key role in envisioning the life you desire. Ask yourself: Who
do you I see myself as? How do I show up every day? What would I choose
as my predominant Being-state, and how much am I living it on a daily
basis? What’s the greatest ideal of myself? Who do I want to be? What
would I have to think and feel in order to express that? The clearer you
see this, the faster you can change into it. The universal quantum law
applies to finances as much as happiness, health and relationships. No
exception.
If you can hold a vision regardless of
what’s going on around you, you are in creative mode, i.e. you refuse to
respond to any triggers in your environment, and you KNOW with 100%
certainty that your vision must come, as it already happened in the
quantum field.
This is exactly what we admire in great
leaders: Gandhi, Dr. Martin Luther King, Abraham Lincoln, Mother Teresa,
etc. Their vision made a difference. They refused to give in to
circumstance, did not blame their spouse nor the weather – they did not
suffer from ‘excusitis’. Holding a vision is a means to achieving a
Being-state which transcends circumstance.
Mechanics of change and the art of ‘becoming familiar with’
Repetition is the mother of all skill –
and it is what wires brain cells together to create new neurological
pathways. Contrary to the paradigm I grew up in which said that brain
cells cannot regenerate nor change, we know today that this is
completely false. The brain is highly adaptive (neuroplasticity), and
changes occur all the time. The moment you learn something new, your
brain makes new connections. A long standing habit can be seen as a
broad, very well trodden path, a super-highway where neurons fire when a
habitual thought or behaviour triggers them. A new thought or behaviour
(i.e. nerve cell circuit) becomes established through use.
The more you practice a new thought or
behaviour, the better you get at it, just like training a muscle. Paying
attention to where you want to go is key. Become aware of how automated
(in terms of thoughts, feelings, and actions) your life really is. Keep
what you like, and change the rest. Not all automated brain circuits
are negative. Some of them are exactly what you want. Others are not. By
withdrawing your attention (i.e. quitting to walk the established path)
and thinking about how you would rather be (breaking into new territory
and establishing a new path), you dissolve those old highways, bit by
bit (they disconnect when focus is withdrawn). Self-love is when you
respond differently to what you’ve practiced all your life.
In order to truly change, we must think
greater than we feel. Remember your vision. If you have none for your
life, develop one! Now. Not tomorrow… and it’s not about painting some
grand picture of your life straight away (but feel free if this feels
good to you now).
Instead, you can pick out single aspects
and start with those. Know what you want, and then assume the
corresponding Being-state. This is completely scaleable, i.e. you can
expand your vision as you go. But start having one! Having no vision is
like going to the airport saying: ‘I want a ticket’, or saying to a
waiter: ‘I want food’. You’re going nowhere fast and nothing can come to
you if you don’t specify what you would like, and expect it to come.
Vagueness equals standstill. In other words, in the context of creating,
it’s a no-no, and you must know your target.
If you truly can do this (thinking
greater than you feel), you have mastered your life. That’s how big this
short sentence really is. To envision means to see something into
existence. It means to create something with volition and expecting to
see it, without having any idea of the ‘how’. That step is up to the
field and not your job. Your job is to hold the vision and feel its
fulfilment. Your job is to become familiar with the feeling-states of
your desires.
See it and rehearse it over and over,
daily. This process rewires your brain (creating new and wanted
super-highways, replacing the automatic old ones). By the way: the
Buddhist definition of meditation is ‘to become familiar with’. Meditate
on desired feeling states. Familiarize yourself to the n-th degree with
them. Live as if. Until it is second nature. Or first. =)
Why we get stuck in repetitive patterns & how to overcome them
Mind is what the brain does.
Psychologists tell us that c. 95% of our mind is subconscious. Yet it
runs us, 24/7, 365. And that’s good! Because if we had to do it all
consciously, good luck surviving even a single second, trying to
orchestrate our some 50 trillion cells that constitute the body. Not to
mention regulating heart beat, digestion, detox, breathing… our innate
intelligence takes care of it all and frees us up to create consciously.
A marvellous set-up.
Some unconscious patterns do not serve
us. So how do we change them for good? This is the essence of the
process Dr. Dispenza proposes, detailed further in his book (see below):
First step: make them known.
Second step: undo them and replace them with what you prefer.
Third step: practice the new state.
We have many unconscious patterns that
we did not choose ourselves, i.e. they arose from our environment
(parents, peers, culture, etc) at a young age and were accepted as true.
If unchanged, they still operate. That is how people become stuck in
repetitive patterns without knowing why.
Experiences and events in life produce
emotions, which eventually dictate how we behave, unless we intervene.
When you think negatively, you feel bad. Feeling bad gives rise to more
negative thoughts, which result in feeling worse…do you see the cycle?
Most of us are trapped in it, without ever questioning it, living a very
reactive life with little room for creating the life we truly desire.
Most people do not know how to do this, and that it’s even possible. And
it is.
Our brain cannot distinguish between
something we imagine, and something that is really happening. As far as
the brain is concerned, it’s one and the same. So there’s little
physiological difference between remembering a negative situation and
actively being involved in one. In other words: every time you beat the
drum of how bad it is (in response to an observation or a memory), you
activate and reinforce those thought and feeling patterns. Eventually,
they become automatic, and we forget why we emotionally react as we do –
we just react. The perfect stuck state. And it leads to an identity we
think is us. But is it? Of course not. A question worth exploring is:
What have I memorized emotionally that I live by that I think is me?
In this automated state, the body
becomes the mind: it knows exactly how to respond to a situation and
just does it. A good example is driving a car. When you first learned
it, you concentrated a great deal (making new neural pathways). And
before too long, you habitually arrive at work, with the car seemingly
driving by itself. Your body knows very well what to do. And yes, you
take in traffic, etc. and respond accordingly. But it’s all well
practiced and smooth, and you don’t think about it. When the body
becomes the mind, we live in reactive, unaware mode. This is good for
some situations, and not so good for others.
The power that you have is one of focus.
You can change from a reactive state to a creative one by disconnecting
the dots that produce a specific reaction. You do so by focusing on
what you prefer instead. When thought becomes the experience, you’re
there. When your vision is so compelling and so real you forget
everything else, and it feels as if five minutes elapsed instead of
three hours, then you’re a creative powerhouse.
We all have been in those situations.
Whether it’s playing music, reading a great book, participating in an
engrossing conversation – time just flew and we could have done it all
day. Harness those situations by tagging them with a little intention
for your life. The feeling state is perfect – add some directive thought
and watch what happens. Mind and body must be aligned, i.e. thoughts
and feelings must be congruent to effect real change.
To sum it up: what you think and feel
today determines how you live tomorrow. Your thoughts and feelings are
that important and potent. So why wait learning how to think and feel
right? Learn how to dance with your thoughts. It’s fun!
I invite you to experiment with influencing the quantum field to your liking. Have FUN! And let me know your outcomes.
Recommended reading:If you’re interested in learning more on this topic, I highly recommend Breaking the habit of being yourself – how to lose your mind and create a new one, by Dr. Joe Dispenza, a successful chiropractor with postgraduate training and continuing education in neurology, neuroscience, biochemistry, brain function and memory formation, cellular biology, and aging and longevity.
This has got to be one of the best chosen book titles I ever came across. The book is a total gem for those interested in growth and real change in any area of their life, including health and wellbeing. It’s an awesome manual to yourself, in fact. Dr. Dispenza intuitively used the process later outlined in ‘Breaking the habit of being yourself’ to heal himself when medical doctors said not undergoing surgery was a highly regrettable mistake, and today he travels around the globe teaching people his views on brain function and how they can be practically applied in daily life to effect true change.
‘Breaking the habit’ is an actual manual for change. It goes beyond giving information and actually tells you HOW to apply it. It is very well written in that it makes you want to turn the pages, eagerly awaiting the mechanism Dr. Joe Dispenza proposes to help you actively create your life, instead of running on automatic-reactive-survival mode. If this resonates with you, gift yourself this book – and APPLY it! I hope you enjoy it as much as I do or more.
References:
- Dr. Joe Dispenza: Breaking the habit of being yourself – How to lose your mind and create a new one. 2012. Hay House, Inc.
- Dr. Joe Dispenza: Evolve your brain – The science of changing your mind. 2007. Health Corporations, Inc.
