Power of Belief
Everything
that you are experiencing now is your brain's perceptions of them, it may not
be real. That is why hallucination is pretty much 'visible' to only that one
guy. However, the hallucination or actual happenings have the same effect on
your mind. In other words, your brain cannot tell the difference between
something that had really happened or something that is make-believe. You can
fool the brain by vividly imagining scenarios and the brain will believe it is
true. This is also known as creative visualization. It is a vital step in the
formation of our beliefs.
If you have ever skipped lunch, you will have
probably experienced it too. Mental images of your favorite cheeseburger start
to saturate your mind. You can see it now. As you grab the burger, you can feel
the texture of the bun and the sweet meaty scent drifting into your nostrils.
You take a long and slow bite, the cheese and patty goes so well together. You
can feel the amount of saliva in the mouth now. If your visualization skill is
that good, you will probably find yourself drooling.
Even though there is
no burger, your mind can imagine one and still send signals to your body to
start salivating. So how will this affect our beliefs?
Your beliefs are never
absolutely true, they are merely generalizations and ill-conceived notions.
Just like the burger, they are never real, they are just fractions of the real
things and subjected to third party influences. If you can remember the beliefs
analogy I gave, those evidences or truck parts, are contributed by other people
or yourself and contain only a fraction of the truth, never complete. Your
beliefs are a combination of feedback and generalizations from you and your
environment.
Hence, you can also
manage your beliefs to achieve peak performance, by using creative
visualization techniques. In the simplest term, you can choose which truck
parts to go with your ideal engine and optimise the truck's functioning. You
can construct your own belief and either let it work for you or hold you back.
So how do you change or modify an existing belief?
Firstly, you must
find enough reasons to change your current beliefs. This first step helps to
build a strong emotional reason for change.
Secondly, you have to challenge every piece
of evidence that had supported the faulty idea, by proposing counter-evidence.
Now that the truck is bare, you can easily replace the faulty engine with a new
one.
Thirdly, replace the old idea with a new and
better one.
Fourthly, support this new idea with
evidence. You are now integrating the new and better truck apparels with the
engine.
However, the work is
not done yet.
Fifthly, you must write this new belief down.
Remember that no beliefs are completely true. Writing it down helps you to
review your beliefs and facilitate future changes.
Always remember that
your beliefs are reliant on your perceptions and they can be fooled. Use this
fact to your advantage and create better and more empowering beliefs. If you realize that a current belief no longer serves well, you can always
change it simply by
(i) finding enough
reasons to change
(ii) disproving the
evidence supporting your old beliefs
(iii) putting forth a
new idea
(iv) supporting it
with relevant evidence and then
(v) writing it down
Always be aware of your beliefs and remember
that you have control over them