In other editions of Holistic Living Magazine, we have gone into many subjects about health and wellbeing. This edition is about beliefs. So what are beliefs and how do they affect us?

As a therapist who works with the subconscious mind, when working with my clients, I see that our beliefs are a key cornerstone in determining our health and wellbeing.

It is not something we are taught when we are young and our doctors certainly don’t tell us this.

There are no pills out there that can help us become aware of our subconscious beliefs, but these subconscious beliefs have a massive impact in all areas of your life.

Beliefs is a way of thinking.

Beliefs affect your health on a physical level as well as spiritual, mental and emotional.

So what do I mean when I talk about beliefs? Let’s see how the dictionary defines it.

Believe Synonym – According To The Oxford Dictionary

Opinion, view, viewpoint, point of view, attitude, stance, stand, standpoint, position, perspective, contention, conviction, judgement, thinking, way of thinking, thought, idea, theory, hypothesis, thesis, interpretation, assumption, presumption, supposition, surmise, postulation, conclusion, deduction, inference.

Belief

An acceptance that something exists or is true, especially one without proof.

“His belief in extra-terrestrial life”

Trust, faith, or confidence in (someone or something).

“A belief in democratic politics”

Let’s look at this more closely. “An acceptance that something exists or is true”. In this world there is no absolute truth.

Everything is determined by your perspective. You have millions of pieces of information going into your brain per second and your brain can not process this much information, so it filters it. If you don’t believe me, do this simple exercise.

Sit next to a friend in a park. Ask you friend to pick out 10 things they see when looking out in front of them. Now you pick your 10 things. Each of you write these things down and then swap the piece of paper.

You will see that maybe you pick one or two things that are the same but you will have picked different things. This is because we all see the world differently, even though we might be looking at the same thing.

Your conscious mind cannot take in everything, so according to your beliefs & values, it shows you what it thinks you want to see.

What we process then forms our belief system. Each of us have different beliefs depending on who we are, where we lived, what religion (or non-religion) we are, what our parents taught us, what our friends think, what we were taught at school, and the list goes on.

Not all our beliefs are healthy or serve us in our life.

What Are Some Examples Of Core Beliefs?

· I am destined to get this condition because of my genes.

· Health and healing requires the help of doctors and pills.

· My illness is incurable.

Do you think these will benefit the person thinking these thoughts? How about if they change their belief to:

· This condition runs in my family but I am breaking the pattern.

· Health and healing comes from gaining knowledge and using it to go inside myself.

· This illness is curable.

It is possible for you to change your beliefs. The experts in this magazine will show you how and help you to understand why you would want to change the ones that are not making your life, the life you dream of.

Enjoy.

Almost all articles in this edition of Holistic Living Magazine follow a similar path; a definition of a belief, some examples of them, a discussion of how they can be positive and negative and finally some advice on how to conquer the bad and substitute them with the good.

And just to be different, I’m not going to follow that pattern. I’m going talk about something that supports and gives succour to beliefs, mainly the bad ones, and that is the concept of cognitive bias.

Any belief will have a starting point, a time, an action, an environment and so on. But if it doesn’t get validation, then much like seeds on stony ground it won’t survive. Every belief survives because it in some way enhances the life of the individual believing in it.

And this is where cognitive biases come in; there are hundreds of different biases all having a subtle, or not so subtle, effect on how we think.

A good example is confirmation bias; this particular bias means that if you have a particular belief, say climate change isn’t real, then you will go out and search for like minded people or situations.

We have all experienced this bias; the article, “Are You Your Beliefs”? by Gwenda Smith, in this magazine describes how one individual was on anti-depressants because his mother was and that meant he felt he needed them, his mother, and her mother’s behaviour confirmed what he believed.

Another bias that impacts many people is a negativity bias; this bias means that you give more weight to bad things that have happened in your life than the positive ones. Just think about that for a moment.

I bet right now it is easier for you to recall the last five bad things that were said or happened to you than the last five good things and it is this type of bias that feeds the fuel of many negative self-worth beliefs.

Now while the list of biases does go on, with some being relatively harmless, the IKEA effect for example, others such as the Gamblers Fallacy or the Worse-than-average effect can be life changing.

Fundamentally if you aren’t aware of such things as cognitive biases, then trying to change a belief without addressing a potential supporting bias would be like trying to fix a leak in a water pipe without knowing where the leak was.

So please read the rest of this wonderful edition, read about all of the expert’s different approaches to beliefs, and at the same time take a moment to think about any beliefs you have.

Think about whether they are positive or detrimental to your life, and if the latter, think about what was the trigger for it to exist and what keeps that belief alive?

Once you know such facts, then you can go about replacing such negativity with beliefs that are better for you. Finally, stay wary of cognitive biases that can confound and confront you, they can and do creep back into your life!!

I’m currently working on a book called Mindset for Authors: How to overcome procrastination, perfectionism, and self-doubt. I’m writing the book because apparently less than 1% of the people who want to write a book actually ever get it done.

I mention this here because this statistic can be put down to several factors including negative beliefs that first-time authors have about their abilities in particular, and their place in the world in general.

I come into contact with people all of the time who know their stuff, and are totally literate and articulate, but there’s something holding them back. In fact I know the feeling well from my own experience.

In fact trying to become an author with a mindset that doesn’t support you is not only an exercise in futility, but it’s also an opportunity for deep healing, because scrutinising what’s underlying your writer’s block will enable you to hone in on negative beliefs that function to keep you stuck not only in relation to writing, but in fact in relation to any area in your life in which you’re struggling to make progress.

What you need to take on board from the get-go is the fact that your ability to accept responsibility for what you achieve in your life is key to moving forward.

I know that some of the people reading this article will feel like that’s a bit of a no-brainer, whilst others will have a lot of trouble accepting it.

That’s the way it is because as Carol Dweck points out in her book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, there are essentially two overarching paradigms that our lives are played out in, and our ability to come to terms with the question of personal responsibility depends on where we sit on the fixed/growth mindset continuum that Dweck is well known for.

People who mostly operate from a fixed mindset believe they are born with talents in some areas and not others, and that the strengths they are born with lead to a set of capabilities that are more or less the ones they go to the grave with.

You’ll hear people with fixed mindsets say things like “I could never write a book, I’m just no good at writing”, or “I’m terribly scattered, I could never organize my thoughts well enough to write a book”.

Thinking about the difference between fixed and growth mindsets reminds me of something I first heard when I was just a little kid. In fact it was my dad who said to me that “we can’t do anything about the cards life deals us, but we can do something about the cards we choose to play”.

This kind of world-view implies both opportunities to improve, as well as responsibility for taking the steps required to allow improvement to happen, whether that means taking a writing course, signing up for cooking classes, hiring a personal trainer, or going back to university to retrain for a new career that requires specific qualifications.

It’s worth noting how dynamic this matter of mindset actually is.

If you think about it objectively you can probably recognize yourself approaching some areas of your life from a growth mindset and not others, and you can probably also recognise that your approach to a certain area of your life is from a fixed mindset on some occasions, and then from a growth mindset on others.

So I want you to think about which mindset you’re in, in relation to an important part of your life that you’re feeling stuck in right now.

And then I want you to ask yourself, what beliefs support that mindset, and in turn what other beliefs that mindset keeps you cut off from. It’s a chicken and egg situation really.

A lot of my clients come to me because they can’t seem to get started with writing a book that they know in their heart they need to write. Often times they describe what they are experiencing as chronic procrastination.

So I ask them to sit with the feeling that comes up when they think about procrastinating.

After doing that they often say something like “I’m not ready”, or “I’m not qualified enough”, or “What if nobody buys my book” or something like that, and these statements open up a whole can of worms around their unconscious need to avoid vulnerability.

I was an expert at avoiding vulnerability myself back in the day. It’s only since I’ve became aware of the extent to which a reasonably common condition called Impostor Syndrome was driving all of my decisions, that I’ve been able to break out of a fixed mindset and more fully embody a growth mindset in relation to almost every aspect of my live.

I see an awful lot of Impostor Syndrome in my coaching practice. I’ve worked with many high achieving clients over the years who are crippled with chronic self-doubt and feelings of inadequacy no matter what they might have achieved in their personal and/or professional life.

People struggling with Impostor Syndrome tend to be particularly risk-averse, and go out of their way to over-perform for fear of ‘being found out’. They’re also likely to be cutting themselves off from opportunities that less capable people end up grabbing over them.

The shame of it is that these less capable people are only able to do this because they’re not encumbered by the kind of fear of being found out and self-doubt that creates a glass ceiling for people suffering from Imposter Syndrome.

Obviously people suffering from Impostor Syndrome are operating from a fixed mindset. No matter how much evidence there is to the contrary, they’re convinced that they’re at risk of being exposed as not being as smart as everyone thinks they are.

No matter how much positive feedback they get, they’re simply unable to establish a realistic appreciation of their abilities.

Certainly I’m not implying that everyone who’s procrastinating is suffering from Impostor Syndrome, but I do want to urge you to take the time to reflect on exactly what it is that’s stopping you from moving forward, and to get help if there are any entrenched negative beliefs about your abilities holding you back that you’re unable to shift.

Unlike people operating from a fixed mindset, people operating from a growth mindset approach challenges with a high degree of curiosity, and remain open to learning how to do new things throughout their life.

They regard themselves as being empowered to improve no matter what their starting point is. Sure, they might never be able to make it to the Olympics or become a Rhodes Scholar or whatever, but they know they can improve in relation to anything they put their mind to.

It’s about improvement for people with a growth mindset, not perfection.

As Dweck explains, it all comes down to the question of how we react to challenges.

Do we just give up when we’re challenged because we can’t bear to risk failing, or do we keep working away in the knowledge that our failures are just stepping stones to success, and hard work and persistence always pays of in terms of our ability to continue to increase our skills in relation to any and all areas of our life.

The good news is that no matter where you are on the fixed/growth continuum, you can develop a growth mindset if you’re prepared to do what it takes to shift your perspective.

According to Dweck, strengthening your growth mindset starts with becoming aware of the voice of your fixed mindset, and recognizing that you ultimately have a choice in relation to how you react to the circumstances of your life.

After establishing and believing that, whenever you hear yourself saying something like “what’s the point of even starting a book when I know I’d never be able to get it finished anyway”, rather than giving in to that story and giving up, you need to deliberately engage the voice of your growth mindset to refute what your fixed mindset is saying.

And then most importantly you need to go on to take the kind of action a person operating from a growth mindset would take. If you continue to be persistent in this regard, you’ll slowly but surely reprogram your brain and change your life forever.

What do you know about beliefs and how they affect you daily, in all areas of your health and wellbeing? Have you heard the saying, “Start feeling better by thinking better”?

Did you know, if you start thinking better you feel better and your brain performs better? Well it’s true.

Studies show that when your brain is positive, it significantly outperforms your brain than when it is negative, neutral, or stressed in terms of several categories; intelligence, energy, resiliency, how long you can work on a project (focus), how many possibilities you see (big picture), and your health.

Shawn Achor says, “That is now what we’re calling the happiness advantage. Which is, when your brain is positive it actually achieves more than it would have otherwise”.

Shawn Achor, CEO of Aspirant and author of The Happiness Advantage: The Seven Principles of Positive Psychology That Fuel Success and Performance at Work. Harvard Business Review.

Our beliefs affect our emotions and our emotions play a huge role in how we feel. So when we think better, we feel better, and are much happier, more rounded people.

Now I am not talking about walking around like Pollyanna and being positive 24/7, which is not normal. If someone claims to be like this, they are in denial. As human beings we have a full range of emotions.

Emotions like, sadness, anger and depression are emotions we are also supposed to feel. They are your body’s signal that something needs to be changed in your life.

Some Beliefs We Have Serve Us & Some Would Benefit By Being Changed.

For example: I have some beliefs that serve me and I want to keep them. One of them is, “I am a healing machine”. A few years ago I had a third degree burn which completely healed in 3 weeks, (often they can take months to heal).

A negative belief I held for years was, “My body does not work like everyone else’s and I will always be overweight”. Anyone who can see me now will notice that I no longer hold that belief. (YAY!)

Now imagine someone who believes they have the weight of the world on their shoulders, what symptoms do you think they might have?

What if the person keeps saying, “I feel sick to my stomach”? How do you think this person would feel?

Do you think this person may have neck pain, if they keep saying, “xyz is a pain in the neck”?

Your beliefs, and words are very powerful. It is best to be mindful of your thoughts, beliefs and the words you say, as this is key in determining your health and happiness.

Here Are Some Beliefs That Are Not Healthy:

I’m not good enough. – A self-judgment that creates feelings of unworthiness and depression.

She is so beautiful. I wish I was like her. – This belief can create anger, resentment, disappointment, envy.

I hate my body. – This belief can create unhappiness and shame, sometimes causing us to separate ourselves from others.

As you can see beliefs are connected to emotions. Usually the idea, or thought, by itself doesn’t feel bad, it is just a thought floating through your mind.

It is when you have that thought and you have connected strong emotions to it, then it becomes a belief and issues can emerge.

Once you recognise these associated thoughts and emotions then you can change the emotions surrounding your belief, you can change your response.

As I told you, I changed a belief I held for many years. Think about, what did I do to change my belief and what can you to do change yours?

My belief was: My body does not work like everyone else’s and I will always be overweight. It had been reinforced over the years by trying every diet known to man (or woman, in my case) and none of them working!

To change this belief, I started experimenting with food. I have food intolerances and many foods caused me discomfort, inflammation, bloating and symptoms of IBS.

Until I heard about a certain type of eating designed for thyroid patients. (Most of my weight issues came from adrenal dysfunction, leading to thyroid issues).

When I started eating only the foods that were good for my body, I started to drop weight.

As I was dropping weight, my belief that I would always hold onto weight became less imprinted in my mind and I experienced more and more excitement as I was getting smaller and smaller.

Over time, I changed the heavy feeling of despair and being stuck, to the lighter emotion of excitement and happiness. This reflected in my body. As time went on, the old belief transformed to the new belief, and I am smaller.

My new belief is: As long as I eat the foods that are good for my body, I can stabilise my weight for the rest of my life. This is a much healthier belief for me with my new understanding regarding my thyroid issues.

Another way to create change is by using affirmations (make sure you say them with a positive emotion attached). They help to reprogram your subconscious mind. When you start telling your subconscious mind positive things it will believe them.

Just as we have practiced negative self-talk repeatedly throughout the years, we can do the same with positive self-talk too. It will take some time but as they say “practice makes perfect”.

Start to do affirmations daily. Start to make a change. Start to tell yourself POSITIVE things about yourself. Start to live the life you dream of. You can see from my example, how my mindset shifted slowly but as I was seeing the results, change happened faster.

Once the neural pathways of those beliefs are constructed and reinforced, changing your mind and creating the life you want can be a real challenge. There are simple daily practices you can implement to bring about the changes you seek.

The first step to changing a belief is to understand its construct and what keeps us so attached to it.

Now we understand how our beliefs affect our emotions, and we know we can change our beliefs, here are 4 simple steps you can use.

This is a very simple list and it can be used on every belief you have about yourself and your life that you want to change. If you have many negative beliefs, then you can repeat this process. The more you practise, the easier changing your beliefs will become to you.

All of us have a story that we tell ourselves and others about why our lives have turned out the way they have. With human nature being what it is, we often tell ourselves the story in which we are the hero or heroine. “I have created the beautiful things and have been victimized by others for the painful lessons.”

Would you be willing to consider that the story of your life, the one that you have told yourself and others, may be holding you back from achieving your heart’s desire? Can your beliefs really change?

If you base the future of your life on past events, beliefs, experiences, and what others may have said or not said to support you or control you, or even disempower you, then this will dictate your entire future.

Neuroscientists have proven that the subconscious mind controls 95% of our behavior and holds our most deeply held beliefs. This generates thoughts, feelings, and emotional states from which our reality manifests.

In addition, science has also proven that there is no separation between the mind and body. “Eventually the mind becomes the body.”

Therefore, you could accurately say that your body is your subconscious mind which holds the beliefs that run your life. Knowing this explains why you continue to re-create certain dynamics in your life over and over.

In other words, the past equals the future unless you can interrupt these patterns and transform your beliefs into empowerment.

Changing Your Beliefs – The Hard Work Miracle

This brings us back to the most foundational question of your life. “Do you believe that you could change a lifetime of subconscious neural and body cellular programming and create a better life?

“If you do not believe it, if you do not have faith, then no amount of therapy, meditation, healing, personal development, business training, spiritual development or religious practice will create any lasting change.

Remember whether you believe it or not, it is subconscious.

My story. As a child, I was extremely shy and introverted. I was quiet and withdrawn in school and rarely participated in class even though I was a very bright boy.

My belief that I could not break through the wall I hid behind that permeated my entire life. I felt like I was in prison.

As an adolescent, the condition became worse. I went to a private boy’s Catholic high school and consequently had little interaction with girls socially or in school.

What made matters worse was the school was in a very wealthy community while I was bused in to this school from my modest middle-class community.

The other boys in the school were overtly confident, socially advanced, and typically owned their own car or at least had access to upper class vehicles. A lot of these guys were very slick and smooth with the girls.

Even more embarrassing was the fact that I was one of the best athletes and won the outstanding athlete award in that same school. Even the fact that I was looked up to as an athlete could not pull me out of my deep-rooted insecurities.

I went on to university with no change in my behavior. I continued to do well in sports and academically but socially remained shy and introverted. I waited until the last term/semester in my fourth year at university to attend my public speaking mandatory course.

I was terrible and humiliated in front of the class. A guidance counselor at school told me I could do well in business but never as a leader to coordinate, manage and direct the activities of others. He said I just didn’t have it in me. This was based on the depth of my insecurities.

I graduated from university and was hired into the corporate world. I was lucky because it was a Fortune 500 company with great leadership; management training, educational benefits, and support.

My boss, Arthur J Cummings was very close to retirement. He spent his entire career with the PerkinElmer Corporation voted by Forbes magazine as one of the 10 best managed companies in America.

He handpicked me away from another team where the manager was irritated by my poor communication skills and humiliated me in front of the team.

After Arthur transferred me onto his team and decided to mentor me – something happened that boggles the imagination. Even after all these years I can hardly believe what occurred in my belief system.

The first question he asked me was, “Do you want to change”? My answer was yes. The second question he asked me was, “Do you believe you can change”? My answer was that I was not sure.

I knew that I needed help but I did not know who could help me or what needed to happen. In other words, I was not sure if my beliefs could be changed.

The first thing Arthur asked me to do was to keep a journal. In this journal, every day, I had to challenge myself with questions about why I believed I could not change or was not able to change.

To write about my behavior and interaction with other human beings. He said it really had nothing to do with other people but the story I had told myself for my entire life up to the point about what I could or could not do.

Arthur taught me how to let go of my story about my past which was limiting me and how to plant seeds of greatness for a new and exciting future.

He had the company pay for my MBA and simultaneously he had me attend the renowned Dale Carnegie course in public speaking, followed by the advanced Dale Carnegie course and the Dale Carnegie sales training.

After graduation from all three courses and earning my master’s degree, I was instructed to join Toastmasters and give a speech every week.

The result was the beginning of a prolific rise up the corporate ladder into management at an alarming rate. I grew into a very capable public speaker.

I became at times an extrovert, socially comfortable and confident. I entered a long-term relationship with a beautiful young lady.

Years later I left corporate America and started my own business, traveling the world and teaching tens of thousands of people how to change beliefs and transform all areas of their lives.

More good news is that in 2017 changes can take place much more efficiently and effectively.

Just be certain that if I could change such an extreme set of social and career inhibitions, then you too can change and transform whatever is holding you back in life.

If you truly want to change your beliefs you must change your thoughts and behavior. Work from the inside out and outside in.

In order to achieve anything, we must first believe we can. This applies to almost every aspect of life whether we’re an athlete competing for gold, a child learning to ride a bicycle, a patient in recovery or a healer helping to restore the health and wellbeing of a client.

In very simple terms, our beliefs determine the outcome of our successes. Our beliefs are things we can change based on how we interpret, adapt, grow, collaborate and integrate our knowledge of life with our experiences of living.

It is said that by the time a human being reaches the age of 35, we run almost entirely on auto-pilot as the mind and body become programmed to think and respond in certain ways based on the experience and knowledge of all that we have become.

Science is beginning to show how our thoughts, attitudes, values, beliefs, perceptions and emotions inspire to play important roles in determining the physical health and performance of the mind and body.

How we think creates the outcomes that shape the physiological, psychological, and emotional reality of the world in which each of us find ourselves.

Perhaps what we believe is simply defined as the extent to which we allow our performance capability to develop through life. Henry Ford said it best ‘whether you think you can, or you think you can’t – you’re right.’

Belief is an enabler – and it’s very powerful. It’s one of the keys that unlocks the potential of super-human consciousness to evolve man and woman kind beyond that which was ever thought possible.

Many of us rarely stop to think about the world in which we find ourselves. Day by day, we repeat most of the things we did yesterday unaware that we will do more or less the same thing tomorrow, the day after and so on.

We repeat our thought processes too – most of which are in fact negative creating the signatures of dis-ease at a cellular level in our inner world.

Behaviourally, we are creatures of habit and our craving for consistency appears born out of a deep-rooted resistance to change – even if consistency means the pain of negative results.

If we stopped from time to time to think about what we do, to evaluate what we’ve done, look forward to where we might want to be or think about how we really feel deep within, then perhaps our perspective would change in every moment of introspection.

We are all capable of embracing change and this starts by changing the way we think about ourselves.

Thinking is art. In my world of ideals, thoughts are a theoretical construct underpinned by many, many things like educational focus, knowledge, perception, suggestibility, memory, experience, societal conditioning, the opinions of others, gene expression and the manipulation of external stimuli by broadcast media.

These components might be considered the individual pieces of a jigsaw puzzle glued together by nothing more than belief. Contextually, belief is a transformative foundation upon which the seeds of our humanity propagate in the garden of our thoughts and in the wild flower meadows of our collective consciousness.

Whether we are consciously or subconsciously aware, our beliefs create the conditions in which we allow our thoughts to take root. How they grow and blossom is determined by the ecology and language of our own human nature.

This can also be instrumental in our own healing process. Our thoughts are one of the most potent forces of energy creating, co-creating and healing the inner and outer worlds in which we think we exist.

All thoughts are energy and energy follows intention, so the language we use to paint the story we tell our cells become the brush strokes of transformation on the blank canvass of our imagination.

The energy of our freedom to make choices and our courage to change these choices again and again and again in search of the things that make us truly happy, is perhaps the energy of the unconditional archetype we embrace to reveal love at the heart of all that is possible.

How we harness this energy for our highest good is also a free-choice and yet it is often a choice that we are unwilling to make. What many of us may not realise is that belief really does trigger responses inside the body which can affect our health and performance.

If we limit our beliefs by constantly talking ourselves out of doing something we can actually hard-wire a semi-permanent blockage in the neural pathways on the mind and body to prevent learning.

Equally true is, if we tell ourselves we can do something then we hard-wire new neural pathways igniting enhanced performance capability.

Think about this for a moment – this is exactly what we do as children when we learn unconditionally without the capacity to think of a million reasons why we can’t do something. So, belief can become the language of success and failure – depending upon your perspective.

As an author, it’s almost impossible not to be excited about the beauty, resonance, intoxication and the healing properties of language.

Like the multi-sensory threads we weave into the emotional tapestry of our hearts or the ultra-violet colours we imagine embossed upon the wings of our inner-butterfly, language plants the seeds of intention in a landscape of reality which is ours to make and make believe.

Literally speaking, how we think, what we think about and what we feel about our thoughts is shaped by the language we use to communicate with our cells and each other. Language is itself thought provoking.

It conjures the essence of illusion, it colours our dreamscapes and it defines the vibrational eloquence of the symphony of every human heartbeat echoing through the Universe. Language shapes thoughts, thoughts define intention and energy follows intention to create and co-create our world.

Positive thoughts create positive outcomes, negative thoughts create negative outcomes and both are derived predominantly by the power of belief.

Human beings, by virtue of our very nature, are a species whose survival is dependent upon the compelling narrative of our social dexterity to find peace and love in a world which often appears to be barren of these and many more beautiful things.

If we are to truly evolve into the super-conscious humans of a Golden Age then maybe it is time to start telling ourselves a different story.

We are each empowered as the writers of our own book where the chapters of our life unfold leaf by leaf formed of the belief that we can heal, create and co-create a better world one thought at a time.

It is perhaps the belief in one’s self that will ultimately determine the outcome of our success to elevate above and beyond the story of convention.

In personal terms, I have to know how to heal myself, be of service to myself before I can truly know how to be of service to others. How I feel, what I think and what I believe becomes the theoretical construct which defines me absolutely.

I have sole responsibility for changing the things in my life which no longer serve my highest good or the good of the collective.

If my beliefs become limiting then I have the choice to find the inner-strength, the courage and the emotional honesty to transform to a place where my own purpose is to know myself on an unconditional scale of love and happiness.

I call this place a place of ‘Dreams, Rainbows and Butterflies’ – it’s where I go to heal. Perhaps the acknowledgement of self-healing is the definitive belief, the key that unlocks the potential for each of us to release the fears of success and failure in pursuit of a Universal super-consciousness that teaches to trust life and know that anything is possible.

Belief as a topic has so much depth that I’d love to just sit down and talk about it with you all, and enjoy a soulful conversation where lots of inspiration flies around, not necessarily ending in some concrete results.

Preparing for this article, my analytical mind wanted to do some research, while my soul playfully suggested checking out the lyrics to some songs that have ‘Belief’ as a subject.

I personally believe in intuitive writing, and this is how each and every piece for Holistic Living Magazine has come to life. I just sit down in front of my keyboard and let the words flow out of me (after my brain does some research and distraction and other stuff).

So here I am, at my keyboard, shifting from mind wanting to offer well-researched specific information into heart and soul just letting it all flow.

Philosophers and psychologists have various definitions and descriptions of the term ‘Belief’, doing their best to phrase something that is rooted deeply inside us humans.

This core has so many conscious and subconscious levels, and it is strongly connected to our awareness of self and to our obeying the society that has shaped our value system and us.

Having lived this life for over 40 years now, I have shifted parts of my belief system a few times, and I feel it is a fluid and flexible thing that can expand, grow and change throughout the rest of my life.

My personal belief system is shaped through my practical experiences, my learning and my (sometimes challenging) need to adapt to society and the surroundings I find myself in.

Part of my beliefs is to question truths that are offered through society as general rules on how to live life. The way I was raised, I accepted what I was told as universal truth.

As I grew older, I looked at this frame of belief from a distance, and I realized that from my personal experience, there were certain matters I didn’t share anymore.

This was a process, and just by realizing what I didn’t accept as my truth anymore, I felt like stepping away from the society that has helped raise me.

But at the same time, I had an empty space where once a strong belief was, and now I needed and wanted to fill it with my own truth.

Fast forward to the present moment, the learning continues.

Through extensive conscious awareness training over the past twenty-odd years, I have come to a point where I accept that there is interdependence between society and me, and between the societal belief system and mine. And that’s ok too.

Experiencing true community in a society that is focused on rational results and successes has taught me there are good (and true) connections between the often cold and hard society and myself.

Practising to focus on love in all areas of my life has taught me there is always a beautiful spark, even in the messiest and darkest moments. Trusting in my inner wisdom, my intuition has brought me along on my individual path very nicely.

Being connected to society has taught me to be less influenced by what ‘they’ want and demand, and to be more influenced by what I need and want.

Taking my attention away from the outside world has taught me that there is so much beauty inside of me, which I sometimes still forget.

Focusing on being in a relationship with myself first has taught me that there are a lot of projections going on, and I don’t necessarily have to be part of these.

Taking away my personal projections, stripping soul-naked, has lost its dread and threat for me; as when I turn to myself, I see so much I can enjoy and work with instead of focusing my attention elsewhere, trying to fix anybody or anything that is out of my control.

The concept of fear that is still so widespread in our world today still touches me deeply, yet I look from a distance and make a conscious decision of letting certain fears into my body-mind-soul system.

As our world and societies change and grow constantly, I have understood that change and growth is possible in me constantly also. Being a mother of two and a stepmother of three, I am aware that my actions leave an impression on the children in my care.

The values and beliefs I am living are shaping those children, and hopefully will instil a positive impact in them. Being honest with myself and in consequence with the world around me has become a vital part of my belief system.

Finding balance between body, mind and soul has become a regular practice over the years, and is a lesson I am still learning. I have understood that I can learn something new for the rest of my life, in all areas of my life.

Working on my self-confidence with self-awareness has become part of my purpose and helps me healing the wounds that I have uncovered. Finding new layers of joy when peeling off old layers of pain is part of the work I do, with my clients and myself.

Work has become a playful activity for me, rather than something I have to do and dread going to. The world is my playground – if and when I choose to see it that way.

Many people have said many wise things about belief, I’d like to quote two very inspiring musicians here; First, Annie Lennox, who offers this: ‘I believe in the power of creation, I believe in the good vibration, I believe in love alone yeah, yeah’ And second, R. Kelly who puts it very beautifully: ‘I believe I can fly, I believe I can touch the sky’.

What do you believe?

Alohaaa! I’m writing some of this month’s article about beliefs, from the beautiful location of the Hawaiian Islands. I’ve had the absolute privilege to feel the love that exudes from these people that have such a long deep tie to spirit.

They are respectful, they have learned many beliefs about their land, culture and ancestors. I’ve listened to guides that share stories about how the sky, islands, water, stars, moon and sun were created.

Tradition and cultures hold many beliefs. These have been passed down through many generations, with many stories and their beliefs about life, myths, and spirit.

What Are Beliefs?

What determines your beliefs? A simple question, but one that can have such have a monumental effect in response! What are beliefs?

We are hearing this more and more in our lives, because we realise who we are comes from how we were brought up, by the people around us, our parents, family etc. and how they influenced our lives.

The beliefs that we hold in our consciousness are literally shaping our realities every single moment.

Everything that you do from people, places and interactions are merely a reflection of the vibration that you are offering to the universe and what is bought up from your subconscious beliefs.

We are amazing beautiful vessels that hold and carry our souls throughout life.

“You create your own universe as you go along” ~ Winston Churchill

When you dive in deeply, and you consciously examine the beliefs that you have around certain universal themes, you have a miraculous opportunity to remove any blocks that might be standing in between your hindering patterns and achieving your dreams.

The things that you currently have in your life are because of the value you place on those things. As the saying goes, ‘energy flows where attention goes’.

More than likely if something isn’t working for you, then you haven’t been giving it the positive love and energy that it requires in order to thrive.

The True You

Your belief systems are a fundamental key to understanding who you are, what family values are and how you connect and receive communication about yourself. These are our truths, what you believe to be true about yourself. There is no right or wrong, no good or bad, it just is.

When you live an experience of happiness, joy, peace, love, your soul grows, it blossoms.

When someone tells a story or lies about something, it’s not possible to make it a truth because it hasn’t been experienced.

If you share that lie and embellish it by changing the truth and you have to recall it, you don’t have the capacity to know that truth because you really didn’t live it, it’s not part of the true you.

Yet some people are not aware of their existence (beliefs) and never give a thought about them, and this is what shapes your world around you.

We Are Programmed To Receive

Your core beliefs are what you assume to be your reality. Your truths.

Childhood conditioning or programming is important, in that a child has this ability of soaking up (like a slurpee sponge) words, actions, emotions and this shapes what they become and what they believe. What a joy to watch toddlers grasping new experiences and seeing the exhilaration on their faces.

Everything is done in bewilderment and pure love.

Look at a child, their mind is untainted, it’s open to receive everything as that experience and integrate their learning to be part of their life.

A negative belief can be unconsciously locked within your subconscious mind, and will be consciously attracted to your experiences to let you know the belief exists. Not everyone’s beliefs are the same and we don’t attract the same circumstances into our energy.

An example of a negative belief can be the belittling words from a teacher who ridicules a child and tells them they are stupid and they should keep their opinions to themselves!

This negative belief can develop into, ‘Well I’ll just keep that to myself because no one will listen to what I have to say”=, or when a parent uses the, ‘A child should be seen and not heard’ scenario, this can be turned into a belief of not being valued or a feeling of, I’m not worthy.

Who didn’t have this experience bought to them when they were bought up?

Our Belief System Changes As We Evolve

As we grow, and search within, our soul knows exactly who we are. It’s learning to reprogram those beliefs and let go of what isn’t helping you to live spiritually as the authentic you.

For me I know within my soul, my deep utter beliefs have changed and I’m so different now. I can see it so clearly, and as mentioned, I was not aware of their existence before. I’m releasing so much from what I believed, whilst growing up and it really doesn’t fit with who I am today.

When profiling a client with the Forensic Healing System we test for one (1-18) of the Negative Belief System categories. It’s surprising how this stands out when a client assesses their life, recalling from childhood, it can reflect how this has had an impact on them emotionally.

If you feel you are being held back in life through your belief systems, to releasing and reprogramming your new beliefs, I love to share this deep gratifying healing system with you.

~ When we live in the power of love, then and only then will we know the truth ~

Forensic Healing is a proven therapy system superior to all healing modalities, because it:

• Profiles the client, identifying negative life patterns, archetypes, emotions, belief systems, and much more.
• Clears curses, negative energies, rituals, and many other spiritual issues.
• Activates spontaneous healing forces in the body for immediate changes.
• Removes the negative conditioning stored in the DNA or cell memory.
• Uses healing secrets from ancient healing scripts combined with the most-advanced scientific methods.
• Utilizes healing pathways that use physical, emotional, energetic or spiritual elements.
• Heals deeply at a soul level by targeting soul facets, fragments, DNA etc.
• Places a blessing on the client at the end of a healing.
• Educates and empowers the client to understand themselves so they leave with new information to progress in their life.

“I will believe it when I see it.” How many times have you heard someone say this statement or maybe you have even thought it for yourself about a person, situation or something in life? This concept comes from a totally disempowered place.

“Only when something outside of myself shows me something different will things become better”. How many times has a person or situation ever “changed” or proven you wrong? Likely, not too many.

As with many of the common expectations we put upon the world and our lives, for example the notion of needing physical proof of change in something outside of ourselves first, we get back to front.

The world is a mirror or our internal reality. You can’t change what you are seeing in the mirror by cleaning the mirror – e.g. we need to wash our face so then the reflection we see looks different.

We can only experience what we desire in our life (or, on a larger scale, the world) when we create the change within and believe it to be so first. First comes belief, then reality follows.

It starts within us and then materializes into the physical. Thought then thing. An architect imagines what they want to create, draws up blueprints, then builds it. Only then does it actually “become real”. This hierarchy is the same for everything.

Believe It …Then You Will See It!

We live in a world of creation, free will and choice (conscious or otherwise) which underpins what is created – always. The outcome of this is our life and experiences within it.

Understanding the vital role our beliefs serve in this creation, how they work, and how we can use them to experience a higher quality existence is absolutely the KEY.

If we aim to create from a point of conscious empowerment rather than unconscious victimhood, we truly can have the best life possible – NOW.

Are you experiencing your “best life”? Is everything in your life the way you truly desire it to be? To move from where you are to where you want to be may be as simple as changing what you believe.

Have you ever thought of what is going on in your life right now – whether it’s “good” or “bad,” as the reflection of a belief you hold? Have you ever wondered why you believe what you do, or thought about how your beliefs have an effect day to day?

Like an architect, ultimately, you are what will create. You can create anything in your life by understanding and utilizing different beliefs for what they are – tools to comprehend and directives to create.

A belief itself is benign, a chain of thoughts concluding a predictable outcome in service of the mind. “This is a hat” “this is hot” etc. A belief is an instrument used so the mind can understand what is what.

It is a type of data that validates itself via reflective self-perpetuation. Because I believe this, I will see and seek only that which proves myself right – I am this and so IT is. Have you heard the saying, “to a hammer, everything is a nail?”

By nature, a belief can only “see” itself and things around it, respond in relation to what it is. Everything around it must validate whatever the belief is by necessity for it to even exist.

Another way to explain this is to see a belief like a coloured lens, everything becomes the colour of the lens (belief) as this is the filter which we see through.

So, no matter what, if you believe it, you will see it. What “belief lens” are you looking through? And are you curious about what things might look like through a new set of beliefs?

“I will always be loved.” “I will never be loved.” “Life just isn’t fair.” “Everything happens in service of the greater good.” “Everyone is always here to support me.” “No one supports me.” “The world is coming to an end.”

“The world is changing for the better.” These are all just beliefs – try them on or take them off. You can see them in your life when you subscribe to them and can change your subscription at any time.

Choice

Like a programmed computer, we have sets of beliefs formatted into folders in our brain about every facet of life – relationships, finances, health, work, etc. These folders contain the information we have recorded through life exposure – be it inherited or constructed.

If these folder contents are updated, new data can be accessed (resulting in new, different, and likely better experiences). If not, we will simply be restricted to old data and only be capable of recreating what has been experienced in the past.

You may have heard people talk about how we repeat patterns until we “learn the lesson” – maybe the biggest lesson is to look inside for a new belief programme when we are stuck. Trust that you have the answers within you. You just find them.

All For One & One For All?

We are all living inside of the cumulated construct of our collective beliefs systems and individually within a map created by our point of focus inside of these.

If we ever want to see or experience a different reality, the only place to go is INSIDE each of our mindscapes. Shifting your point of focus gives you a new perspective, and with it, a new set of beliefs. As we change inside, the outer world changes too …. Everyone affects everyone else – #ripple #butterflyeffect

Power In Numbers

The more we resonate to or adopt certain qualities of beliefs, the more magnetism in the creation of what those beliefs dictate comes into the larger reality.

It’s like an equation; 1 individual’s reality + all other’s realities = “the real world”. The “real world” is predicated on the materialization of mass.

Although each of us is unique and exists within our own reality and will inevitably see things differently based on our individuality, because we are all connected and operate within the same fields of consciousness, we all affect everyone else.

The more energy/power/people who share a similar belief system set, the more the map of creation is swayed to “become” that.

All for one, one for all. Imagine a world where each of us is truly valued, loved, healthy and happy, where there is abundance is experienced in all its forms – true peace, because in a world where there is abundance for all, there is nothing to fight for, only more to give “have” and EVOLVE into.

This may seem a little airy fairy – I agree, but it is merely a possible application of conscious empowered use of beliefs in the co-creation of experience.

Seek belief-programs inside yourself geared toward connectedness in all forms. Create that reality for yourself, and watch how the world shifts to reflect this reality back to you.

Seeing every human as equal, each holding a piece of the puzzle of wholeness, a specific set of beliefs, holding a vibratory potency.

The more individuals who subscribe to higher quality beliefs, the more magnetism is created, allowing others to follow suit making the puzzle itself more beautiful.

We are all just energy. And the totality of the energy is affected by each of us and changes as we change ourselves.

When we believe in disconnection, we perceive all the belief systems, which fuel, validate and recreate that concept. So, the creation and recreation of that can also be tapped into and lived out – free will and choice.

We co-create and can always create change, no matter what the beliefs are stating. They are benign programmes which become obsolete when no one uses them. Like anything within the 3-Dimensional world, a lineal bookend can be applied to belief systems.

There are a specific number of facets to the human experience – security, safety, love, relationships, communication and within these aspects of life the way we experience each of these facets can be broken down into a simplified scale of the dualities, FEAR and DOUBT, and LOVE and TRUST.

These are the poles of the spectrum through which our perceptions are coloured. What end of the spectrum is driving the different areas of your life?

Answers

After decades of curiosity, seeking answers, and desiring self-awareness, the dissection of the human psyche has taken many forms, and a variety of formulas for changing human behaviour a multitude of practices have been created.

You may have heard of NLP, psycho-therapy, Kinesiology or even Hypnosis – these techniques focus on principles of empowerment and operate to access the source inside the mind of the individual and affect change in their outer reality. In effect, they change beliefs to change people’s realities.

So, what does this mean for you? What does your current reality look like?

If you could change one thing in your life, what would it be, and what would you need to believe to make it so? In answering this question, we have, to some degree, identified what you currently believe, and this is exactly why that area of your life is the way it is.

Change your belief and your reality will change by default, this is the natural order. Of course, it can sometimes be complex to “change” a belief that has been programmed in your “hard drive” (brain) as it has been done so for a reason.

Identifying why you adopted this belief in the first place will assist you in releasing it. Look at it like monkey bars, your mind needs something new to grab on to before letting go, but it can’t let go unless it is safe to do so on a primitive level.

Our beliefs act as the psychological corner stone of the evolution of the mind.

Just as our physical body has adapted to environmental changes to survive, our mental selves have simultaneously evolved, and the beliefs we hold are the bi-product of that.

You can always seek assistance from professionals who have dedicated their lives to learning how to navigate the constructs of the mind. That is what we do!

On a biological level, just as the immune system adapts to environmental changes within the body, each of us adapts to changes in our environment as well.

Each of us creates the external environment as we are the source of what is mirrored back to us. There is no need to fear what we see in the mirror, as by simply believing in a NEW reflection, we create one. Shall we?

Each individual woman’s belief systems surrounding her ability to give birth to her baby can have a significant and lasting impact on her direct experience of pregnancy and birthing.

Core beliefs in relation to childbirth can take on a pivotal role in shaping the care providers she will align with and indeed the type of birth she is likely to experience. Before we begin to discuss beliefs surrounding childbirth…

What Exactly Is A Belief?

Beliefs are commonly defined as inward convictions; they are what you hold as truth at the core of your inner being. A belief is both mental and emotional in nature, it is the power of our beliefs that generally motivates us into purpose and action.

Our beliefs are established and stored within the realms of our subconscious mind. This is what Dr Bruce Lipton, Cellular Biologist, has to say about the subconscious mind;

It is interesting to note that Dr. Lipton includes the last trimester of pregnancy as being inclusive of this period of intensive downloading we go through in the development of our subconscious beliefs and patterns as young humans.

It is often at this late stage of a woman’s pregnancy that she begins to really contemplate and experience fear and trepidation regarding the imminence of her birthing day.

All too often as her tummy expands, she is confronted by others who relay traumatic birth stories and their own fears about birth, the relentless and unrealistic portrayal of childbirth by the media can be a stark confirmation of her unconscious beliefs and fears about the intensity of labour and unfortunately many care providers are also guilty of imparting a lack of confidence in the women they are attending based on their own beliefs and experiences of birth.

So as you can imagine, there is a huge morphogenetic field containing many often unhelpful and disempowering beliefs in childbirth that a pregnant woman has to navigate on her journey to motherhood, some of which could have even been established in her as far back as her own visceral experience as a baby in her mother’s womb.

As we discussed before, mothers beliefs about birth are shaped by the implicit or explicit information she has received from her family, her peers, the media and any health practitioners she may have utilized.

It is often the combined influence of these groups that can reinforce unhelpful beliefs about birth and mothers who identify with these beliefs can go on to carry a huge burden of fear and disempowerment throughout their pregnancies.

The expectation that birth is going to be extremely difficult and painful can cause high levels of catecholamine hormones and overall physical tension in the body, which when sustained in pregnancy and into the labour process means, you guessed it, her birth generally can become quite painful and difficult.

What the mind believes tends to be realized.

A study involving Australian and Swedish women conducted from 2007-2009 aimed to investigate the prevalence and impact of fear on birthing outcomes in two cohorts of pregnant women from Australia and Sweden and to explore the birth attitudes and beliefs of these women.

In this Australian and Swedish study, the women involved were categorised into three attitudinal profiles: ‘Self determiners’, ‘Take it as it comes’ and ‘Fearful’ according to their attitudes about childbirth held during mid pregnancy.

The ‘Self-determiners’ cluster contained the highest proportion of women. They had the highest percentage of unassisted vaginal birth of the three profiles.

These women showed firm opinions on the range of attitudes and beliefs. They were not afraid of childbirth and importantly they were the only group who showed strong agreement that birth was a natural event.

Women in the ‘Take it as it comes’ cluster were identified as a vulnerable group for an operative birth.

Why? Because this group were less likely to have researched their options for birth and the role of different care providers and the importance of critical thinking and decision making processes in labour.

Belonging to the ‘Fearful’ cluster had a negative effect on the women’s emotional health during pregnancy and increased her likelihood of preferring and actually having an operative birth and also increased the odds of having an epidural if they did go into labour.

Of these three profiles, the presence of fear linked to a belief that birth was difficult and painful had the most negative impact on women’s emotional health, feelings about pregnancy and parenting and experience of birth.

The results of this study suggest that attitudes and childbirth related fear are very important factors related to birth outcome and that they should be more thoroughly explored by health professionals during the antenatal period than what they currently are today.

What is most evident from this study is that the fearful women who were more likely to receive interventions and to birth via cesarean when surveyed did not perceive or BELIEVE birth to be a normal and natural event.

So what if this lack of belief and mistrust of birth that leads to such fear and disempowerment could be addressed during pregnancy for these women? Could the birth outcomes for women holding high levels of fear and a lack of belief in normal birth be positively influenced?

The answer is unequivocally YES!!!

We can take back the power of our mind, especially our beliefs surrounding pregnancy and our ability to birth our babies. Just by identifying our beliefs we can facilitate changes in our emotions and behavior without it needing to be a struggle.

Through self-awareness and education, we can realise that the thoughts and beliefs held by our subconscious mind have become outdated.

Changing a core belief can be surprisingly easy, you simply shift your perspective and stop believing in it, a new perspective allows you to have that epiphany and new awareness that can completely transform the old belief you were holding.

The good news too is that your subconscious mind will also readily accept new beliefs to replace the old ones.

If during your pregnancy you wisely choose the education and caregivers to align with, you can replace inherited and unhelpful beliefs about childbirth easily.

Just as there is a huge morphogenetic field containing negative perspectives on childbirth, there is an equally large morphogenetic field of positive beliefs about childbirth nourished and fortified by ancestors and generations of women who have believed in their bodies and ability to birth powerfully and consciously.

Working with the Hypnobirthing AustraliaTM program, which teaches mindset and subconscious repatterning tools such as Hypnotherapy and the power of affirmations, has a tremendous impact in imparting positive birthing messages to women.

Using these tools, negative beliefs surrounding childbirth can then thankfully be transformed and embodied by women to read more like this…

If I leap from a tall building without a parachute I believe I am likely to be seriously injured or even die. I can believe that is what will happen because I am not a bird and can’t fly!

If I stop doing anything and sit on the couch day in and day out, I believe I will be happy. I can believe this because I am not happy now and just want to do nothing.

I believe that life is more than what I do every day. Go to bed, sleep, get up, eat, go to work, play, talk, go shopping, have a shower, visit friends and family and then do it all over again.

I can believe that it is true that there is much more to life and living than what I or you do every day, because when I was a child I could see people who weren’t like me or my family. I could see through them yet they were moving around.

And as I grew older I could not only see them but hear and talk with them. I had many occasions as a nurse when I saw spirit walking the passage ways, they seemed to be repeating the same path every day or night.

Over time I came to understand that the spirits I saw were in fact doing what I call “looping.”

They existed on a different plane of life, but only that it was like a time warp, and they relived their last days or even minutes of their physical life here and were essentially stuck in that loop.

I came to know how to help them by releasing them from the “loop” and in that my faith and belief in a higher power and different planes of existence was formed.

So what is a belief and how does it affect our life and who we are?

Your beliefs are first formed through your immediate family, were their belief systems are imposed upon you and this may be in teaching you right from wrong, what is accepted and not accepted and are set by the foundations of belief in your family environment.

As you grow and move through different circles of life you will experience other beliefs and belief systems.

You might adapt these new beliefs into your life or you may choose to form your own, thereby creating your own foundation of a belief system. Would there be any value to your life by designing your life by your beliefs?

Through my experience as a nurse and my practices as a Holistic Lifestyle Practitioner, I have seen that beliefs which are put upon a person in the family environment and are never challenged are often simply accepted as the way we are.

This leads to a foundation of belief in that family which can be detrimental.

An example which comes to mind is of a man who came to my wellness centre, he was 62 years of age, over weight, very unwell with several health issues including very high blood pressure. When I did his assessment he said he was on a high dosage of antidepressants.

I asked how long he had been taking the medication, he replied “Oh since I was 19”. I asked what had happened when he was 19 he looked puzzled and said “nothing at all, life was good”. I asked if he was happy with what he was doing at the time “yes” he said.

Then came the clanger, “It’s a family thing, my Mum has been on them all of her life and her Mum was and her Mum before her was on some sort of calming stuff”.

So this man believed that was what happened in his family, therefore he believed it was the way of life for him.

I have also worked with women who are habitual believers that they must go to the chiropractor every week and then believe they must take their children too.

When the children reached the age of 16 they were staunch in their belief that they must go to the chiropractor every week without fail.

So I put it to you that beliefs can be either a most amazing foundation on which you will build a life of trust, hope, joy, success, happiness and faith or a life of fear, uncertainty, illness, pain and constant struggle.

You see your beliefs determine how you look at life and how you react to situations and other people. As such your beliefs will directly affect your relationships and decision making process in all areas of your life.

Have you heard about the power of your thoughts in that “As he thinketh in his heart, so he shall be” which is from Proverbs in the Bible. This means that how you think about things, is how your life will be and your thoughts will be governed by your foundation of beliefs.

To have a closer look at this let’s consider the person who lives by their own very high personal beliefs and values. Most often they will be spoken of as “lucky”, “good fortune comes their way all the time”, “anything they put their hand to turns out well”.

And now to look at the person who believes they won’t do well in life because of the way their father was, their family never achieved anything, there was never enough money, and the list goes on.

The point is that this is the belief system held by this person and as such it is the constant thinking process and how they conclude every day of their life.

I have had female clients tell me that they won’t be able to have successful pregnancies because their mother had lots of miscarriages. This is a belief that is highly detrimental and yet accepted because that’s what mum has said.

This brings me back to my earlier mention that you may choose to design your own life by creating your own foundation of beliefs.

Interlaced with beliefs is personal values, I am often amazed at what people think are personal values. If you are not aware of your personal values it is most likely that you are living other people’s beliefs.

Beautifully intertwined in beliefs are some favourite “beliefs” of mine; Faith, Trust and Hope.

Many, many times over the years I have found that the people who struggle the most in everyday life and who succumb to serious illness or disease, are without a strong foundation of beliefs in anything other than what they can touch, see, feel, taste or hear.

My foundations of Belief being Faith, Trust and Hope can never be swayed because of the wonderful experiences I have had throughout my life.

Not only with communicating with the spirit of those who have physically left this world but with Angels, Deities, Ascended masters and other “beings.” The ability to use the energy of what I refer to as Gods Light or Divine light to heal and seeing the healing happen, not only for others but for myself, I can never deny.

Beliefs form who you are and what you stand for but even more importantly I feel that beliefs provide you with the opportunity to know you are never alone in this world and that there is more to life than what you do every day.

When I think of the word ‘beliefs’ I think of several things. What I would like to do for this article is to separate these thoughts out and place them into three distinct lines of thought and aspects.

The first one is ‘Self-Belief’, the second is ‘Belief in Other People’ and the final one is ‘Spiritual or Religious Beliefs’.

Self-Belief

For me, self-belief is one of the most empowering and necessary things that I can bring into my life. It is the one thing that I can work with every day as I engage with both myself and other people with my interactions, communications and connections.

Learning and putting into place new belief systems to replace the old ‘used by date’ beliefs, that may have been in my head for decades, is a constant activity for me.

Having a deep sense of self-belief enables me to do so much in my life. It enables me to be more courageous, more vulnerable, more adventurous and more emotionally open, empowered, connected and healthier – physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually.

Having a good sense of self-belief helps me to keep the doubts from forming less often. It helps me to stay more positive generally, which then ripples out around me.

In my work as a counsellor, psychotherapist and teacher I work a lot with people who lack this sense of self-belief. I see lots of clients, students and workshop participants who have a very negative view of themselves.

This is of no surprise if we take a moment to look at all the outer messages around us that point, show, tell, or determine how we should look, feel, act or even think.

From a very early age we are surrounded by these messages and if we are not guided and protected by our parents and educators from this and given positive reinforcing words to support, encourage and nurture us, then it is almost inevitable that we will have some self-belief issues.

The basic message from the advertising world is ‘You are not good enough (unless you buy and use our product)’.

These messages get implanted within our subconscious mind, as that is most often how the advertising is designed and we then act out from these messages to make ourselves more acceptable, desirable or beautiful.

Taking the time to do this, whilst consciously trying to steer away from the many artificial things that should make us look or feel better is often a challenge. Bringing ourselves back to who we are without our masks (clothes, make-up and all those other things that keep us out of self-love) can generally only be done if we have a mission to do so.

Otherwise it is easy to get caught up in the social conditioning and stay stuck. On some level, we are all in this world, but when it gets to the stage where self-belief is diminished to the point of alcohol or drug addiction, anxiety or obesity, then it has gone too far.

Sadly, this has become quite a normal thing for us to deal with in our western cultures. All too often I see people in these states of dis-ease and in the position of not loving themselves.

For many ‘denial’ comes into the picture. This is often true of people who are obese or with parents who have obese children. Not accepting or admitting that their obesity is an issue is often a clear sign that they are not loving themselves.

Denial is a very delicate issue to work with in the psychotherapeutic process, but one that is essential in supporting people to (re) enter the space of self-love.

In my profession, I work with hundreds of people a year to help them to find or restore their sense of self and it is very rewarding to see the results when they make the choice to change.

When people step more fully into themselves and find that (next level of) self-belief it is wonderful to see the sense of liberation and freedom that they receive. The inner celebration is obvious as I see their energy shift and the smile on their faces widen.

Seeing a client step back into my studio after a week or two of going to the gym, or giving up smoking, alcohol or marijuana is a great feeling. In these moments, I am truly rewarded in my work.

In my own life, I have a range of people that I believe in. They include all of the above. However, sometimes my belief in them can get challenged if I see or experience them doing something that does not fit in with my own personal belief or ideology, which can make it a challenge sometimes to keep them in the elevated position I once had them placed.

I am sure that is also true for people who have me as someone that they believe in when I am not in my truth or integrity. This is why I feel that it is so important for me to try and ‘walk my talk’ every day, which sometimes I do not always achieve as I struggle with my own inner challenges in life.

If I cannot challenge myself and learn to step into, and act of this truth, integrity and belief in myself then how can I feel any sense of self-love or self-belief. This is the cornerstone of all the work that I do on myself and the cornerstone of all that I try to teach my clients, students and workshop participants. This, for me, is the essence of self-belief.

Belief In Other People

Having a belief in other people is an interesting thing to contemplate. It is interesting to get a sense of who in our own lives we believe in. Who are these people? Why do we believe in them?

In my work, I have to believe in my clients. I have to believe that they want to change. I have to believe that they have the courage, the will and the energy to make the changes.

I have to believe that they and I will form a relationship to enable this to happen. If I do not carry this belief and set up a negative non-belief about it, the reality is, not much will change.

I find that when I work with people in this capacity I have to keep all judgement, negativity and any possible reactions right out of the picture. I must be very present and focused.

We also have various beliefs in people in our social, political, medical, scientific and spiritual realms and with our mentors, coaches, counsellors, idols and perhaps even our employers or bosses.

In these realms, it is about believing in someone who has, from our own perspective, a (slightly) higher standing than ourselves. It is directed at someone who we ‘look up to’ for guidance, support, help, encouragement, learning or inspiration.

Other people that we can find belief in could be our partner’s, our parents or other family members and of course our friends.

Having a belief in someone is a very empowering thing as long as it is not done in a co-dependant needy way. Having an inspiring person in our visualisations or meditations or on a picture or photograph can be a useful tool to use for our own growth.

My mentors and inspirational people include: Nelson Mandela and Rudolf Steiner and several close friends, my beautiful wife and all of my children.

Each of them help me to grow from the gifts that they bring me and from what I see them doing and achieving. When I am in need of some inspiration it is one of these that I often tune into.

Spiritual Or Religious Beliefs

This belief goes way outside of ourselves in one sense and way within ourselves on another. This belief is, for many people, based on a story; an imagination.

In the mainstream, especially from a more material scientific perspective, it is often very difficult to ‘prove’ the existence of such things as angels, spiritual entities or even a God.

Unless one has experienced something that one ‘knows’ is our own truth, then it is something that sits in the realm of belief. Knowing and believing are two separate things. We either ‘know’ what we have experienced or we ‘believe’ in it as a potential; as a possibility.

Even in this knowing, if it is not backed up by other people having the same real, measurable experience, it could be argued by others that it might be an imagination or a fantasy.

Having a spiritual or religious belief is generally something that we have come to have in our lives as a pathway of guidance or support. Moving from a community or institutional belief to the absolute inner knowing from within ourselves is what makes it a truth for us.

This is connected to the feeling of self-love, of self-belief. Without that deep sense of self-belief, it is not easy (or perhaps it is impossible) to hold this truth of spiritual or religious knowing.

Because of the nature and content of this magazine many of you readers will be ‘spiritual people’ and you will be either in a place of exploration, partial belief, full belief or in a place of knowing.

These are the steps people generally take on this journey as they get more and more trust in both themselves and the higher knowledges and the realms of the spiritual or religious worlds.

One of the most popular ‘images’ that we see and work with today in the ‘spiritual community’ are that of Angels. They are on cards, websites, flyers, car bumpers and even on supermarket products.

Going from the image of something like an Angel to the belief in their existence and then to the inner-knowing of their existence is quite a journey which would include the process of working through and into belief, faith, trust and knowing.

Where are the Angels in your own life? How real are they? Can you place them where they truly belong so that you are authentic in your own being, in your own life? How close are you to ‘knowing’ their existence from a real ‘seeing’ experience?

All in all, belief is something that we all have. One of the beliefs that I wish to add to end this article is the belief that I have in this magazine and in the vision of what Sharon White is holding for the development and growth of our Global Healing Exchange Community.

Adrian Hanks is a Teacher, Writer and Speaker. He lives in Sydney, Australia and travels and works nationally and internationally.