Most of our thoughts are recycled. That's good news if you are one of the few positive and optimistic thinkers around. However, that's not-so-good news if you are among the majority of folks who tend toward limited and small thinking. Even if you don't mean to be pessimistic, if what's running through your head is anything less than encouraging, you're constantly hearing negative ideas and opinions, and trust me, you're listening. Some of us have more baggage than others and some of us struggle to envision new ways. But in one way or another, if you're going to succeed with weight loss and changing your destructive patterns for good, you need to clear out the bad stuff in your mind and start anew. In the same way you established previous patterns of thinking, you now need to create new ones. Those negative messages didn't arrive there overnight. It took time and cultivation for them to grow strong. And of all the emotions that we can experience, there's not one more damaging and paralyzing to weight-loss success than guilt or shame. The negativity they cause can be enough to keep hope at bay, and you from realizing your true potential. What good could they ever offer you?
To succeed, you need to let go of any old, haunting beliefs about yourself. If you're courageous and face those things that bring you down, you can bring the healing emotions of compassion and acceptance into this process now. Compassion and acceptance of you - you and all of your humanness, your beauty and awkwardness, your failures and successes, and your life lived up to now - can be gained through your new soft and accepting eyes.
If you are open and willing to heal, you can let go of any history that no longer supports or aligns with who you are today and that better place where you are definitely headed.
Negative beliefs about yourself and your ability to succeed act as anesthesia to your sense of passion and confidence. They will sabotage your weight-loss efforts if you let them. It is important to work toward getting rid of as many negative thoughts in your mind as you possibly can. Here's an exercise to help you do just that.
In much the same way we use dental floss to clean our teeth, we can use a similar method to clean out our minds. Employing mental floss is a method for removing what is challenging us mentally and emotionally. To do it, you must first identify key habitual thought patterns that continually get in the way of your success.Watch your thoughts, day by day, and start to notice when negative things occur. Then, when those thoughts arise, I want you to remove them from your mind by transferring them to paper. By writing them down, you are better able to see and to disengage them - stare them straight in the eye.
At first it's tricky to even notice they're there, but after a while you'll be on a no-holds-barred thought rampage, and as you key into your mind more and more, you'll also notice that most of these mental messages are reflexive - they seem to come up at the oddest times, for no reason at all. But there is a reason somewhere, and know this, too: even if they seem errant, they will continue to come up and bring you down until you physically remove them and throw them away.
That's why you need to work at flossing your mind throughout your entire day, and as you do, you'll begin to see that your dialogue becomes empowering to you and to those around you, too. It's like becoming electric! You will see that your life quickly begins to reflect more of your true thinking and your true vision for your life. Continue to pay attention to yourself. You can even play games with this exercise to see how long you can go through your day, your week, and your month without being brought down or caught up in a belief or thinking pattern that is no longer true for you. You'll be amazed at what happens. You'll continually be able to go longer and grow stronger with your self-care, and your ability to transcend obstacles will strengthen in new ways.
This has been particularly true of my clients who were especially down or in a place where they had been beating themselves up pretty badly; of those who were very vulnerable to feeding their hurt with less than healthy foods.When they began to use this practice, not only did they quit beating themselves up but they were able to feed themselves with loving, supportive dialogue rather than food. Their hunger was met.
Remember, you are not your history. You are the present moment, and that is the greatest and most freeing thing you can ever know. Herein lies your ability to change and grow! Today you have the choice to make your life the way you'd like it to be. From your weight to your attitude to your relationships and how you interact with the world, you can either allow your history and all of its weight and disappointment to continue to direct your life as it always has or you can decide to show up new, open, and willing to let your potential move through you and express itself as you - no more buts about it!
Many times in our lives, our buts get in our way:
Our lists can go on and on, and often we don't even realize how many times we but our way right out of our own potential. But not anymore! This simple exercise is an opportunity to identify all of the buts in your life that you would like to get rid of. It's a chance to realize how often you make excuses and to make a positive shift in your life. Sit down and take inventory of any beliefs about yourself or any worn-out stories that you know are not supporting you now and where you want to be going. Write each of them down specifically and in detail. Where did the negative thinking come from? How long have you held on to that notion? How long have you been making that excuse? Once you've identified all the buts and limiting beliefs in your mind, bring them down to the end of your mental driveway and release them all. Envision a huge garbage truck taking each of those nonserving, outdated, fear-minded buts away for good. Practice this exercise whenever you need to lighten your load a little. Think of it as your going out of unfinished business sale!
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