Tag Archives: power of thoughts

the secret to achieving your goals

Are you focused?

What would it take to actually achieve those goals you set at the beginning of the year?

Are you focused; or are you plagued with guilt over still carrying those extra pounds or not maintaining the original vigor you had to accomplish a specific career or relationship goal?

In a previous blog, I talked about how our subconscious mind has a set point, that brings us back to a pre-programmed belief about ourselves (whether it is in our weight, work or our relationships).

For most of us, those unconscious beliefs keep us stuck where we don’t want to be instead of heading where we’ve stated we want to go.

But there are ways to use this same mechanism to get what we do want, too.

The four steps for moving from a negative set point to a positive one are:

  1. Move your attention from what you do not want to what you do.
  2. Start to see yourself as having what you do want.
  3. Expect the good you want; not the bad you do not.
  4. Look for what is already good and be grateful for it.

I remember a friend telling a story about his first motorcycle ride in the Colorado mountains. Although an experienced rider, he said he was overly nervous and driving slower than the friend he was riding with. Finally, his friend pulled off the road at a overlook to talk. When they had both pulled over his friend looked him in the eye and said, “You will go off the edge if you keep looking at it. You have to look at where you want to go. It is the only way to drive these mountains safely.”

It is the same lesson in life as on that mountain road — if you keep looking where you don’t want to go, that is where you will end up. I notice it in every aspect of my life.

I remember hearing about this same concept in parenting classes years ago. My kids would promise to help with dishes or do some chore. I would notice that they didn’t do it. We would fight. They would do it reluctantly and then the cycle would start all over again. But when I would follow the recommendations to notice and thank them when they did do what I wanted, rather than focus on when they did not, I truly got more and more of what I wanted.

So whatever the goal — no matter how guilty you feel that you haven’t yet achieved it — start training your mind to look at the goal, not your current lack of it.

It really is simply a habit, the way we look at things. Like any habit, they become habits through repetition. So to change it we need to repeatedly change our view. I have been doing this for a year and by repeatedly moving my attention to my goal, and off my current results, I have noticed I am changing my set point. My rebound to old patterns is happening less and less.

It took years to set these old patterns of noticing what is wrong, so be persistent at reinforcing the new place you want to be.

I like to write my goal each morning as if it has already occurred. You might prefer recording yours, so you can listen to yourself saying it while driving. Either way, find ways to remind yourself to visualize your goal. And then when you notice you are thinking about your current result, remember the mountain road and readjust where you are looking!

Pick one or two things you have been trying to change and make a conscious effort to feed your mind the positive pictures and feelings of having already achieved it.

the power of your thoughts

Are you in your own way?

Do you wish things in your life were better? Different? Are you are getting in your own way?

I think everyone has things they want to see improve–whether in their career, relationships or health. Yet, I have noticed that these changes are slow and laborious, if they happen at all.

Does it feel that way to you? You go on a diet and the weight comes off slowly, but it comes right back. You go to counseling with your partner and things change for a while but then you find yourselves back in old patterns. Maybe you got a promotion at work a few years back but now feel stalled in this position.

I have learned a few things lately that can change this trajectory–or lack of one–for you and me. These tips can move you from slow and steady progress, with numerous setbacks, to quantum leaps towards the life you desire!

Did you know that our minds operate the same way a rocket gets to the moon or a plane on auto pilot gets back on course? It is through thousands of small adjustments that the rocket ship arrives at the moon, exactly on course–slightly off course the whole trip (always correcting.

Your mind works exactly the same way, only sometimes the course you keep resetting to is exactly the one you are trying to move off of.

Have you ever noticed someone who is finally making big improvements in their lives and then they sabotage themselves? You probably wonder why they would do that and comment what a shame it is that they did. It is because the good they were creating was not aligned to their internal belief about who they are or what they deserve, so their subconscious mind does what it takes to get them “back on course.”

It is called cybernetics, and Maxwell Maltz wrote a great book about it in the 1960s called “Psycho-Cybernetics” that describes this human tendency in detail. It is a thought provoking book, and if you haven’t read it you should.

The bigger question in your mind is probably how do you change your subconscious mind’s set point, so you can lose the weight, advance in your career or permanently improve your relationship.

It is really quite simple. There are three steps:

  1. Move your attention from what you do not want to what you do.
  2. Start to see yourself as having what you do want.
  3. Expect the good you want; not the bad you do not.
  4. Look for what is already good and be grateful for it.

We are going to look at these individually over the next few weeks. I will bring you tips and exercises to help you do each one because by changing your internal cybernetic mechanism you will be able to shift your life dramatically in the direction of your desires.

Are you ready to take a quantum leap?

I want to leave you with a quote from another fantastic book called You Squared (it actually is You with the 2 up high in the mathematical position of square which I simply cannot replicate in WordPress.)

The quantum leap is something you’ve been keeping from happening. It’s not something you have to struggle to make happen. You don’t really force it into existence…you just let it occur. The key is not to get in the way!

Here’s to getting out of our own way! I would love to here how it goes for you here or on my facebook page.