Mastering Your Thoughts for Success - Step One: "Freeze-Frame"

Success is a "recipe" made up of a number of necessary ingredients. For example, although success may begin with a dream, mere dreaming alone is not enough to achieve success. Other key components include: passion, determination, taking daily action, the ability to learn from your mistakes, creating a plan and re-creating that plan if need be.

Where do our thoughts come into achieving success?

From the time we began to think and assimilate our world when we were children, our thoughts were influenced by people around us, usually our parents or the folks who raised us. If we were fortunate enough to have positive influences in those impressionable years, our own thoughts will likely have evolved into positive self-messages.

But, most of us were not raised with a steady stream of positive, self-affirming messages. In fact, many of us were raised with messages that were essentially fear-based. And as the years went by, we were also influenced by a wider circle of people such as teachers, friends, employers, partners, etc. who also had their own limiting thoughts.

Back in the mid-1980s, Tony Robbins was teaching people to empower themselves by doing a "firewalk", remember? He actually guided groups of people through a series of exercises in just 4 days that enabled them to walk over A BED OF HOT COALS without getting hurt.

A miracle? Yes and no. Yes, on one hand we can call it a miracle because our BELIEFS tell us that if we walk over a bed of hot coals, our feet will get burnt to a crisp! No, it is not a miracle because the beliefs of the people who participated were altered.

This is valuable information.

OK, where does that process of changing our beliefs start?

Before you can begin to change what your limiting beliefs and thoughts are, you have to know WHAT they are.

You have to "freeze-frame" your thoughts.

Think of it this way: your thoughts are like the frames of a film that go zooming at high speed through the "camera" of your mind. These thoughts appear on the screen of your brain only for a second and sometimes only for a fraction of a second. They are the old, conditioned beliefs that were "programmed" into us way back when we were still toddlers.

The thoughts seem to be automatically triggered by an external event - it's as though a switch is thrown inside of us that immediately sends a message to our brain to release this stream of thoughts and beliefs. The result is that we react rather than act.

The key is to slow the film down enough to catch the frame of the thought - freeze-frame it.

Let's use a simple example to illustrate this. You call a friend to say hello with the intent of getting together with them and when you ask how they are, the response is curt. Your friend cuts the conversation short and you are left holding the phone, confused and wondering what just happened.

The film in your brain has started to run. Your thoughts are coming fast and furious. You think, "Maybe I said something wrong." Your next thought may be something like, "I guess that relationship is over." Fill in your own blanks from here - the list goes on and on.

However, this is the critical moment during which we must catch and freeze-frame those thoughts, for they are the old, inhibiting ones we need to get rid of. Notice them. Become aware of them. Become acutely aware of them, even if you're uncomfortable doing so, for this is the beginning of the process of change.

Then, take it one step further: ask yourself what the beliefs are behind the thoughts you just had - dig a little deeper. You may come up with: "No one likes me", "I have no real friends", "People are not trustworthy, thoughtful, kind, etc." You may be really squirming now but stay with it - this is well worth the few moments of discomfort. Write them down immediately.

These core beliefs, implanted in us years ago, are the power behind the engine that drives that seemingly automatic stream of negative thoughts.

But, if ordinary people like you and me can learn to walk over a bed of hot coals in just 4 days, think of what the process of becoming aware of your limiting thoughts and changing them can do over a period of months and years.

You CAN change them, but that is a topic for the next article so stay tuned!