Fitness Experts

What do I do now? Do I visualize my goals or work on repeating my new beliefs? I also took the list of limiting beliefs and made a new list called 'self enhancing beliefs'. This is the list of beliefs that I am wondering if I should affirm everyday until they sink in. Should I do this BEFORE affirming my goals?


We could break this down into 2 major steps, 2 quick questions and 4 ways to challenge a limiting belief.

STEP 1: IDENTIFY LIMITING BELIEFS

We're well aware of some of our beliefs because beliefs about spirituality or politics or animal rights any other topic are the types of beliefs that are usually conscious.

But the beliefs that affect us the most in our physical development are NOT conscious. They are unconscious.

So the first step, which you've already done, is to make sure you've flushed them all out. For our readers who haven't done this yet, here's how:

2 Quick Questions Will Draw Out Your Beliefs

It pays to do this as a formal "exercise" with serious quiet time and pen and paper.

Question #1. What causes me to be overweight (or unhealthy, not having body I want, etc)?

Question #2. What's preventing me from getting leaner?

Spend some time with it.

Consider the answers; what you may come up with may be legitimate issues that you can deal with or which you have no control over, but either way, you will also see limiting beliefs flushed out through this questioning process.

Example: "I can't because I have no time, I'm too old, I can't stop eating, I hate exercise, You just can't do it when you have 4 kids, after a hip replacement, it's impossible... And so on....

Thing is, those are not accurate facts. Those are beliefs (negative thought patterns) that hold you back.

STEP 2: CHALLENGE THOSE BELIEFS

How do you challenge a belief? 4 ways:

1. Challenge it directly: is it even valid at all? See if you can find a counter example. For example; you think that when you've had 3 or 4 kids you cant get a nice flat stomach, meet Maxine or Bonnie or any one of our other super fit moms who have been profiled within the Inner Circle.
   
   Now... if they did it, then how could this belief be valid? Answer: It WASN'T valid! Your belief wasn't true. You were believing in something false and inaccurate and it was holding you back!
   
   Out of all the psychological techniques that we can apply to create belief change, I have never found a way easier or better than finding role models that are counter-examples, therefore dis-proving a limiting belief.
2. Challenge the source: is it your belief, or have you been living what someone else handed down to you? Just the realization that a belief wasn't yours to begin with is enough to shatter it.
3. Challenge the usefulness of the belief. Ok so you believed something before, does still believing it has any usefulness today? Does it help you move closer to what you want in your life?
4. Challenging the belief by weighing the consequences. If you keep this belief what is it going to cost you? what will the pain be like? What will you miss? And what will these consequences be if you don't change it NOW?
   
   Last but not least, You're RIGHT about "deservability." So start with an affirmation every day that "I deserve it."

Keep in mind that affirmations alone won't do it in the case of having feelings of unworthiness. You MUST take massive action. The more action you take, the more you will feel "worthy" of receiving.

That's why it's harmful to seek something for nothing; you can't get something for nothing in the long run anyway, but even if you could, you would not feel worthy.

There would be an incongruous feeling inside you and you'd sabotage yourself... kind of like those lottery winners who win a million dollars overnight, but they never became millionaires (in their mind/self image), so they blow the money faster than they got it...

You can create affirmations about all kinds of things and work on them at the same time - things you want to change, get, improve, attract. Goals get turned into affirmations. Beliefs can be written as affirmations.

Affirmations are simply stating your goals or your desired empowering belief in a way that your subconscious mind is receptive to.

The difference between a belief affirmation and a goal affirmation is that goals all have end points. Beliefs don't. Most of your empowering beliefs you will want to keep. But when a goal is achieved, you have to set new ones.

So when you've found that belief that you know is limiting you, write an affirmation for what belief you would want / need to hold instead. Read it right along with your goals every day. Keep it up until you start to see your behavior change and your results fall in line with what you want.

If you're diligent, you will see changes in attitude and behavior with 21-30 days. It may take longer if you've carried deep, lifelong, life-impacting limiting beliefs, but the roots of the new pattern will be formed.

Then you can move on to another goal or belief you want to work on... and the effect of changing a few beliefs one after another can be nothing short of life-transforming.

Train hard and expect success,

Tom Venuto
Author of "Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle"
Burn the Fat Inner Circle

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