A lot of the work that I do with my clients is around changing their thought patterns.
Why are our thoughts so important?
Thanks for asking!
Our thoughts are important for a number of reasons. First off, every thought that you think creates A corresponding chemical cascade within your body. For example, if you were a person who happened to be afraid of snakes and you thought you saw snake on the floor of the room that you're in right now, there would be all kinds of physical, psychological, emotional and chemical changes that would occur in your body. Your heart would beat more rapidly, your palms would sweat, your mouth would go dry - you're entering into the fight flight response. You are preparing to flee from the room or protect yourself against the snake. However, if you realized it wasn't a snake at all but rather, an extension cord, all of those responses would go away. Your heart would return to its normal rate. Your poms would be dry again, your mouth moist. You might even laugh at yourself for thinking it was a snake in the first place period now you're releasing endorphins, serotonin, all the feel good hormones. And the point is, it didn't matter if there was a snake there or not. All of those reactions, good or bad, were created by your thoughts.
You can be in a perfectly calm and safe environment but, through the power of your thoughts, create a reaction as though you were in a threatening space. Our nervous system doesn't know what's going on out there in the world. It relies on certain cues to know what to turn on or off. One of those cues is your thinking.
Another reason why our thoughts are so important is that the subconscious is constantly listening to our internal chatter. Your subconscious runs 90 to 95% of your behavior. And the subconscious does whatever it is programmed to do. The subconscious is not the rational, thinking, analytical part of the mind. If you tell yourself something over and over, your subconscious will eventually take it in and create that very outcome. What you tell yourself, therefore, becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. Your subconscious doesn't know to censor a negative message or giving you ourselves or argue back and say “that isn't true!” Your subconscious just receives whatever it is you tell yourself and then generates that outcome in your life.
Another reason why our thoughts are so important is that they determine our behavior. The approach I take in hypnosis is very much a cognitive behavioral therapy approach. In cognitive behavioral therapy, there is a theory that it's not the events that occur in our lives that cause us our suffering, it's what we tell ourselves about the events. It's the meaning we attach to those events. And this is good news when you think of it because although we cannot change the events that occur, we do have a certain amount of control over what we tell ourselves about those events.
Let me give you an example. Two people might lose a job. The first person says to themselves, “how could I let that happen? I'm such a loser. I'm going to end up on the street. This is the worst thing that could ever happen to me”. With that kind of thinking, this person is going to feel down and depressed and have very little energy to change their situation. Another person might have the same event, the loss of a job, but they tell themselves something different. They say, “what if this is happening for me instead of two me? What if this is the universe freeing me up to do something I enjoy even more? Maybe this is an opportunity to meet new people, travel, learns the new skills, make more money. Maybe this is an opportunity for me to get out of something that wasn't quite right for me and find something that's a better fit”. It's the same event but with this type of thinking, the person is going to have way more energy and ability to change their situation than the first person would.
Again, it comes down to our thoughts. We can look at an event from several different angles and choose a way of framing it that feels good. Not everybody looks at events in the same way. Some people suffer and some people don't. And those who suffer do so because of what they're telling themselves about the event that has occurred in their lives.
And so our thoughts are hugely important. They contribute to our Physiology, our choices, our decisions and behaviors. They become our self fulfilling prophecy. They determine what we do or do not achieve in our lives.
If you struggle with thoughts that are not helpful and you'd like to change to a more uplifting or inspiring frame of mind, contact me! I'd love to help you out
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