8 Subconscious Behaviors That Are Keeping You From Having the Life You Want

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brianna-wiest/8-subconscious-behaviors-that-are-keeping-you-from-having-the-life-you-want_b_7949578.html

1. You believe that creating your best possible life is a matter of deciding what you want and then going after it, but in reality, you are psychologically incapable of being able to predict what will make you happy.

Your brain can only perceive what it's known, so when you choose what you want for the future, you're actually just re-creating a solution or an ideal of the past. Ironically, when said ideas don't come to fruition (things never look the way we think they will) you suffer, because you think you've failed, when really, you're most likely experiencing something better than you could have chosen for yourself at the time. (Moral of the story: Living in the moment isn't a lofty ideal reserved for the zen and enlightened, it's the only way to live a life that isn't infiltrated with illusions... it's the only thing your brain can actually comprehend.)

2. You extrapolate the present moment because you believe that success is somewhere you "arrive," so you are constantly trying to take a snapshot of your life and see if you can be happy yet.

You accidentally convince yourself that any given moment is your life, when in reality, it is a moment in your life. Because we're wired to believe that success is somewhere we get to - when goals are accomplished and things are completed - we're constantly measuring our present moments by how "finished" they are, how good the story sounds, how someone else would judge the summary. (If at any point you find yourself thinking: "is this all there is?" you're forgetting that everything is transitory. There is nowhere to "arrive" at. The only thing you're rushing toward is death. Accomplishing goals is not success. How much you learn and enjoy and expand in the process of doing them is.)

3. You assume that when it comes to following your "gut instincts," happiness is "good," and fear and pain is "bad."

When you consider doing something that you truly love and are invested in, you are going to feel an influx of fear and pain, mostly because it will involve being vulnerable. When it comes to making decisions, you have to know that bad feelings are not deterrents. They are indicators that you want to do something, but it scares you (which are the things most worth doing, if you ask me). Not wanting to do something would make you feel indifferent about it. Fear = interest.

4. You needlessly create problems and crises in your life because you're afraid of actually living it.

The pattern of unnecessarily creating crisis in your life is actually an avoidance technique. It distracts you from actually having to be vulnerable or held accountable or whatever it is you're afraid of. You're never upset for the reason you think you are: at the core of your desire to create a problem is simply the fear of being who you are, and living the life you want.

5. You think that to change your beliefs, you have to adopt a new line of thinking, rather than seek experiences that make that thinking self-evident.

A belief is what you know to be true because experience has made it evident to you. If you want to change your life, change your beliefs. If you want to change your beliefs, go out and have experiences that make them real to you. Not the opposite way around.

6. You think "problems" are road blocks to achieving what you want, when in reality, they are pathways.

If you haven't heard it before, Marcus Aurelius sums this up well: "The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way." Ryan Holiday explains it even more gracefully: "The obstacle is the way." Simply, running into a "problem" forces you to take action to resolve it. That action leads you down the path you had ultimately intended to go anyway, as the only "problems" in your life ultimately come down to how you resist who you are and how your life naturally unfolds.

7. You think your past defines you, and worse, you think that it is an unchangeable reality, when really, your perception of it changes as you do.

Because experience is always multi-dimensional, there are a variety of memories, experiences, feelings, "gists" you can choose to recall... and what you choose is indicative of your present state of mind. So many people get caught up in allowing the past to define them, or haunt them, simply because they have not evolved to the place of seeing how the past did not prevent them from achieving the life they want... it facilitated it (see: the obstacle is the way). This doesn't mean to disregard or gloss over painful or traumatic events, but simply to be able to recall them with acceptance and to be able to place them in the storyline of your personal evolution.

8. You try to change other people, situations and things (or you just complain/get upset about them) when anger = self-recognition.

Most negative emotional reactions are you identifying a disassociated aspect of yourself. Your "shadow selves" are the parts of you that, at some point, you were conditioned to believe were "not okay," so you suppressed them and have done everything in your power not to acknowledge them. You don't actually dislike these parts of yourself, though, you absolutely love them. So when you see somebody else displaying one of these traits, it absolutely infuriates you, not because you inherently dislike it, but because you have to fight your desire to fully integrate it into your whole consciousness. The things you love about others are the things you love about yourself. The things you hate about others are the things you cannot see in yourself.

This is so recognizable. Some are like busted, didn't even realize that, others are check, yes I am aware of these things these days.

Great post Kazoo, thank you for sharing
Can you think of any examples for #5? What sort of experiences?

Hey lunar,

I can't say 100% what the author meant but I do know that on my "journey" I've come across an approach that takes kinda the opposite approach to LoA.  Where LoA emphasizes changing thoughts to change behaviors, there is also a "behavioral" approach that says that if you want to change your thoughts, you can do so by changing your behaviors.

I think tackling an issue from both angles can be really effective.

Not sure if it's the best example, but say you always wanted to be an artist.  Like not as a career or anything but just wanted to do it as a hobby.  But when you were a kid you told yourself (or you were told by others) that you just weren't artistic.  So you carried that belief around but the desire never went away.  Well, you could try to re-train your thinking but of course if you also took art lessons and stuck with them- even if you weren't very good to start- you'd probably end up believing you had some artistic ability after a while.  Make sense?

Another example I can think of is I've been a fan of the Australian version of the Biggest Loser.  In every season, as part of their journey they take the contestants to another location and have them do some sort of experience where they have to confront some fear.  They make it different for different people but usually it involves some sort of bungee jumping, sky diving or something like that (with fear of heights being common...) that helps the contestant tap into some reserves within themselves that they didn't even know that they possessed and the experience ends up being transformative and helps them change the way they think about themselves.

Or another example would be if someone who didn't feel very confident about their looks went and got some "glamour shots" done where they had others help them bring out their beauty and make the most of their appearance  and photograph it so that they could see themselves differently and begin to build some confidence.

It's hard to keep thinking you aren't artistic if you have artwork that you've done that proves otherwise. It's hard to think you're not capable of changing when you've confronted a fear in a badass way, and it's hard to keep thinking you're not attractive if you have photographic evidence that shows you're actually hot stuff!

Thank you Kazoo, that makes sense Facing fears does take you to a new level and actually even a smallest experience can completely change your mindset, if it's accomplishing something that you before believed to be impossible.

For example, when I was in school, I sucked in all sort of handicraft stuff, so I believed I just can't do anything along the lines, can't sew, can't knit and all that. Then once when I was 22 I was home sick and bored and for some reason I found some knitting supplies in the attic and started knitting. And I didn't stop until I had knitted a 2 meter multicolor scarf lol.
It was the simplest thing but somehow because it was something I believed was impossible for me to do, it lifted my whole mindset into some different level- like nothing's impossible

Or when I was 13, I climbed down a 6-7 story high vertical wall in the winter during snow storm (some silly challenge) and even though I thought I was going to die, when my feet finally touched the ground, I felt absolutely invincible.

But if we were to take some of the more common core beliefs such as "I am not worthy" or "Money does not come easily" - what experiences would one try to go and have then?
Or what happens if someone tries to have such experience and fails. For example, say a guy that believes he never gets a girl, then decides to go out and meet girls but gets rejected by everyone?

Thank you kazoo for this share. I like how it doesn't include the words law of attraction. Sometimes it's easier for some people at some times to learn this way without the associations with certain phrases.

kazoo wrote:Where LoA emphasizes changing thoughts to change behaviors, there is also a "behavioral" approach that says that if you want to change your thoughts, you can do so by changing your behaviors.

I think tackling an issue from both angles can be really effective

To me, these are both in fact the same. Changing thought and changing behavior are the same on a vibrational level. In order to choose the behavior, it must begin in thought. It just seems like the behavior is the starting force because it's an action-based choice. It's the choice that is the force behind it, which originated in the mind and is a different frequency from previous thought, which didn't match that new behavior that picks up momentum in the direction of what we prefer.

I enjoyed the article... all great reminders and good to have in one place. Forgetting can be common when we're wrapped up in emotions sometimes. We need to read this stuff again and again and we will always learn something new.

lunareclipse wrote:Can you think of any examples for #5? What sort of experiences?

That's just another way to say "take action".

But in LoA community noone like to use that "A" word because it doesn't sell well or people are just...... Oh! Well.....

Lunar, I get what you're saying. In those cases, where the fear of failure is real it might be best to confront an unrelated fear in general another way-like with the bungee jumping or something like that? If you can survive facing one fear you can face a girl turning you down? Besides, you're a badass bungee jumper, what girl wouldn't want you!?

And if past experiences made your current beliefs evident to you then you have to find another way to go about it. If a guy strikes out every time he goes to a bar then he needs to find another way to meet women. Or if someone always struggles with money because they get stuck in low paying jobs maybe they need to try a business of their own or go back to school? I'm not saying I have the answers here, just some ideas. And as always different things will work for different people.

And you're right Armine, the thoughts and behaviors go hand in hand. They reinforce one another.

I really get into those TV shows about hoarding or addiction and the like. For some reason I'm fascinated by them. Well there was a series I saw about people with OCD. They of course are extreme cases where their thoughts are just completely out of control. And the goal by the end is to get them to confront their fear. I think they call it exposure therapy. It's something they need to build up to but for instance if someone is afraid of germs and compulsively cleans their bathroom all day their therapist might take them to a gross port-a-potty and not let them wash their hands right away. This helps them understand that all of those thoughts they have that the world is gonna collapse if they have some nasty germs on them are unfounded.

Again, they need to build up to that as part of a process, their therapist doesn't just throw them to the wolves so to speak. That would be cruel. And the therapist remains with them for support while they "live with" the results of their exposure (in the example, the dirty hands.) So I think sometimes baby steps and support are in order if the fear or belief is particularly deep rooted.

And Lunar, I think it's great you brought up real life experiences you already had. I think most of us have those types of experiences but they usually aren't the ones we draw upon when we are feeding the negative thoughts about ourselves. A lot of times we don't even remember them because we are so focused on when things didn't go the way we wanted.

So sometimes it isn't about creating new experiences to create new thought patterns but rather digging deeper and remembering our successes and drawing upon them instead of only focusing on the times the experiences seemed to point to failure.

kazoo wrote:  And the goal by the end is to get them to confront their fear.  I think they call it exposure therapy.  It's something they need to build up to but for instance if someone is afraid of germs and compulsively cleans their bathroom all day their therapist might take them to a gross port-a-potty and not let them wash their hands right away.  This helps them understand that all of those thoughts they have that the world is gonna collapse if they have some nasty germs on them are unfounded.  

Again, they need to build up to that as part of a process, their therapist doesn't just throw them to the wolves so to speak.  That would be cruel.  And the therapist remains with them for support while they "live with" the results of their exposure (in the example, the dirty hands.)  So I think sometimes baby steps and support are in order if the fear or belief is particularly deep rooted.

Past experiences make the present and it takes effort to change it. Kazoo, this example reminds me of my fear of water. Last year I did an obstacle run and I've found out at the last moment I had to swim. Didn't want to give up but got a panic attack in the water, they had to get me out . So after that I decided I needed to get over that fear and decided to learn the chest crawl. The avoid quitting, I also registered for a triathlon. The first couple of times in the water I still panicked, wasn't able to swim more than 3 meters. So I trained and I trained, did one triathlon quite ok. Got even to the point where I could swim 1000m, did another triathlon and then panicked again,... Unfortunately. Even though I learned to swim the chest crawl, that fear of water is still there to a certain extend. Of course I can give up on it. But if you change nothing, nothing will change. It takes part mind, part action. Think that counts for everything we do.

Kazoo, for ocd, they have ERT (exposure response therapy) the client will make a list of their fears and compulsions and grade it from least scary... up to totally scary and not a chance! they start with the least scary and with the help of a diary they expose themselves and don't do their compulsions (cleaning, checking, mental rituals), then they write down how bad their anxiety is, what they did differently, what they'll do next time etc, the client builds up to the more scarier, its one of the most effective therapies, it really does work.

only thing i would add is its not that the thoughts are out of control, studies have shown they have pretty much the same thoughts as anyone else, but they become intrusive because their brain flags them up as dangerous whereas someone else would have the thought but it would just 'pass through'. it can be a very scary condition, unfortunately the media doesn't highlight it very well at the moment so people just see it as people that 'clean a lot' which is a shame, it can be very debilitating.

i think this is good for a lot of things aswell as ocd, if you can sit with the anxiety, it passes and you slowly begin to move away from whatever you're worried about and it doesnt hinder you

i also find this very interesting....10 cognitive thinking distortions.... i recognised a few of them lol

http://powerstates.com/10-cognitive-thinking-errors/

Thanks NE. One thing I saw with those shows is that most of the people suffering had experienced some sort of severe trauma that triggered the disorder.

While something like getting rejected may not be considered as severe it can still end yeilding similar results, perhaps just not as extreme. So a similar process could be used for those of us who don't have OCD but are dealing with lesser traumas and more "normal" fears.

I posted on this thread earlier but somehow - the Internet must have swallowed it?

I love the list. I do have a comment on point no. 3, but I won't bother with it right now because it would mean fetching a link and I don't have the time or inclination to do that at the moment.

But Night Eyes - how amazing! Synchronicity, or a sign...? Just before you posted that I found that same list of cognitive distortions saved on my phone and I was thinking it would be a good thing to share on here.

1. You believe that creating your best possible life is a matter of deciding what you want and then going after it, but in reality, you are psychologically incapable of being able to predict what will make you happy.

Your brain can only perceive what it's known, so when you choose what you want for the future, you're actually just re-creating a solution or an ideal of the past. Ironically, when said ideas don't come to fruition (things never look the way we think they will) you suffer, because you think you've failed, when really, you're most likely experiencing something better than you could have chosen for yourself at the time. (Moral of the story: Living in the moment isn't a lofty ideal reserved for the zen and enlightened, it's the only way to live a life that isn't infiltrated with illusions... it's the only thing your brain can actually comprehend.)


I think this is so important. If you aren't happy now you won't be happy when you get that thing you've decided you want. At least not in a meaningful, lasting way. After the temporary feeling fades you just focus on the next thing you want and repeat the cycle. Is that happiness? Chasing stuff you think will make you happy?

And the part about living in the moment is so true. So much emphasis on "focusing on what you want." Which is fine I guess. If that makes you happy. It's better than focusing on what you don't want, for sure. But while you are busy focusing on what you want are you missing out on what you already have?

SelinaM wrote:I posted on this thread earlier but somehow - the Internet must have swallowed it?

Same thing happened to me. And, I can't remember what I posted in this thread yesterday. Oh well.............

Time to bump this old gem by kazoo (and hopefully sneakily manifest her back to the forum)
Especially this part here-

4. You needlessly create problems and crises in your life because you're afraid of actually living it.

The pattern of unnecessarily creating crisis in your life is actually an avoidance technique. It distracts you from actually having to be vulnerable or held accountable or whatever it is you're afraid of. You're never upset for the reason you think you are: at the core of your desire to create a problem is simply the fear of being who you are, and living the life you want.

Today I got so wound up on some drama that was going on in my local forum page that I almost reported it to the local sheriff's office... ehemm..
Yeah, so this is why we distract ourselves with concentrating on dramas that have nothing to do with us instead of living our lives.
Jeez to think of all the useful stuff I could have done today instead...tsk-tsk...

Aww I miss this thread, such a good one. I miss kazoo more, though.



As for drama... of course it's so easy to be pulled in... and forget reality - truth, beauty, light...

A favourite quote of mine: "Beneath the surface of things, everything is perfect, complete, whole."