Limiting Beliefs - Stop Trying So Hard

Tired of going through the same insane loop of groundhog day with the different versions of the same situation? The problem is you, and what you think you know. It's time to stop living in your limiting beliefs by seeing them for what they are. Below is a meditation on limiting beliefs, and what dumb luck really is.   

Narrow-mindedness and short-sightedness are both ideas attached to someone’s literally narrow viewpoint, which is often linked to their lack of vision/information, tied to their own expectation to a situation, based on past experiences and cultural references to those around them.

This narrow viewpoint (a small hole in the wall, if you will) furthers an idea held onto by your own ego, in it’s need to be right, and for you to be right about an idea you think to be true and yours (an actual extension of your identity), because you thought you came up with it… when in fact, you are just going off of information experienced and processed through the filters of your existence and experience up the point in your life so far.  

Being able to tap into the infinite, or even being open to it, will give you more and more possibilities. Being open to a new experience, or new possibility, is the first step. Realizing you know just such a fraction of the million, billions, trillions of data points around you will start to give way the opportunities beyond your own limiting beliefs.

If you have the belief that you are right, you will work to prove that the belief is right to others, and yourself, even if that belief is wrong. If you think 2 + 2 = 5, you will work futilely to prove it is true, even though 2 + 2 = 4, whether you want it to be or not.

If you are open to a new belief, a new way to look at a problem, or to maybe even have the openness to consider there was no problem to solve in the first place, then you are again open to infinite possibilities – or at the very least, you might be open beyond the very few possibilities for a solution that you would have been able to come up with on your own. 

So how to you start to tap into the infinite possibilities all around you?

You have to let go of what you think you know (your limiting beliefs) and the telescope you look at them through (your filters) . If fact, you have to be open to the possibility that everything that you think you know, might be wrong. You have to even come to believe that everything you know is wrong in order to stop falling back into trying to make the world and yourself think you know the answer to things. You have to stop maintaining this delusion that 2 + 2 = 5, when you yourself might even have a feeling that 2 + 2 might not equal 5, but you haven't had the courage to admit it, even to yourself.

So how do you get there? How do you un-program this idea that you know things (your limiting beliefs that are limited by you)? How do you move beyond your egoic threshold?

Most people require proof that they don’t know things, or they need proof that other people know more things than they do, and so hold the other person’s beliefs in higher regard than their own. This itself would be a good step in the direction of at least admitting that you don’t know everything, and another person might at least know some things that you don’t.

Another way to do this is to fail miserably. You could try to prove that 2 + 2 = 5 to a bunch of people, only to have them laugh in your face. You could try this multiple times until you actually go to the point to consider that you’ve got it all wrong, and you could try proving that 2 + 2 = 5 to a few other groups of people until it sinks it that you are wrong, totally wrong. If you were wrong about this, what else could you be wrong about?

How do you like them apples? 

Being Human After Being Humbled.

After either of these options of finding your path to humility, you are now able to be open to the infinite possibilities that actually exist and are happening around you all the time, beyond the realm of your human comprehension (or at the very least, your ego’s bias). Once you are open to the infinite possibilities, they can just jump out at you, mystically appearing like a magic trick. When was the last time you were in a hurry and had to find your car keys, your phone, or your glasses. You run around the house screaming to yourself, “I can’t believe I can’t find my glasses,” when that itself is the problem – you ARE believing that you can’t find your glasses, you are thinking about that belief, and you are proving that belief to yourself. The irony is, you are probably wearing your glasses, and looking through them to try to find them. I’ve actually run around my house looking for my phone, while talking on the phone I’m looking for, and telling the person on the other end of the line that I can’t find my phone! Now, when was the last time you were NOT in a hurry, and didn’t have any trouble finding your glasses? Odds are, there wasn’t any problem finding your glasses when you could take your time and your body didn’t enter into an adrenaline-crazed survival tornado.

I’m lucky enough to be a mellow person with a general calmness about me. If I would say I had a super power, it would be the ability to stay calm in a storm, and even calm down the energy in the people (and even pets) around me. If you don’t have this innate sense of calm, you might want to hit up some meditation or yoga, and maintain a regular practice (it’s called a practice, not a cure, because you have to do it regularly, best to get in the habit/practice).

Even with this innate calm, I have the limiting belief that if I work at something hard enough, or try enough times, that I can accomplish most things. This again, is my own belief that I can’t find my glasses, even though I’m looking really, really hard for them. If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again…Or maybe not. 

I’m sure everyone reading this knows someone that hasn’t ever had to tried hard for anything. You probably have a friend or someone you know that constantly has things fall in their lap! Is this dumb luck? Is there such a thing as luck? You have a 50/50 chance of choosing between door number one for $1m, or door number two for a year’s supply of potatoes, right? It’s just the odds you might say (Aren’t odds, odd?). What happens when you stop trying?

Now I’m not saying that you should stop trying. I’m suggesting that if you stop trying your way, you might be surprised that your odds go up (odd right?). This all circles back to the idea that my ideas are limited and referred to in our culture as being short-sighted or narrow-minded, IE: limited. While I might think there is only the 50/50 chance for choosing between door number 1, or door number 2, I might not even realize that door number 3 is sitting wide open right behind me, and there was a brand new Ferrari with $10m cash sitting on the front seat. I couldn’t even see door number 3 because I was so focused on the other 2 doors.

Don’t you want a Ferrari and $10m? Don’t you want things to fall into your lap? All you need to do is stop tying so hard, stop trying to do things your way, and the possibilities are endless.