What we believe we ultimately conceive in our lives...changing belief systems is an important part of NLP.

So often we think about beliefs as if they were tangible, real things, when they are actually nothing more than hunches or feelings of certainty about something or someone and they are usually nothing more than generalisations about the past.

When you take a look around, what do you see? Do you see a world of constancy or a world of ever unfolding change? Of course the answer is obvious and yet when you take a close look at people, what do you see?

On first inspection it would be reasonable to assume that people remain very much the same, that nothing ever really changes. Whilst that is the way that many would perhaps prefer it to be, it is not the case at all, for with each new experience, each ‘new’ thought and each new day, we evolve and hopefully grow. At the very least, we certainly do change with time.

Interestingly, there is only one constant in the entire universe and that is change. Change is the one thing that most people avoid and fight against with all their being. They somehow fear or are highly suspicious of change and avoid it, generally speaking, wherever possible. But despite our inherent distaste for what we perceive it to bring, change affects us all, and it exists within all of us.

Our mind, like our body is changing all the time, but at a level that is not immediately obvious to the casual viewer. Our experiences and the meaning that we give to them shapes our thoughts about a whole myriad of issues, all of which are subtly inter-related and often inter-dependent. As each new experience takes place, our mind re-assesses, re-evaluates and reshapes our mental map of the world in which we live, and with it, our well-being and our physical health affects our thinking about ourselves and what the process of life is all about.

It is here that our mind, body and spirit meet and become mixed in the melting pot that is our beliefs - those elements that create some feelings of certainty about life, about the whole process, order and sequence of that experience we call being, all fed to us through the miracle of consciousness.

Beliefs are fundamental in creating who and what we are, for they affect what we think, feel, do and ultimately, the outcomes that we create in our lives. If, as we have seen, our perceptions of reality are filtered and manipulated internally, then so too are many of our beliefs, which all come from our personal frame of reference of life, as we believe it to be and mean. Is it therefore possible that some, if not many, of our own beliefs are not necessarily accurate, and as such they may not serve us particularly well in having, being and achieving all that we want from life?

The process of positive and desired change comes about through, amongst other things, changes in our beliefs and internal experiences of life - the mental associations that we hold on to and which ultimately create the behavioural and emotional programmes that we run internally from day to day. The key lies not in making judgements about what is right or wrong in our beliefs, thinking or behaviour, but in asking what is useful, desirable and self-empowering!

The Power of Belief

As we have seen in the previous section, beliefs are a fundamental part of who we are both as individuals and as an integral part of the society in which we live. Our beliefs form the fundamental, ethical values and certainties about life that we hold to be true and certain. They are, in fact, the certainties that we hold dear to us about life, other people, ourselves and indeed the very meaning of it and our part in it.

Beliefs, because they are so strong and ‘certain’ to us, are the very essence of who we are as a person and are instrumental in the process of thought, decision and action in all human beings. What is interesting, however, is that beliefs are often merely generalisations about the past and represent mental programmes that are copied or learned, often from others, throughout our childhood and adolescence. Because beliefs are so important to us, our sanity and our frame of reference upon life itself and our part in its often uncertain unfolding nature, they play an important part in the development of our thoughts, values and attitudes. By default then, what we believe, we ultimately conceive, or ‘see’ (experience) in our lives.

Where change is desirable it should be appreciated that beliefs both direct and inhibit our thinking and our behaviour. Do you have a dream but feel that you will never achieve it? Is there some thing that you would like to do but feel that you cannot do it? The simple fact is that for everyone who says that they cannot do something, there is, somewhere, another person with similar circumstances who is doing it. For every person who says that they are too old to do something or other, there is a person of the same age doing it. Henry Ford once said:

"There are two types of people in this world,

those who say they can and those who say that they cannot,

and they are both right."

The point here is that for as long as you believe that you cannot do something, you won’t do it. But, change the belief, and you will almost certainly change how you feel and what you do. Change what you do and you change the outcome - believing differently really does mean seeing something completely different manifest in your life.

REMEMBER: The key lies, not in making judgements about what is right or wrong with a belief, but in asking yourself what is useful, desirable and empowering for you and what you want to create or make happen!

NLP is the science of excellence that provides an amazing range of sensory-based tools that can help almost anyone to transform their thinking and their way of perceiving themselves and the world around them. You can find out more at http://NLP4dummies.com. You will find a range of opportunities including FREE mini-courses and NLP resources that work in the real world.

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