Why You DO Get What You Think About: 4 Steps to Getting Better Outcomes
Author: Dana Wilde
“We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.” ~ Albert Einstein
You’ve heard it hundreds of times . . . you get what you think about. What if it’s true? What if your brain was actually designed to “bring about” what you “think about”?
If you knew this to be true, would you spend time complaining about your growth rate last year? Or how you’re having a hard time finding good team members? Or how no one is buying in this economy?
Would it surprise you to find out that the results you’re getting ARE a direct reflection of your thoughts? Let me introduce you to The Cycle of Perpetual Sameness.
It all begins in the unconscious mind. All of us have ideas about ourselves and about the world around us, stored in our unconscious minds. These ideas are called “beliefs” and beliefs take hold in our unconscious mind from processing all the various experiences and circumstances in our own lives and the repetition of our own thoughts inside our own minds.
Beliefs about your business can be things like . . .
No one is making money in this economy or . . .
It’s not what you know, it’s who you know or . . .
You have to work a lot of hours to be successful . . . and countless others.
Now to take this one step further, inside each and every one of us is a part of our brain, which acts like a little matchmaker. It’s called the Reticular Activating System and this little matchmaker’s full-time job is to spend all day every day looking for matches in the world around you. It’;s zeroing in on all of the different situations and circumstances in your day to day life . . . your “outside world" and trying to find the perfect match with your beliefs that are already stored in your unconscious mind or, what I like to call, your “inside world” . . . your inner beliefs.
For example, if you have an inner belief that you can’t find good team members, guess which type of people your brain is going to find as a “match” for your team? That’s right. You’ll be “seeing” and hiring the less-than-par applicants. In other words, the little matchmaker in your brain will literally filter out other types of people.
Now if we just lived in the world and we didn’t talk about our circumstances or think about our situations all the time, we’;d probably have a much easier time creating change for ourselves. But we don’t do this, do we?
When we get bad results, we want to talk about them, don’;t we? In fact, we often complain about them!
So you may find yourself talking about your problems in your business over and over and thinking about these same problems. This is what we call negative self-talk.
This negative self-talk works up a bunch of emotion that acts like a glue and cements these thoughts into your unconscious mind and reinforces the beliefs already stored in the unconscious mind and we’;re right back where we started and the cycle continues.
And this is why most people either see no change in their business or they see incremental or minimal change at best. It’s because many people are on The Cycle of Perpetual Sameness. They keep thinking the same things over and over and they keep reinforcing the same situations in their lives.
So how to you get off The Cycle of Perpetual Sameness? The easiest way is to stop the negative self-talk and to start talking and thinking differently.
In other words, changing your dialog, changing what you’re saying to others and changing what you’re saying to yourself. In order for you to get off The Cycle of Perpetual Sameness, you must make a conscious effort to change the thoughts you’re thinking.
Follow these four steps for changing your thinking which helps you to use your brain’s natural tendencies to your advantage.
Step 1: Become aware of the thoughts and messages you regularly think and say.
Get your mind aware and start paying attention to the thoughts you are thinking and the things you are saying to yourself and others. Ask yourself, “Is this the message I want to match?”
Step 2: Make a decision to change
Make a conscious decision to change the way you think and the way you talk, which therefore changes the belief stored in your unconscious mind.
Step 3: Use your focused conscious attention to think and say positive statements that reflect the change you’;d like to see in your beliefs and your life.
It may be hard to believe but the brain can only think one thought at a time. Make a conscious effort to say positive phrases like mantras or affirmations to yourself and it’s less time the brain is thinking negative thoughts. Make a conscious effort to look for the “silver lining.” Do your best to stay hopeful and positive in your day-to-day life.
Step 4: Feel the positive emotion generated from the new positive thoughts.
Negative thinking and negative emotions cut off the creative pathways in your brain. When you feel positive, you create a resourceful brain. Stay in that positive place and you make better decisions. When you are in this better frame of mind you can now start taking effective action in your business. I call it Intentional Action … get your mindset right first, then take action.
So start now. Start thinking new positive thoughts right now. Create a new positive voice in your head, which will not only give you new beliefs about your business but will also give that little matchmaker a chance to show you positive results. It’s time to get off The Cycle of Perpetual Sameness and to start taking Intentional Action.
Dana Wilde is founder of The Mind Aware and the author of Train Your Brain. She’s taught thousands of business owners how to train their brains and grow their businesses quickly and easily. Check out her FREE video training at https://danawilde.com/.