Each one of us has feelings of inferiority that we are not good enough. We think that we are not as good as other people, and we feel that we are not good enough to acquire and enjoy the things that we want in life. Very often, we feel that we don’t deserve good things. Even if we do work hard and achieve some worthwhile objectives, we believe that we are not really entitled to our successes, and we often engage in behaviors that sabotage our successes.
The fact is that we deserve every good thing that we are capable of acquiring as the result of the application of our talents. The only real limitation on what we can be and have is our absence of desire. If we want something badly enough, nothing in the world can stop us from getting it, if we are willing to persist long enough and hard enough. Over and over, we find that our beliefs, more than anything else, act as the brakes on our capacities. We have high hopes and dreams and aspirations, but we let doubts creep in and undermine our competence and effectiveness.
We need to develop our beliefs about ourselves to the point where they serve us every day in every way. Men and women who accomplish extraordinary things are just ordinary people who developed themselves mentally to the point where they were able to overcome the obstacles that stood in their way, and they kept on keeping on until the goal was attained.
Psychologist William James of Harvard University said that beliefs create the actual fact. The reason for this is because we always act in a manner consistent with our innermost beliefs and convictions. If you believe yourself capable of accomplishing good things, you will walk and talk and act like it. Your behaviors will actually make your beliefs a reality.
The most harmful beliefs that you can have are what we call self-limiting beliefs. These are beliefs about yourself, most of which are not true; but they hold you back nonetheless. Sometimes you, or others, will say that you cannot achieve certain goals because you did not get enough education. Sometimes you will say that it is because of your gender or race or age or the state of the economy.
Many people blame their parents or their bosses or their families or their current relationships for their failure to make progress in life. Others say that there is no opportunity in their particular area or their particular field. Some complain because they have no money. Others complain because they received poor grades in school or did not go to, or finish, university. Still others say that they have never had a natural talent or ability for a particular field.
The humorist Josh Billings once said, it ain’t what a person knows what hurts him/her. It’s what a person knows what isn’t true. It isn’t the actual truth about yourself and your abilities that hurts you; it’s the things that you consider to be true and that have no basis in truth.
The starting point to change your beliefs is to get up the courage to question them seriously. Question your basic premises. Check your assumptions. Ask yourself, What assumptions am I making about myself or my situation that might not be true?
What Beliefs Might You Have That Are Holding You Back?
Think about them. Remember, most of our self-limiting beliefs have no basis whatsoever in fact. They are based on information and ideas that we have accepted as true, sometimes in early childhood, and to the degree to which we accept them as true, they become true for us.
Your beliefs about reality are based on a thousand influences, many of which began even before you were aware of what was going on. You have beliefs that are deep and beliefs that are shallow. Deep beliefs, with regard to your religion or your political party or your family, or especially yourself, are very hard to change. Shallow beliefs are easily changed. And many of your beliefs are in fact very shallow. They have no substance to them whatsoever. If you challenge them hard enough, you’ll find that they are made of tissue paper. They’ll simply blow away.
You can always tell what your true values and beliefs are by looking at your actions. It isn’t what you say or wish or hope or intend that demonstrates what you really believe. It’s only what you do. It’s only the behaviors that you engage in. It’s only the actions that you choose to undertake. Your values and beliefs are always expressed in your actions and behaviors.
And out of your actions come all of the elements of your life. You are where you are what you are because of what you’ve said and done in the past.
The wonderful thing is this. Each of us is in a state of becoming. Many years ago, a teacher of mine said that each human being is a becomingness. You are constantly evolving toward the fulfillment of your individual possibilities. You can become anything you want by sitting down at the keyboard of your own mental computer and beginning the process of programming in new beliefs.
Once you’ve clearly decided on the person you would like to become, you are on the path toward developing new beliefs. You then discipline yourself each day to behave exactly as you would if you were already that person.
That simple technique, the act as if technique, is extraordinarily powerful. The more you act like the person you want to be, the more consistent your attitude will be with that person’s. Your attitude will have the back-flow effect of affecting your expectations. Positive expectations will have the back-flow effect of building beliefs that are consistent with them. And your beliefs will exert an influence on your values.
You have no limitations on your potential except for those that you believe you have. If you would like to win, but think you can’t, It’s almost certain you won’t. Life’s battles don’t always go To the stronger or faster man, But sooner or later the man who wins Is the man who thinks he can.
People succeed not because they have remarkable characteristics or qualities. The most successful people are quite ordinary, just like you and me. Most of us start off poor and confused. We spend many years getting some sort of direction in our lives. But the turning point comes when we begin to believe that we have within us that divine spark that can lead us onward and upward to the accomplishment of anything that we really want in life.
By Brian Tracy