Your mind is constantly working; while you sleep, work or chat. As all that happens, it collates lots of data in its "cache" which happens to be your subconscious mind.
These data directly and indirectly influences the results you get in life, relationships, business and in ministry.
There is a category of data stored in your mental cache called limiting beliefs.
A limiting belief is a conviction you hold as true about yourself, about others, or about the world that prevents you from being something, doing something you otherwise would have done.
Limiting beliefs can be subtle. They often require bulb moments for their bearer to realize, “this is what has been holding me back all these years.”
Do you believe that the business will fail if you started without a master degree?
Do you believe you won’t get seed funds because you are not connected to the high and mighty in the industry?
Do you believe that you cannot serve successfully in ministry because no one in your family has ever done that?
Do you believe you will never find love because your marriage just ended in a brutal divorce?
Do You believe you can’t run a ministry effectively because you are single?
If you answered yes to any of these questions, then that is one of the reasons you have not taken action about the related area of your life.
Read: Stewarding your desires
One very common limiting belief that most people have but don’t realize is the belief that they can’t do anything about their situation or purpose because they lack motivation.
That’s a big lie but because they believe it, they cannot take action until someone or something happens to motivate them.
Your mission is too priceless for you to will over the power to take action to some external motivation.
What if no one ever motivates you? What if that special occasion never comes? You can’t afford to wait forever.
I’ve found that motivation is the result of action not the cause of an action.
You don’t need to wait to feel high/motivated/inspired in order to land the mission a knock out kick.
Will yourself to raise your leg high up in the sky and land it on the target; you will be motivated to do it again.
Limiting beliefs are usually experiential-evidence based.
Your mind is convinced about them because you have had an experience that impressed them strongly on your heart.
I agree with Dunja Rado an intuitive mentor and coach who says, “The essence of a limiting belief is emotion. It is not a thought, it is an emotion. “
On her blog (BeBee Producer), Dunja explains that humans develop limiting beliefs when they experience an overwhelming emotion.
For instance, if you just started learning to drive and had an accident?
The experience (accident) will ignite a deep emotion (fear) in your heart. Accident then serves as evidence which your mind holds in conviction that you are a bad driver. Every time you have to drive, you see the emotion of fear taking over your mind tore-iterate the belief that you are a bad driver and consequently, you will have another accident as a result of the emotion (fear).
Some people never drive again after an accident. Others have been able to break off the limiting belief fueled by their experiential-evidence and have moved on to become car racers.
Am I communicating?
Limiting beliefs are disempowered when we challenge the evidence surrounding that belief.
Spare me a moment to walk you through identifying and disempowering at least one limiting belief that has prevented you from taking action towards your desired future through the years.
Get a note book you care about and a pen that looks just fine.
Identify that one thing you want done in the next 2 weeks.
It could be to finally start your business, launch the online magazine or begin the youth prayer group. Whatever it is, write it down.
Identify and write out all the limiting beliefs (you can think about) that have stopped you from taking action all along.
Examples,
✔ I don’t have enough capital
✔I don’t know much of the bible yet
✔ I am a bad driver
✔ I can’t teach.
Pick one of those limiting beliefs on your own list. Decide on the one you feel is the strongest and let’s
Identify and challenge the evidence surrounding that belief using these questions.
Identify: Why do I believe this? (Write this down) Perhaps your answer is because you failed, or didn’t have a mother to guide you, or because your teacher never praised you.
Challenge: What other areas of my life have I achieved something despite the situation (experiential-evidence) that has made me believe (insert limiting belief) about myself?
The goal here is to create doubts in your heart concerning the limiting belief.
Once you can doubt it, you dispel its power over you and embrace an opportunity to replace those beliefs with a better version that empowers you to take action.
See Ada’s note below to help you understand this exercise better.
The one action Ada desires to take is to lunch a master class
that teaches nursing mothers to study the bible.
The limiting belief she is trying to disempower is “I’m a bad teacher”.
In identifying the evidence, Ada has this on her note.
Why do I believe I am a
bad teacher?
• My daughter says I am a bad teacher
• When I taught in the past, the students didn’t understand easily.
In challenging the evidence, Ada has
✔My daughter says I am a bad teacher
- Does my daughter know what makes a good
teacher?
- What else does my daughter tells me that is
incorrect?
- Does my daughter sometimes tell me that she has learnt something (perhaps not related to her homework) from me?
- Has anyone else ever learnt anything from me?
✔When I taught in the past, the students didn’t understand easily.
- How many times have I explained something to
someone this week and they understood?
- Were there any other influences that made the students not understand easily?
Was I impatient?
Was I tired? Were they distracted?
Identifying the experiential evidences that fuels an emotion and supports a limiting belief, gives you the power to break free and update those beliefs.
Get the picture?
Now that you understand better repeat the exercise above
on a fresh sheet of paper.
When you are done, update your
beliefs. See Turn wishes to wins book for how to update limiting beliefs.
EXCERPTED FROM TURN WISHES TO WINS BOOK - AVAILABLE HERE
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