CHAPTER 1
YOUR MIND
Freedom to take 100%responsibility for your life.
By Selwa Hamati
"Your mind is the greatest power in all creation."~ Dr. J.B. Rhine
I was recently asked to speak at a women's brunch. When Iwalked intothe room, I found beautifully decorated tables and dolls everywhere.The theme was "Childhood Memories." As announcements andacknowledgments were being made, one of the women (let's call herDee) told us this amazing, true story about an encounter betweenDee's dolls, another woman, and several city and county staff andvolunteers. Here's the gist of what happened:
Dee was planning her daughter's baby shower. She had put twoof her beautiful, extraordinarily lifelike dolls on a blanket in thebackseat of her car. Also on the backseat was her daughter's weddingalbum. There was a special conference on Saturday that Dee plannedto attend, after which she would go to her daughter's house to spendtime with her and prepare for the baby shower.
Street parking was not available, so Dee parked in a garage nearbyand walked over to where the conference was being held. At some pointduring the day, a woman parked next to Dee's car. When she stepped outof the car, she happened to glance into the backseat of Dee's car whereshe saw two "babies" wrapped in a blanket. The woman panicked andran over to the attendant to have him call 911. She told him that therewere two babies abandoned in the backseat of a car in his garage.
The attendant called 911 and then followed the woman to the carwhere the babies were sleeping. As they were trying to figure out away to get into the car and rescue these poor babies, they noticed thewedding album lying next to them. Their imaginations ran wild. Theythought for sure that the mom had left her two babies to die in the carwhile she ran off somewhere to kill herself. The woman who foundthese babies was now hysterical. The attendant was trying to calm herdown while figuring out a way to get into the car.
Soon the fire truck arrived. The firefighters tried to unlock thecar door, but could not. So they broke a window to get in there andrescue these poor babies. When they got in, they felt for the babies'pulse. Nothing ... it was too late. Everyone thought the babies weredead. The woman who found them was now hyperventilating andout of control.
By now, the medics had arrived. They had to take care of thiswoman, who had passed out, as well as see what they could do forthe little babies. Unfortunately, they, too, could not feel a pulse. As alast resort, one of them decided to look into the babies' eyes for anysign of life. That is when the medic discovered that the "babies" wereactually dolls.
Wow! I couldn't believe that this had really happened. Everyonewas laughing when Dee told the story. When you stop to really thinkabout it, though, it's not at all funny. Actually, it's quite sad. How oftendo we build a nightmare for ourselves based on nothing more than theappearance of things? How often do we arrive at conclusions based onnothing more than a mere glance at the facts?
The poor woman in that parking garage jumped to the worstconclusion. She assumed that a distraught mom had abandoned hertwo babies and taken her own life. See how easily and quickly she wasable to build the nightmare? What is even scarier is how contagiousnightmares can be. One person's panic causes another person to panicand the domino effect begins -- from bad to worse it goes, and it picksup speed along the way.
Although people think that perception is reality, it is not.Perception creates your reality — your reality, based on what youhave assumed and believed. I like this quote by Dennis Deaton, anauthor and motivational speaker: "The eye sees what the mind looksfor." Our minds are powerful and we need to know how to effectivelyuse them.
I am not a psychotherapist, but I have read and heard about theformula that is taught them: A + B = C.
A = What happens to you in life.
+ B = Your interpretation of what happens to you in life.
= C = How you act.
So our interpretation of what happens to us in life is really ourtruth, because our actions are based on our interpretations – ourperceptions.
Dr. Daniel Amen, a brain-imaging specialist, refers to AutomaticNegative Thoughts, or ANTs. Based on the story of the two dolls, canyou see how ANT infestations can take over your mind and causeyou to do things that you wouldn't ordinarily do? We must take carenot to let these infestations happen to begin with, but when they dohappen, we must be aware of the situation and be prepared to dosomething about it, like kill those ANTs before the infestation getsout of control.
Why is it that when things go well and you feel super happy, youtend to stop yourself from enjoying the situation too much because youfear you may "get used to it" and set yourself up for disappointment?You think, "This is too good to be true. I wonder how long it's goingto last?" Then you begin to self-sabotage. Think about it. If you do notdo this, then you must know someone who does. Too many peoplewaste beautiful opportunities by thinking, "What if it doesn't workout?" Well, what if it does work out?
We are intelligent human beings, independent thinkers. Theproblem is that most people have gotten so used to doing things by habitthat they don't think for themselves anymore. They live unconsciously.Somewhere along our journeys, we let a few "powerful" people takecharge of our important decisions and eventually gave them controlover more of our lives until we stopped thinking for ourselves. Wegave away our power to other people who "know better than we do"about us. It doesn't make sense, does it? So we must take charge ofour lives again.
I realize it is important to have good leaders, but the danger lies ingiving away all of our power. We think that "they" know best, are moreeducated, richer, more powerful or more experienced. So we lean on"them" to take care of some of the most important things in our livesand we get involved in busywork. We think that when we busily runaround, taking care of everything and everybody but ourselves, thenwe are doing what is right, what is expected of us or our "duty." Well,"busyness" has nothing to do with taking care of real business.
What happens, in most cases, when we hand over all of ourdecision making to someone else? We think of ourselves as victims.We feel helpless. And then we begin to blame other people for ourproblems. We give away our responsibilities because it's easier forsomeone else to get the job done and then we blame that someone forour plight when things don't work out the way we want them to. Whois better equipped to take care of my business than me? I can seek help,but I must be the one to determine the kind of help I want.
So we must wake up from our hypnotic state and take 100 percentresponsibility for our lives, actions and well-being. It may seem harderin the beginning, but it sure beats having someone else take chargeof my life. As personal-development leader Jim Rohn said, we mustmake a choice between experiencing the pain of discipline or the painof regret. Which pain will you choose?
I would like to introduce you to some brilliant information aboutthe mind that can help you take charge of your life. This informationhas changed my life. Please receive it with an open mind and take thetime to apply it.
When we think, we mostly think in pictures. If I say "house," apicture of a house pops up on the screen of your mind. If I say "car,"you see a picture of a car and so on. Now, if I say, "mind," what picturepops into your mind? There is usually confusion about this one. Didyou, perhaps, see a picture of a brain? Many people do. I did, until thedifference between the brain and the mind was explained to me. Peoplebecome confused because they don't know what the mind looks like.
The mind is the invisible part of your personality, so it's no wonderyou don't know what it looks like. Because we live in an orderly universeand as highly intelligent beings functioning in an orderly, intelligentmanner, we do not like being in a state of confusion. Therefore, weneed an image or picture of the mind to create order.
In the early 1900s, Dr. Thurman Fleet, who developed the Concept Therapyapproach to chiropractic medicine, noticed this dilemma anddecided to do something about it. He recognized that the mind is theinvisible part of our personalities. Because he believed in treating thewhole person by getting to the root of a problem (the cause), ratherthan simply treating symptoms, he came up with this remarkablegraphic–what we call "The Stickperson."
At first glance, you may believe the picture is upside down, butthis is done on purpose. You see, until now, we have given all of ourconscious awareness and attention to our physical body and our fivephysical senses, when everything in our life is nothing but an expressionof our mind, where our thinking begins and where our intellectualfaculties reside. Our mind initiates and creates our actions.
Now that you have a picture of the mind, you can better understandhow it works. The mind is divided into two parts: conscious (thinking)mind and subconscious (feeling) mind.
When we combine our thoughts with our feelings, they produceaction (through our bodies), and our actions then produce results.This is very similar to the psychotherapist formula mentioned earlier:A + B = C.
When you think positive, happy thoughts you feel good and youractions reflect those positive thoughts. When you think negativethoughts, you feel bad and your actions reflect those negative thoughts.It sounds simple, I know — and it is simple, yet so misunderstood. Thisis the Law of Attraction in action. It is the foundation of everythingwe do in life, so I believe it is very important. We must pay attentionto this "simple stuff," understand how it works, and then take actionand apply it in our lives.
The conscious mind has the ability to accept or reject anyintroduced thought. The problem is that the majority of us do not usethis ability. Instead, we allow all kinds of garbage to enter our mindswithout ever stopping it. The subconscious mind, on the other hand,cannot reject anything. It must accept whatever you put into it. Thinkof your mind as a radio or television. Whatever channel you tune intocreates the broadcast you receive.
Remember what I said about giving away your power somewherealong your journey? Well, here is how you can claim it back: thesubconscious mind is where all of your "paradigms" reside, such asyour current beliefs, your memories and your self-image. So if we arenot careful about what thoughts we allow into our conscious mind,our subconscious mind will accept whatever thoughts we feed it. It hasno control over what to believe and what not to believe; it just takes itall in. Our thoughts are then mixed with our feelings. Together, theyproduce actions, which, in turn, produce our results.
A good way to examine your mind is to take a good, honest look atyour results, because results don't lie. You see them all around you in yourenvironment. They are the mirror of your mind. If you do not like yourresults, go back to the very root of the problem and take a look at whatis going on in your mind. Once you fix that, your results will change.This is how it works, period. Author James Allen said it well: "We thinkin secret and it comes to pass, environment is but our looking glass."
So, what influences your thoughts, and how can you control whatyou think about?
You have five physical senses; you see, hear, smell, taste, and touch.We are conditioned to learn through these senses from a very youngage. It is as though our senses are hardwired to our conscious mindlike little antennas. This is how we gather most of our informationfrom the world around us. We must be aware that these senses arealways on. When you get up in the morning and open your eyes, youimmediately see. You don't have to think about telling your eyes tostart seeing. The same goes for smelling, hearing and so on.
Because these senses are always on, they are constantly beingbombarded by our environment through television, radio, computersand the people around us. We have been so conditioned to live throughthese senses that we go about our daily living in an unconsciousstate — we do things in a certain way, out of habit. We are also worriedabout what people think and about "looking good" in front of them.Strong conditioning and tuning into our outside world keeps us on anemotional roller coaster for most of our lives. When someone pays usa compliment, we feel good. A few minutes later someone criticizes usand we immediately feel bad. One minute we are up, the next momentwe are going down fast.
So if you want to change this madness and improve your results,you must be aware of who and what you listen to. You must guard yourthoughts (conscious mind) as though your life depends on them — becauseit does. Once you become aware of how the mind works andunderstand the process, then you can go to work on the inside tochange your outside environment (your physical results).
Now let me warn you that, as intelligent human beings created fora specific purpose, we know a lot more than we realize. But did youknow that the biggest gap in life is between what we know and what weactually do? I'm reminded of what psychotherapist Nathaniel Brandensaid: "We are the one species that can formulate a vision of what valuesare worth pursuing, and then pursue the opposite." Why? Why do wenot pursue those visions and values that are worth pursuing? Becauseit is easier to remain stuck in our old ways of thinking and doing whatwe are used to doing. We experience strong resistance in the form ofhuge, self-created barriers when we attempt to change. This feelingcan prevent us from taking the necessary steps to achieve the resultswe want. We get scared or anxious, and ask ourselves questions like,"What will people say if I don't do this, or if I do that?" Rather thanpursuing what we value, we wind up settling for the familiar andstaying in what we call our "comfort zone."
Keep this in mind as you face your challenges: growth requiresgetting uncomfortable. "Good" is not always good enough. As amatter of fact, "good" is the enemy of "best." It is each individual'sduty to step up and live their best life possible, as they define it forthemselves. No excuses!
It is crucial to understand that your current results do not reflectyour potential. Your current results are a direct by-product of yourprevious thinking — the way you thought until this moment. Previousthinking may have limited you in the past, but you are by no meanstrapped by it. You have infinite potential, limited only by your ownthoughts. So, if you want to change your results, you must first changeyour thoughts. You do have choices -- even in matters out of yourcontrol, you have choices. It's all in the way you look at things, yourown interpretation of what happens to you in life.
We tend to look to others (family, friends and associates) for advicewhen we pursue what we want in life. If you follow this strategy, thequestion you must ask yourself is this: Is the person you are looking tofor advice qualified to give it? If you want to learn how to swim, youmust find someone who knows how to swim well, and is willing andable to teach you. You would not go to someone who knows nothingabout swimming and has never been in the water, would you?
Now, let's consider better ways to influence our thoughtsindependent of our environment. You will want to learn how to useyour mind with a higher intensity by engaging, enabling and usingit to think with your own intellect and thoughts. In doing so, youwill not need to rely on others to make your own choices. You see,we all know our five physical senses, but few people know abouttheir intellectual faculties. You have six intellectual faculties. Thedirected use of these faculties allows you to control the way you think.Because they are like mental muscles, you can develop and strengthenthem through exercise — mental exercise. When these faculties aredeveloped and used properly, you enhance your thoughts and producewhatever results you want in your life.
Our intellectual faculties are these: imagination, memory, reason,perception, intuition and will. Let's take a brief look at each one.
Imagination
Your imagination is your ability to build big, beautiful pictures inyour mind. It is the mind's workshop. We can use our imaginationsto build nightmares or beautiful dreams. Most of us have not usedour imaginations properly since we were small children. Rememberwhen you could take a box, especially a big appliance box, and turn itinto a fort or playhouse? How about a blanket and a couple of chairs?They made for a cool tent! But then we had to "grow up" and go offto school, where there was not much time to dream like we once did.Slowly but surely, we stopped using our imaginations properly andlearned to follow instructions and do what we were told to do.
