Reduce Limiting Beliefs in 3 Steps

Copyright 2006 Sharron Phillips

We live in an amazing time and are afforded the luxury of opportunities to live intentional lives. There is nothing to stop us from living our dreams except ourselves. Do you know what your dream is, what your purpose is, what gets you out of bed in the morning? If you do know all that, what is holding you back from your success? (p.s. How do you define success for yourself?)

Once we can target where we are and how we want to proceed, sometimes it is a mystery that we find ourselves stuck. ‘Stuckness’ can serve a purpose. It can be a necessary percolating time to learn what we need to move forward. When that percolating time has finished, it may be time to figure out what stumbling blocks we aren’t aware of. One area to explore is thoughts we have stored and accepted as true, that have become limiting beliefs.

Limiting beliefs are many times unconscious messages that may no longer be valid or useful to us. The messages we receive come from our socialization, education, our daily living, and exposure to advertising, to name a few sources.

Negative or limiting beliefs can infiltrate any part of daily life and that may include relationships, your financial arena, and self care. It may be important to get an overview of which messages holding negative and limiting beliefs you are ready to dispose of once you have uncovered their presence.

To become a more healthy and whole human being, discovering and examining limiting beliefs is essential. For example, if in your mind and heart you hold a belief that money is the root of all evil, that money corrupts your integrity, that money means you have no friends, then you will likely not attract money to you.

The benefit of clearing out negative and limiting beliefs is that you are then open to receive and attract what you truly desire and want.

One of my limiting beliefs was around dance. I told myself and believed that I could not dance. One of my ex-husbands pronounced that I danced like a baby elephant. The resulting frustration and painful ache of not moving to music, with my feet stuck to the floor, my back plastered to the wall, was agonizing. And finally I had had enough. I uncovered the fears and limiting beliefs I had about my dance skills. On my 50th birthday I declared I was worthy of dance, signed up for a weekend workshop with Gabrielle Roth and danced from Friday evening until Sunday afternoon and have not stopped since then. I feel alive, present, and joyful to be dancing whenever and wherever the music meets me.

Another area where I have benefited from becoming aware and have reduced my limiting/negative beliefs is my traditional high level of modesty and inhibition. I now enjoy and appreciate my body and sexuality in a more healthy way and I am grateful to have allowed myself to dismiss beliefs that limited my physical pleasure and sense of my feminine self.

There are steps to take to reduce your limiting beliefs. First, heighten your awareness by listening to what you hear in your thoughts in response to a goal or desire that you have. Second, decide when you hear a limiting or negative belief around succeeding in that goal or desire, whether the belief is true for you now. The third step is to dismiss the belief if it is not true. This is a continuous growth sequence and will become easier to follow as you practice.