Do you like to read?
If someone asked me that, my first answer would probably be, Read what? We all have our individual preferences. But what if you wrote the book? Would you want to read it?
I would hope the answer is YES! What if I told you that you’ve been writing a book your whole life - without knowing it?
And your book consists of all the thoughts you have about yourself daily. Do you want to read THAT book?
SENSE OF SELF
Most of us were taught to treat others the way we want to be treated, all with the overall intention of being kind to others.
But when did we learn how to treat ourselves?
Personally, I was never explicitly taught to ‘Learn my limitations so I can help educate the people I love on how to connect with me. Or to ‘Learn to love myself first before I give to others.’
But this lack of knowledge creates a culture where our sense of self is disconnected, and most of us aren’t even aware of it. We operate from a space of ‘How do we get what we want from people?’
Maybe you want calm, so you people please. Maybe you want to feel important so you wear certain name brands.
Let’s say you don’t like name brands, but it’s just so important to feel important that now you find yourself financially challenged? Or what if, in order to make someone else calm, you have to drain yourself?
Without having a sense of self, we don’t know who we are. So we seek the transactional reward from our interactions and when we don’t get it the inner bully shows up spewing thoughts that can fill a whole book we don’t want to read.
THE ENERGY OF THOUGHTS
Every thought we have carries energy. When we think, What the hell is wrong with me? the thought’s energy itself feels negative. But when we think, Wow I’m proud of myself for volunteering and giving back! that feels uplifting, right?
When you reflect on the average quality of the energy you feel in a day, is it more uplifting or draining? If you answered, Draining! then you have an energy crisis! You might feel like there’s never enough time to get everything done, which leads you to overwork and push yourself until you burn out. All the while you’re operating from a space of judgment, blame, and shame, so there’s no wonder you’re so exhausted! When you speak to yourself with thoughts that drain your energy, why would you expect to feel energized?
Right now, you face a challenge. I talked about this in my blog Think Yourself Happy, but here’s a quick reminder: It’s important to practice having repetitive thoughts that are connected to certain POSITIVE emotions, in order to release certain hormones to maintain our internal balance.
The good news is you truly are in control. Sure, sometimes you (and I!) might hand our responsibilities over to our subconscious autopilot, but we are ultimately the editor of our life’s story, and can rewrite our thoughts.
BE THE EDITOR
Because these negative thoughts that create that draining energy are happening subconsciously they will pop up without your awareness. This is not something to fear, but rather something to notice. Your power lies in the second thought.
That’s where you have editorial rights to rewrite your first thoughts about the situation, which can influence the energy of those thoughts, changing up the feeling. That in turn creates a new hormone release that helps you become more aligned with how you WANT to feel.
Need some clarity? Let’s say you have a thought that randomly pops up and sounds like, “Ugh I’m so fat.”Your second, controllable thought might sound something like, “No, I’m not fat, I just feel bloated. Hmmm I wonder what I ate that made me feel that way.”
And just like that, you switched the energy of the thought and added some curiosity to the story. The reality is, your body is wired to produce the feelings, thoughts, and experiences you’re used to having. If you want a different experience, if you want to write a different story for yourself, you need to practice different thoughts.
THE BEST PART
Here’s the best part: What’s really awesome is when it comes to being healthy, it is a full body experience. And your thoughts, and the energy they carry, play a role. When you own your editorial rights to change your second thought you get to change your inner body experience. This in turn will change your exterior experience….leading to results you can actually see!
So many of us get frustrated and blame ourselves and our will power for not being better when we don’t see immediate results. Again with those pesky, draining thoughts. When we speak to ourselves in a way that is draining and shaming we are working against ourselves to achieve our goals. However, when we choose to prioritize our editing rights, we can shift the inner body workings to work WITH us!
So not only do you get a better experience, and get to feel uplifted, but you also get to help achieve your goals! Why hate yourself to motivate yourself to work harder, when you can love yourself and feel empowered to work easier?
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