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Belief systems

by Adair Good

How many times have you said to yourself, “I can’t do that” or “I’m not good enough”. Think about these limiting beliefs – negative thoughts that are instilled in our minds by others. They’re usually formed during childhood by significant adults in our lives, be it parents, grandparents or teachers.

These beliefs are powerful and can be significant in the forming of self-esteem. Do you know where your limiting beliefs come from or if they’re even valid?

A good example of how these thoughts are formed is this: A parent asks a child what is the picture the child has drawn. The child replies: “An aeroplane”. Without thinking, the parent says the picture doesn’t look like a plane. Something as simple as this can lodge itself in the child’s mind as a negative thought and leave the impression that “I can’t draw”, thereby becoming a limiting belief.

Unfortunately, as children, we make these thoughts part of our belief system and they’re imprinted in our subconscious as reality since we are as yet unable to tell true from false.

As we get older, we reinforce these beliefs in our minds and in the minds of others when we make mistakes and offer the reason that we’re not good at something.

Understanding that these are only negative thoughts and not necessarily true may help us to stop believing them, but it depends who said them to us and how much of an impact they’ve had.

You may like to do an exercise that will help you become more selfaware. Note down all the negative thoughts you have about yourself. This is your limiting belief system – for example, “I’m not …” or “I can’t …”. Read your list and ask yourself: “Do I really believe all these negative things about myself?” If you did, you wouldn’t have achieved anything in your life.

It’s also a good exercise to make a list of positives, along the lines of: “I can …” and “I am …”. There’s nothing wrong with being positive and even praising ourselves once in a while, especially if it helps overcome negative thoughts.

Imagine what’s possible if you can create a completely different belief system within yourself. If you can unlock your true potential you will be able to become the person you’re meant to be.

Think about your dreams: Don’t they deserve to be realised?

Adair Good is a member of the Hong Kong International Coaching Community (info@coachinghk.org)