As a Coach, I observe that the challenges people come up with are quite often the indicators of deep rooted conditioning or a belief which they are not aware of. Yet those beliefs are so intricately weaved into every facet of their life.
You do not know what you do not know and human perception of reality is limited by neural network and human language – as stated by Alfred Korzybski.
These are the three questions that are frequently asked in a session to delve into the problem.
1. What is bothering you? 2. How is this a problem for you? 3. What is stopping you to move forward/take action?
One would assume, response would be lack of resources such as money, time, network etc etc.
However, the truth is quite opposite.
The response that I get is ” Nothing. Just Me, I am stopping myself”
My next question should be pretty obvious by now!
4. What specifically is stopping you to move forward/take action?
And the response is a three worded statement starting with a four letter word starting with F***
Not quite the word that you heard in your mind as you read that.
It’s “FEAR OF XXXXXXXXX”
Yes, its the fear of judgement, fear of failure, fear of isolation, fear of dying,fear of lack, fear of authority so on and the list is endless.
That simple 4 letter word is a monster that takes different forms, cripples many for a life time and stops them from many things including:
- self care
- saying No
- saying Yes
- taking action
- taking decisions
- speaking up and voicing their thoughts
- self appreciation
- changing jobs
- grabbing opportunities
- pursuing your purpose
- being YOU
Strange but true. 95 percent of brain activity is unconscious. These include habits and patterns, automatic body function, creativity, emotions, personality, beliefs and values, cognitive biases, and long-term memory.
“Most of what we do every minute of every day is unconscious, ” says University of Wisconsin neuroscientist Paul Whelan. “Life would be chaos if everything were on the forefront of our consciousness.”
The realisation that our actions may not be the pristine results of our high-level reasoning can shake our faith in the strength of such cherished values as reasoning, logic, a capacity to choose, and a sense of responsibility over those choices.
Enough of conscious and unconscious. Now where is this unconscious stemming from. It does sound like we are mere puppets in the hands of unconscious mind. But can we change that and create new thoughts and redesign the unconscious to help us think without thinking.
We asked four questions so far to reach here and here is the slicer :
5. When did you take on that fear of xxxxx for the very first time?
and the response is astounding.
They are the fears that one picks up from childhood and sometimes, it can be ancestral/genetic. It is as though we grew up to be an adult still wearing the clothes of a 5 year old kid.
Life moved on and everything changed since childhood yet surprising how your mind can hold on to the definitions that you took on board as a child.
What if, you can get the adult in you revisit the inner child in you and give assurance that it was in the past and that is no longer true. Let that inner child know that it does not serve you any more and that was just an experience.
Your inter personal relationships directly reflect your inner emotional state and inner dialogue. Same applies the other way round too.
So go ahead and ask yourself those 5 questions when you are in a state of reflection and set aside some quiet time to explore that inner child. What you find will amaze you and that may be the new beginning.