Welcome back to my Mindset 101 Series! Throughout this series I will be sharing the fundamentals of mindset work. In this episode, I’m going to help you understand:

• Your thought patterns are the cause of every result in your life
• You aren’t stuck with the first thought that comes to mind
• If you want new results, it begins with changing your thinking

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In the previous two episodes, Mindset and Circumstances, we’ve already talked a lot about the impact our thinking has on our life. You’ve learned that your mindset is simply your particular way of thinking. I’ve also shown you there is a difference between your thoughts (your story) and circumstances (neutral facts) and what an empowering difference that can make on your perspective of your life.

Your thoughts are simply sentences in your mind that you tell yourself. They are the the interpretation and meaning you assign to your circumstances. When someone else says or does something, or something happens in the world around you, you observe it, and then have thoughts about it. This is your brain’s way of making sense of its environment. Our thoughts form our opinions and beliefs, they dictate how we feel, and they shape the way we interact with ourselves, other people, and the world.

I want you to imagine one of those giant colorful ball pits for kids. Each ball has a different thought written on it. Any time something happens, it’s like you reach down and grab the first ball you see. This is where most people stop. They assume that they are stuck with the first thought that comes to mind, whatever thought comes naturally to them is the one they hold on to.

Our brain’s default is to run on autopilot and not stop and question whether the thought actually serves us. However, you ALWAYS have the option of reaching back in and grabbing a different ball (or thought,) from the pit. You can dive on in and swim to the bottom and come back with a thought that may be harder to get to, but is going to be far more helpful and useful to you.

What starts to happen over time as we have the same/similar thoughts again and again, we create a thought pattern or a belief. Imagine that every single one of the red balls in the pit all represent the thought of, “not enough.” That means when a circumstance arises, you have a really high likelihood of coming back with a thought based in “not enough.” It becomes much more difficult to find a ball that has a different thought on it.

These thought patterns and beliefs become so engrained in our brain that we start to accept these thoughts as actual truth. This is often why it is difficult for people to separate their thoughts from their circumstances. However, with awareness, understanding, and intention, you can start to weaken the unwanted thought patterns and shift into new thoughts and beliefs that will align with the person you want to be and the goals you have.

The effects of your thinking:

• Neutral circumstances happen in your life
• You have thoughts which give meaning to the circumstance
• Your thoughts make you feel certain emotions in regards to the circumstance
• The way you feel impacts how you act, react, what you do, what you don’t do
• Those actions create results in your life that are either desirable or undesirable to you

This system shows us that if we want to create more desired results, we have to go all the way back to what initiates the chain reaction which is our THOUGHTS. This is where the adjustment needs to be made. When we think differently, we feel differently, which allows us to act differently, therefore creating different results.

As a weight loss thru mindset coach, I help my clients identify and understand their thoughts and beliefs (about food, eating, exercise, themselves and their ability to lose weight and live life as a thin woman, etc.) which keep them in the cycle of having an overweight body and shift into new thoughts and beliefs that align with creating the new result of losing weight for good.

When you change the way you think, rather than just trying to change what you do, THAT’S when you’ve fully aligned your mindset to support simple, effective, and permanent changes resulting in long-term results!

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