Our Beliefs Have Power

"Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will rule your life and you will call it fate.”

― Carl Jung

That has to be my favorite quote. Our beliefs have so much power and most of them live underneath the radar screen of our conscious thought. They can propel us into great success or they can hold us back. I was listening to my speaker mentor, Roddy, as he was explaining how beliefs are formed, changed, and why some are stronger than others.

There are levels of cognition, which is the mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses. These levels point out how we can go beyond the level of available information and reach conclusions and beliefs that aren’t helpful to us. These conclusions may be accurate, but they may not be either...and either way, they can control our lives.

We interpret or process our experiences in these different levels and in different ways. It’s not what happens to us, it how we process. We, not the experience, are the variable here. Our habitual thought patterns can lead to erroneous conclusions without thinking. The quote in the picture is from an ancient Greek philosopher, so this concept has been around for a long time. 

I’ll give you an example. I was preaching a sermon some months ago and someone in the front of the sanctuary had fallen asleep. Hahahaha, yes, that happened to me. Can you believe it:)

There are four levels of cognition, what I like to call mental gymnastics, that my mind can take me through during this experience.

1. Description—I can just observe and describe without attaching meaning or emotion to it. It’s a very simple, “I’m preaching and she’s sleeping.”  It’s very healthy because this is what’s real.

2. Interpretation— “I’m preaching and she’s sleeping because she’s bored.” I don’t know that she’s bored, but I make that assumption. I am taking this beyond available information, still without emotion, but I draw my own conclusion. Is this a certainty?

3. Inference—this level is beyond available information and emotions are starting to come into play here. I’m beginning to take it a bit personal. “I’m preaching, she’s sleeping because she’s bored with my preaching.” Okay, it could be true, but is that definite?  Could there be other reasons that she’s sleeping?  Of course, maybe she partied all night (wait, this is church) or maybe she was up with a sleeping baby.  How do I know?  I don't know, do I?

4. Evaluation—this is where I go way beyond available information and make a judgement with emotions.  “I’m preaching, she’s sleeping because she’s bored with my preaching, because I’m not a good speaker…I never prepare enough…I’m a loser…I’ll never be good…and that’s just the way I am.” The power of this level of cognition to impact my life is great, and  because of the emotion behind this thinking, a belief has formed.  The belief that I have formed is not really a reflection of reality, is it? I have no evidence. I have pieced that belief together in my own head. I have drawn my own conclusion. If I accept that without reflecting or without really looking at the truth of it, is that going to influence my life? Yes, absolutely.

Vladimir Lenin quoted, "If we repeat a lie often enough, it becomes truth."  There are beliefs that we have told ourselves that we need to challenge.  Remember, the world was flat for a very long time and everyone believed that...until Kopernicus challenged it.

We weren’t born with beliefs, we were born with a clean slate. Our beliefs have been learned, and some of them might not reflect reality. This is shown by the fact that two people can process the same experiences in totally different ways.  It's not the event that causes the negative feelings, it's what we believe about the event. If we want to change the results that we are getting, we need to change our beliefs. When we change the belief, we change the negative feelings.  The beliefs that hold us back need to be challenged and evaluated for the truth in them.

Watch for your mental gymnastic levels this week.  I know I went to level four this morning already. If you need some help identifying and changing some beliefs, I’m happy to be there for you.

Ever learning,

Jan

Jan McDonald
Maxwell Certified Leadership Team