Importance of Lining Up Your Beliefs and Expectations

What role do your beliefs and expectations play in shaping your life? And how much should they influence your actions?

A belief is a thought pattern that you hold, either consciously or subconsciously. It could be something that you were taught, something that people around you or the media espouses, or an ingrained way of thinking formed from your own experience. An expectation is just that- what you expect to happen even before it does. People generally have a positive or negative set point when it comes to their expectation. And your set point probably varies depending on a given subject (for example, you could have a positive expectation when it comes to relationships because you have had good experiences in the past, but have a negative or somewhat lower expectation about what is possible for you in your career).

Your expectations are really, really important when you are trying to create change in your life. If you desire something, and are taking action steps towards it, but don't at your core believe that it can happen, then you will always be disappointed in the results you achieve. The universe can only deliver to you as much success as you think is possible for you.

That's why it's critical that your beliefs and expectations be in line with your actions. Take the issue of losing weight for example, which is something a lot of people struggle with. Most people have certain set beliefs about what they must do to lose weight (cut calories, work out more, etc), and their expectation is that if they do these things for an extended period of time, they will indeed lose weight. The problem comes in when you don't follow through on the action steps that are in line with those beliefs. When you slip up on the action, then your belief and your action are no longer in sync. You inadvertently set up your own struggle.

But if you ever watch a thin person eat, you will notice that they have a different set of beliefs and expectations. They don't see food as the enemy that is making them gain weight. They eat with relish, because their belief is that the food is nourishing them - there is no internal struggle or angst between what they think and what they are doing. Their energy is perfectly aligned on the subject of food, so their body follows through for them in a variety of different ways - efficiently metabolizing calories, sending them a strong signal to stop eating when they are full, attracting them to healthier foods and less cravings, and naturally controlling their appetite.

These physiological differences in people aren't mere coincidence or good luck! They are a direct result of aligned energy. When you have positive thoughts, beliefs, and expectations about food and your body (or any other subject for that matter), you are allowing your own energy source to work in your favor in more ways that you can consciously ever coordinate. All of the action (drastic dieting, killer workouts, etc) in the world will not make up for misaligned energy in the long term. You will find that when you stop or lessen the action, the weight will pile back on even quicker than before. Taking action before aligning energy is like putting the cart before the horse.

Just like everything else, you have to change your thoughts and expectations to be more positive in a way where you can love and trust your body, and then follow through with easeful, inspired action (a healthy meal you can savor, exercise you really enjoy, etc). The positive action then aligns you with your energy even more, which automatically raises your vibration, and automatically (without your conscious effort) helps guide you towards more inspired action, which picks up more positive energy, and so on - until you have a strong momentum going in your favor. After a while, being able to eat what you want and maintain your weight becomes a habit - just ask your skinny friend!

Authentic Power

Most people have mixed thoughts when it comes to understanding the source of power. I've noticed most people (including myself, at times) say one thing, but believe or practice another, which causes a conflict in your energy. The most basic question you should ask yourself is: do you view power as external or internal? And what does power mean to you? It depends on who you ask. Some might say that power is influence over others. Some people think of it as the ability to do whatever they want, whenever they want- a freedom of sorts. Some equate money to power. The one thing all these answers have in common is that they are all external sources of power. The problem with viewing power this way is that it is not really yours - when you find that you can't manipulate someone, or aren't in a state of financial abundance, or in a circumstance that you feel cannot change, then you suddenly feel powerless. This is the fundamental problem of assigning your power to something or someone outside of yourself.

What if your perception of power was different? What if true power was control over your own mind? If you buy into the theory that you are creating your own reality through your thoughts (which are vibrating at a certain frequency), and are attracting other thoughts, circumstances, and people of a similar frequency, then your logic should tell you that your thoughts (both your underlying core beliefs and conscious thoughts) are driving your experience- nothing else.

The more positive energy you cultivate, the more power you gain over your own experience. This then, is authentic power. By becoming a master of your thoughts, you become a master of your own universe. You don't get to control other people's experience - they are doing that through their thoughts. The problem happens when you are convinced that someone else is in charge of your experience. You then voluntarily (through this erroneous belief) assign power to the other person by giving them your attention. Everyone is creating their own reality, and no one can create yours for you. You don't have to control anyone else's actions to get what you want - all you have to do is stay focused 100% of the time on what you want, and then the Law of Attraction brings you circumstances and people of that exact frequency.

The easiest way to gain power (both internal and external) is by focusing your attention. You don't have to push against what you don't want; you simply have give your attention and energy to what you do want. This can and will work in your own life - just try it. Start small, because you have the least resistance to changing patterns of thought about smaller things. Focus on something that is already a small part of your life (like your favorite color, for example). Start seeing it everywhere, appreciate why you like it, notice it frequently in your daily experience. And then just relax and let go of it for a while. You will find that that exact thing will expand and replicate itself in your life. And then you will notice it more, and it will expand more, and you will notice it more, and so on. You have then, through the power of your focused attention, created and brought more of that thing into your life. As you get good at it, you can do that for practically everything, big and small. Now that is real power.

How To Create Real Change In Your Life

After last week's post, people commented that they're intrigued by the concept of meditation and want to try it, but would like to understand more about what's actually behind it. So I wanted to write about how you can take something like the concept of meditation (which may sound great in some abstract philosophical sense), and create real change in your life. Not only inner change, but clear, sustainable outer change. That's the bottom line you're trying to achieve - a noticeable difference in the way you feel, think, react, and experience events in your life. When you change the inner, the outer automatically changes - that's the secret.

The true litmus test of any set of beliefs, whether they come from organized religion, spiritual beliefs, or your own personal experience, is whether they are adding value and helping you create the life you want to live. If your beliefs are not helping you grow, evolve, and accomplish the things you want, it make senses to explore and adapt them to what will work for you. So ask yourself, is your belief system helping you or hurting you?

Meditation helps you to do just that - instead of assigning random outside causes to things in your life (I'm unlucky, the economy sucks, I was born into a bad environment, my government is holding me down, my husband/wife is unsupportive, etc), it helps you look within to create change. Think about it - you really have no other option - if you do not look within, you are looking without. While it is certainly true that outside circumstances do influence your life, you can slowly begin to change those circumstances from the inside out, which is the only real way to create change.

Meditation helps you get in touch with the part of yourself (your consciousness, or the greater Energy source that some people call God), that is beyond your mind, ego, and body. It is a way of silencing your mind so that you establish a stronger and clearer link to your own power source. As you begin to identify more with this Source (which is only pure, positive energy), your mind and body benefit as well. For example, after a while you will notice your breathing become deeper and more relaxed (in fact, this should be one of the first things you should notice). You thoughts will become more peaceful and have more clarity. You might notice negative emotion like fear or anger subside; on the flip side, meditation sometimes heightens emotions that are laying just below the surface in order for you to be able recognize and deal with them more effectively.

There is no absolute set of things that will happen to any given person, simply because no one has the same thought patterns, emotional blocks, expectations, desires, and goals as anyone else. It is a highly personal journey, just like your life. But your own consciousness or higher self is always aware of everything that is going on with you (past, present, and future), even if your mind is not. Flashes of intuition, insight, solutions to problems, healing in your body, and seeming coincidences all come from this untapped pure, positive Energy space. The impulse may occur to you through an idea in your mind, a random synchronicity in your life, or an inspired action. But the source is always the same.

Simply put, the goal of meditation is to heighten your awareness, and to increase your level of consciousness to the point that all your thoughts and actions are always inspired. But, it's not an all or nothing game, and no one is keeping score. You can never lose. Consciousness is always present, beckoning you. The only choice you have is whether or not to answer the call.