Finding and Changing Limiting Beliefs
Beliefs serve three major purposes. First, they function like lenses that you peer through to see the world, both outside and inside of yourself. Second, they are gate keepers for your creative flow. They are one of the major determinants controlling what you can create in your life and as your life. And, third, they keep you firmly anchored in what is often called Relative Reality, as opposed to Ultimate Reality. (This third purpose is fairly esoteric and you don’t need to work with it or worry about it unless or until you are on a deep spiritual path.)
Any belief that says you are less than you truly are is a limiting belief. These beliefs continue to create limiting experiences and conclusions for us until we find and change them. Finding and changing these limiting beliefs is one of the most important skills for healing that you can master. The challenge lies in how the human mind works. We only have one mind, but we divide it into parts to talk about how it works. One of the most common divisions is into the conscious and subconscious minds. The large majority of the beliefs that make up your world view are in the subconscious mind, operating on autopilot.
To find these unconsciously-held limiting beliefs and get them aligned with higher truth requires a methodology for getting into the subconscious, isolating the belief, moving it over to the conscious mind, comparing it with higher truth, then putting the higher-truth belief back into the unconscious mind. For this task, we use:
The Seven Tools Method of Embodied Inquiry
Step 1: Put yourself into an openhearted space, tap into your heart center, connect to self compassion.
Step 2: Remember that all feelings are valid.
Step 3: Become aware of what you are feeling both emotionally and physically, in your body.
Step 4: Compassionately acknowledge that you are feeling that way without trying to change it, deny it, or make it any different than it is.
Step 5: Ask that feeling to take you to its roots.
Step 6: Become aware of the roots (the belief behind the feeling). If a memory emerges, look for what conclusions were drawn at that time, those are the roots.
Step 7: Compassionately acknowledge the truth that you have been holding that belief as if it were true then observe and acknowledge the impacts it has had in your life.
Step 8: Check to see how aligned that belief is with your highest good.
Background:
The Seven Tools Method of Embodied Inquiry was arrived at by combining insights from three sources:
how your mind processes information to arrive at an interpretation of your experiences (the lens analogy)
the Seven Tools of Healing
and known aspects of Consciousness.
When a person has an experience and feelings are generated because of that experience, the question we want to ask is “what belief(s) generated those feelings from that experience?” Then we want to ask, “Are those beliefs really true from a wider context, higher perspective, or based on what the person knows now?”
Because feelings are innocent messengers bringing us information, we never have to say, “Oh, I shouldn’t be feeling this way.” You may not want to be feeling that way, but the fact is, you are. Techniques that focus on changing the feeling before fully exploring it are like sweeping the problems under the rug. So, a healthier approach would be to say to yourself something like, “Here is how I am feeling. I wonder what information it is bringing me, what belief generated it?”
We use some of the Seven Tools to start answering these questions
Here is a summation of the strategy. You start by choosing to adopt an open-hearted, self-compassionate perspective. Then take an honest look at how you really feel right now. Compassionately acknowledge that you are feeling the feeling and then ask the feeling to take you to its roots. When you become aware of the roots (aka the belief), you compassionately acknowledge the truth that you have been believing that belief and the impacts it has had on your life and then you ask your preferred question to see how aligned that belief is with your highest good.
Sample Questions for Running Through Each Step of the Seven Tools Method of Embodied Inquiry:
Step 1:
It can be helpful to find a trick to viscerally connect to loving self compassion. For some people it works to imagine holding their child, hugging a loved one, or playing with a beloved animal and then turn that loving feeling towards themselves.
Step 2:
All feelings are valid so resist the urge to invalidate or judge uncomfortable feelings as you become aware of them. If you feel it, it’s a valid feeling. There is no need to change it, just to explore it.
Step 3:
Start by increasing your awareness of the truth of your present moment. You might ask:
How are you feeling right now?
What are you feeling in your body right now?
What are you experiencing around whatever life situation is at hand?
What does that emotion feel like in your body?
Just be with your physical feeling. What emotion does it evoke in you?
Step 4:
Then you deepen into feeling whatever it is you are feeling and just accept the feeling as it is. You make more space for the feeling. You allow it to be without trying to change it or make it go away. You practice increasing your acceptance of the truth of your present moment. You might ask/say:
What happens if you allow yourself to hold the fact that you are feeling this way in your heart space?
Can you allow yourself to feel compassion for yourself because you are feeling this way?
What happens when you allow yourself to feel this?
Can you hold enough space for yourself to feel both of these things at once?
Can you bring that feeling into your heart space?
What else do you know about this feeling?
Can you tell me more about this?
Can you allow yourself to be with this feeling? To fully feel it?
What else are you feeling around this topic?
Be as kind to yourself as you can that you are having this feeling. What do you notice?
Say to the feeling, “I see you. I feel you. It is okay that you are here. I’m here with you. What do you need me to know? How do you want me to be with you?”
You may need to cycle through awareness and acceptance a few times to get a clear enough picture of what you are feeling and where the charge is (in other words, which piece of the equation is likely connected to a limiting belief). MAKE SURE YOU ARE BRINGING IN COMPASSION BEFORE MOVING ON TO THE NEXT STEP.
PLEASE NOTE: Not all painful feelings are connected to a limiting belief. Sometimes we are feeling something uncomfortable because there is something painful happening in our lives. When this is the case, compassionate awareness and acceptance are still extremely helpful, for example, with grief. The Seven Tools Method of Embodied Inquiry is especially helpful for exploring chronic and/or recurring feelings such as depression, anxiety, those driving patterns in relationships, left over from abuse at whatever age, and those driving addictions, for example.
Step 5:
This is when you ask the feeling to take you deeper, to the belief that created it. Remember that you might access the belief through the words popping up such as “Everyone leaves me” or as a memory or sometimes, another feeling. If it’s a memory, look for the conclusions you drew. If it’s a feeling, head back up to the Step 4 questions for a bit before looking for its roots.
What is your body trying to tell you by creating these symptoms?
Let your body take you back to when you first had this kind of physical sensation. What were you experiencing then? What was your take-home message from that experience?
Ask that feeling to take you to its roots.
When is the first time you remember feeling this way?
When have you felt this way before?
What conclusions did you draw from these experiences?
Once the belief is brought into conscious awareness:
Step 6:
Keep exploring the feelings and the experience until the root has been revealed. Since in the last step you were asking questions to elicit the roots/belief, this step will happen in the flow, but it’s outlined here so you recognize it as you see it. You may want to explore the belief and your experience of it a bit. You might say/ask:
What has been your experience of this belief?
How has holding this belief impacted your life?
How are you feeling now that you see this belief at play in your life?
What else has this belief helped create in your life?
PLEASE NOTE: Sometimes the belief becomes immediately apparent and sometimes it takes time and repeated or prolonged attention. When this happens you can acknowledge that the belief isn’t making itself known and explore the feelings that that brings up along with any resistance you might be having to having that belief emerge. For this you might ask:
What might happen if you were to become aware of this belief?
What is the fear?
What part of you is protecting you from this truth? What does it need?
What is the resistance about?
Step 7:
Now that you are aware of the belief, next you want to acknowledge your truth that you have been carrying that belief. (Note: not admitting that the belief is true. Admitting the truth that you have been holding the belief whether or not the belief is true). You might say/ask:
How have those conclusions been impacting you through the years?
Can you find compassion for yourself as you recognize the impact this belief has had in your life?
How do you want to be with yourself as you see this belief at play in your life?
What are you feeling in your body as you see this belief and its impact on your life?
Step 8:
Once you have uncovered the belief that created the feeling and fully acknowledged your truth around that belief, next bring the belief into your heart space and see if something else is ready to start taking its place in your inner blueprint. You might ask/say:
What does your heart say about this belief?
What would God/higher power say about this belief?
How does this belief look through Spirit eyes?
Is this a belief that you would want a loved one to hold?
How does this belief align with your higher truth?
What might you believe instead?
What does your inner wisdom say about this belief?
What else might be true here?
What happens to this belief as you hold it in your heart space?
What other conclusion might you have drawn from those experiences?
Is there anything that your adult self wants to say to your younger self who experienced things this way?
How does your inner wisdom/higher knowing want you to be with this belief?
PLEASE NOTE:
We outline these steps as though they are eight steps but the more you practice The Seven Tools Method of Embodied Inquiry, the more this will all start to flow and to happen naturally. You may not always have to consciously go to each of these eight different places. Indeed, the goal is to build the capacity to practice compassionate accepting awareness of what you are feeling, trace the feeling to its roots, practice compassionate accepting awareness of the belief (aka the roots) and listen for what belief is most aligned with your authentic self to the point that this is just how you naturally are with your feelings, your “muscle memory”.
Asking your favorite aligning question of a belief in this way once is sometimes enough to get it to shift. Other times it is a practice of noticing it as it comes up again and again in your life. Some of these beliefs get so baked into our lives that it can take time and several explorations for them to unwind. Practice being kind to yourself when you see the same feeling cropping up again and again. Then you can go through this process as many times as necessary with the knowledge that things are taking whatever time they are taking to shift.