Thoughts are things.
Your thoughts are not just wispy little clouds drifting through your head. Your thoughts are things. They are actually measurable units of energy. Thoughts are biochemical electrical impulses. They are waves of energy that, as far as we can tell, penetrate all time and space.
Thought is action in rehearsal. — Sigmund Freud
Your thoughts are powerful.
They are real, they are measurable, they are energy.
Every single thought you have is a statement of your desires to the universe. Every single thought you have generates a physiological change in your body. You are a product of all of the thoughts you have thought, feelings you have felt, and actions you have taken up until now. And…the thoughts you think today, feelings you feel today, and actions you take today will determine your experiences tomorrow.
The game of life is the game of boomerangs. Our thoughts, deeds and words return to us sooner or later, with astounding accuracy. — Florence Shinn
Thoughts affect your body.
We know from polygraph, or lie detector tests that your body reacts to your thoughts. They change your temperature, heart rate, blood pressure, breathing rate, muscle tension and how much your hands may sweat. Let's say you are hooked up to a lie detector, and asked a question like, "Did you take the money?" If you did take the money, and you lie about it, your hands may sweat, or get colder, your heart will beat faster, your blood pressure will go up, your breathing will get faster, and your muscles will tighten. These kinds of physiological reactions occur not only when you are lying, but in reaction to every thought you have. Every single cell in your body is affected by every single thought you have!
I admit thoughts influence the body. — Albert Einstein
So, you can see the importance of learning to think as positively as possible. Negative thoughts are toxic, and they affect your body in a negative way. They weaken you, make you perspire, create muscular tension and a more acidic environment within your body. They increase the likelihood of cancer (cancer cells thrive in an acidic environment,) and other disease. They also send out a negative energy vibration, and attract more experiences of the same vibration.
Positive thoughts, on the other hand, will affect your body in a positive way. They will make you feel more relaxed, more centered, and alert. They stimulate the release of endorphins in your brain, reducing pain and increasing pleasure. In addition to this, your positive thoughts send out a positive energy vibration that will attract more positive experiences back into your life.
It has been proven now scientifically that an affirmative thought is hundreds of times more powerful than a negative thought. – Michael Bernard Beckwith
Your conscious and subconscious mind.
Most of us are fairly aware of our conscious thoughts, but it is important to become aware of our subconscious thoughts as well. Our subconscious mind is pretty much running the show, and since most of us have a constant negative tape playing in our heads, we are continually sending out negative messages. You must learn to reprogram your subconscious mind, and transform your negative internal thoughts into healthy positive ones. By looking closely at your beliefs and self image, you can work on eliminating any limiting or negative ideas. This negative self talk is like a type of static, or interference on a phone call, it will interfere with, distort, and even block the frequencies of your positive intentions. If not removed, it will reduce your ability to create and manifest the future you desire.
Sometimes you’ve got to let everything go…..purge yourself. If you are unhappy with anything…..whatever is bringing you down, get rid of it. Because you’ll find that when you’re free, your true creativity, your true self comes out. — Tina Turner
Unfortunately, many of us have a fairly stubborn tendency to hold on to our old negative thoughts and self images. It's our comfort zone- we've become accustomed to our familiar concepts of reality, and we tend to get stuck in our subconscious beliefs of inadequacy, fear, and doubt. Most of these limiting thoughts and feelings stem from past incidents, beliefs, and experiences that we've internalized over the years and turned into our personal truths. These negative concepts can sabotage us and keep us from realizing our fullest growth and potential unless we make a conscious decision to address them, release them, and let them go.
Think about trying to drive a car with the parking brake on. No matter how much you try to accelerate, the parking brake will keep slowing you down, but as soon as you release it – you will automatically and effortlessly go faster. Your limiting thoughts, feelings and behaviors are like a type of psychological parking brake. They will drag you down, and slow you down unless you make a committed effort to let them go, and replace them with more positive thoughts and beliefs.
You must be willing to release your negative mental programming, and step out of your comfort zone in order to make room for a positive, healthy self image and belief system. This will shift your energy vibration and allow you to more easily and effectively attract the positive energy and experiences that you desire in your life. Beliefs are just your habitual thoughts, and they can be changed through affirmations, positive self-talk, behavioral changes and visualization techniques. These are all extremely effective tools in releasing these old negative thought patterns, and we will address each of these powerful techniques in the chapters to come.
If you find that your negative programming is so deeply rooted that you are experiencing great difficulty in letting go, then you may want to try another approach. I have discovered three very powerful releasing techniques. They are extremely effective in the release of negative thought patterns, beliefs, and emotions. They are:
- The Sedona Method by Hale Dwoskin (www.sedonamethod.com)
- The Work of Byron Katie (www.TheWork.com)
- The Emotional Freedom Technique (www.emofree.com)
Each of these websites contains information on books, audio courses and seminars that will help you learn how to quickly and powerfully release your negative mental programming and return to a place of pure awareness.
What the mind of man can conceive and believe, the mind of man can achieve. — Napoleon Hill
Your conscious mind.
The conscious mind is the part of you that thinks and reasons ? it's the part of your mind that you use to make everyday decisions. Your free will lies here, and with your conscious mind, you can decide just what you want to create in your life. With this part of your mind you can accept or reject any idea. No person or circumstance can force you to think consciously about thoughts or ideas you do not choose. The thoughts you do choose, of course, will eventually determine the course of your life. With practice, and a little bit of disciplined effort, you can learn to direct your thoughts to only those that will support the manifestation of your chosen dreams and goals. Your conscious mind is powerful, but it is the more limited part of your mind.
The conscious mind has:
- Limited processing capacity
- Short term memory (about 20 seconds)
- The ability to manage 1 to 3 events at a time
- Impulses that travel at 120 to 140 mph
- The ability to process an average of 2,000 bits of information per second
Your subconscious mind.
Your subconscious mind is actually much more spectacular. It is frequently referred to as your spiritual or universal mind, and it knows no limits except for those that you consciously choose. Your self-image and your habits live in your subconscious mind. It functions in every single cell of your body. This is the part of your mind that is connected to your Higher Self at a much greater level than your conscious mind. It is your connection to God, your connection to Source and Universal Infinite Intelligence.
Your subconscious mind is habitual, and timeless, and it works in the present tense only. It stores your past learning experiences and memories, and it monitors all of your bodily operations, motor functions, heart rate, digestion, etc. Your subconscious mind thinks literally, and it will accept every thought that your conscious mind chooses to think. It has no ability to reject concepts or ideas. Now, what that means is that we can choose to use our conscious mind to deliberately reprogram our subconscious beliefs, and the subconscious mind has to accept the new ideas and beliefs ? it can't reject them. We can actually make a conscious decision to change the content of our subconscious mind.
The Subconscious Mind has:
- Expanded processing capacity
- Long term memory (past experiences, attitudes, values, and beliefs)
- The ability to manage thousands of events at a time
- Impulses that travel at over 100,000 mph
- The ability to process an average of 4,000,000,000 bits of information per second
As you can see, the subconscious mind is far more powerful than the conscious mind. Think of your mind as an iceberg. The part of the iceberg you see, the part above water, is your conscious mind. It represents only about one sixth of your actual mental capacity, and the part below water (the other five sixths) is your subconscious mind. When we operate primarily from the conscious mind (as we typically do) we are only using a fraction of our true potential. The conscious mind is a much slower and more cumbersome vehicle than the subconscious mind.
So, the goal here is to learn to tap into the vast power of our subconscious mind in order to use it to our advantage. We must create room in each day to "check in" with our subconscious spiritual mind. Daily time spent quietly without any external distractions will strengthen our connection to who we really are. We can connect with our subconscious mind through the use of several techniques. They include: affirmations, visualization, prayer, contemplation and meditation, gratitude and appreciation, and the use of positive focus techniques.
Our subconscious mind can take us where we want to go, and help us reach our goals in life much faster and easier than our conscious mind ever could. So, by connecting with and utilizing the amazing speed, power, and agility of our subconscious minds, we can begin to use the Law of Attraction in a deliberate way to more effectively attract and create the results we desire.
Within you right now is the powerto do things you never dreamed possible. This power becomes available to you just as soon as you can change your beliefs. – Dr. Maxwell Maltz
About The Author:
Long before co-creating the bestselling Chicken Soup for the Soul series, Jack Canfield was already teaching the ancient principles of the Law of Attraction. Jack has been consciously living in harmony with this universal law for more than thirty years, and his personal success is a testament to its power. Now, in the Key to Living the Law of Attraction, he shares his knowledge and experience with you, and offers you his proven tools and techniques for applying the Law of Attraction in your own life.
Visit http://www.JacksKeyToLiving.com to learn more!
