That’s because it effectively determines our life.
What we think, believe, and view life as will be how we connect to it and experience it. A poor mindset leads to seeing life the wrong way, being unhappy, and feeling unfulfilled. A brighter one leads to taking positive action, enjoying all life has to offer, and boosts health and well being.
So, mindset is all.
In this post I’m going to give you three strong reasons why your mindset might need to change. Change so that you can develop the best mindset for the best possible way to live.
Let’s dive in with reason No.1.
1. Your mindset is outdated.
Most of our body is designed to last a lifetime.
The mindset isn’t part of that. Surprised? Don’t be. Many minds are out of date. The expectation and outlook contained within them have been the same for many, many years.
Now while it may seem that that’s consistency, it’s actually a lack of progress mentally. It’s akin to being stuck in a pattern and remaining there. After all, you would never think like you did as a teenager as you do now in your late 40’s.
Somewhere between 16 and now you never amended your mindset to move with the times, your changed standards and values, and the different choices and priorities you have.
Have you asked yourself where your mindset is stuck?
I did a few years back and was shocked to honestly realise I was thinking as if it was still 1995. No wonder my life had never caught up.
Not now and yours might need the same updating too!
2. Your mindset has been over influenced.
We all like to believe that we own what we think.
No-one is holding us captive and trying to take over our mind. Which means we are free to think what we want…and we do.
That’s a beautiful theory.
In reality everyone’s mindset has been influenced.
And in this permanently open social media and 24 hour rolling news era, influence is ever present in our lives. Due to the sheer nature of a) the length of time we spend on social media/watching news and b) the easy availability of them, our minds are being convinced on a daily basis.
That’s not difficult to instigate at all. The social media groups you follow or your preference of news channels lead you to hearing and seeing a certain angle and agenda on life. Repeat being there day after day and soon their influence becomes your mindset.
It’s the 21st Century achilles heel.
We believe we are informing ourselves when actually we are being informed by someone.
That’s called influence.
3. It wasn’t yours in the first place.
Everyone starts with an inherited mindset.
Everyone. Even the very best among us.
No-one is born ready made with a mindset to go.
We accumulate one from our early years upwards. We learn and are told by parents, family, teachers, people in authority etc what to believe, what is right and wrong, and how to view life.
It’s not until our mid teens that we start to reject some of that ‘wisdom’ and begin adding some of our own.
But, we often still hold much of our initial mental training in our memory banks that still directs us in life. It’s only if (or when) we question that mindset because it’s not feeling right with the person we are, do we override it and replace it with our own.
Most people never get anywhere near that far. They keep being led by an inner thought process from childhood and early years even when it clearly isn’t valid in their older world many years later.
If you seek change in your life, that’s the place to start. What you were once told.
It’s time to change your mind.
So that’s where you may be.
At a point in life when you need to change your mind so life can begin to change behind it.
Change it because your life hasn’t been working or not reaching the promise it once had with the mindset that’s led you to here.
Take a look at the three above and be honest if some or all of them are you. And your mind. But, there’s good news. It’s your mind and you can change it.
Because a bad life often becomes a much better one when our mindset changes which changes everything for us.
Photo attributions – free to use under Pixabay Content License by elsimage and geralt.
Wherever we turn, wherever we look, there is some element of living pressing down right in front of our face and our mind. It’s like we can’t get away from everything piling up on us. We become heavy headed and overloaded.
This is the modern experience of the average person. Life has become highly stressful, costly, draining, hyper fast, and increasingly out of control.
What used to be called not seeing the wood for the trees. We can’t see the obvious because all the small details are demanding our attention.
What we really need is perspective.
Step back, head away.
Perspective is something few ever practice, or even know how to do.
But it’s a powerful tool that when you get the hang of it turns into a mental art that creates a balanced life.
How often, when you are separated from a difficult situation for a short while, do you see it differently? Take a Christmas break. It reminds you of what counts and then suddenly all the hassles you think mean everything, count as nothing. You change how you view what’s going on as if the clouds have cleared from your mind.
But, you can’t wait for Christmas or a two week holiday in the sun to gain a true picture of your current life.
Waiting for one or two chances per year to escape what swamps you, won’t unswamp you for too long. You will soon be in the very same environment not long after and it will all start again.
You need to build in regular perspective into your schedule.
If you can commit to watching Netflix or hours on end on social media, you can’t argue that you haven’t got the time. If you truly want to get a grip on having a stronger mental state, you have to make room in your weekly timetable.
Here’s how to add it to your life.
Perspective in action.
Perspective WILL change your outlook on life.
But only if you commit to it. It’s like eating healthy for a month then giving up and wondering why you have put on so much weight and feel sluggish. Doing some or many of the following will keep perspective alive in your mind. And that will help you avoid being mentally anxious and in a fog all the time.
Some perspective gaining options –
Do more hours of nothing – just soak in the bath, a long walk 2 or 3 times a week, have lie downs and just reflect. No devices or anything to focus on.
Arrange short breaks – not to cities or fun places but to somewhere quiet where you can switch off and just take in the scene. Places to get away from it all even for a few days.
Have removal weekends – once a month remove one regular activity or chore from your to-do list. Block off pure chill time for mellow music or for chats with family and friends.
Stop hurting your mind – cut out watching news and gossip and social media with their negative horror stories of the world. And check out your TV viewing preferences for how often you watch dark thrillers, murder mysteries, and tense psychological dramas.
Get offline – put your phone down!! It’s got you addicted wasting your time and feeding it with drivel and nothing that adds to your life. You won’t die or miss anything if you hide it for a few hours per night.
There is a phrase that says, ‘the choice is yours’. And despite what people may say and think, most of our life is our choice. We choose to NOT do plenty of those listed above and complain how damaging life is today.
But if we chose instead to bring perspective back, we’d have a better relationship with that same life. And our future. Plus give us back the mental power we have given away.
Perspective shows you the life you are living, not the one you think you are.
Perspective is power. It’s art itself. It’s mental mastery.
It can achieve a huge range of things from ideas to memory, computing to storage. It’s a supercomputer housed in your head.
But, a supercomputer can only be asked to undertake a large range of outcomes based on instruction. While your mind runs automatically as such, it does so to keep you safe, secure, and functioning at your prime most level.
It’s output is down to you!
If you don’t direct it, your mind will wander only onto the normal range of your thinking. Think worrying, negative beliefs and outcomes, that’s the state it will remain in as it obeys your instructions which say, ‘I always think this/these’.
That’s the one life you are living through your mind.
And that’s the only only one it focuses and forms because of this.
So, now onto the Golden Mental Rule this post has been leading up to.
The Golden Mental Rule.
Here’s the Golden Rule.
Your mind cannot create a life it has not experienced.
This means that it can never begin to imagine, activate, and develop any existence you don’t ever think about. Or in short, it won’t ever work on something with no blueprint. Like a builder, it can’t erect a house there are no plans for.
If you want your mind power directed to an aim or aspiration, spend more (if not most) of your time thinking about it. Want/love to have a special partner, new home, better job etc, then get projecting how it would look, feel etc into your mind.
Show it in crystal clear fashion that THIS is what it’s got to get busy helping you construct. Your mind follows you. So show it where you want it to go so it can send back ideas, possibilities, and routes to getting there.
Turn your mind onto ONE life only, the one you want!
Photo attributes – free to use under Pixabay Content License by newarta and JuliusH.
