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I have the best job in the world. 
I get to see people’s best selves. 
It’s like I have a superpower. Everywhere I look, I see people’s potential.
When I work with people, it’s almost as if I’m working with 2 people: their current self and their future best self.
I see what’s possible for them. I can see the joy, freedom, and ease that’s possible in their future.
Here’s what I can’t do: I can’t make that future self a reality for them. I can’t force them to think certain things. I can’t force them to take certain actions.
As a coach, I can have all the knowledge, share all the fancy tools, and be full of amazing encouragement. Yet if clients don’t believe in my future vision for them, it will never happen for them. If they don’t believe that it’s possible for them, they won’t take the action necessary to become that future best self. 
Remember last week when we were talking about beliefs? Remember how beliefs are just thoughts we tell ourselves over and over until we think they’re true? My biggest challenge as a coach is to get clients to BELIEVE something different than what they’re currently believing. To suspend their current belief to dig into the possibility that a different future may exist for them.

What Can I do? 

While I can’t force clients to think or act differently there are some amazing things I can do that help tremendously. Here are things I can help with:

• I help you dig into their thoughts to see what they’re thinking and how those current thoughts have created the life they’re currently living.
• I introduce the power of the thought model and how, if we change our thoughts, we change our life. Literally. Our thoughts drive our emotions. Our emotions drive our actions and our actions lead to the results we see in our lives. The results we see ALWAYS lead back to the original thought and things we were telling ourselves. Always. This is the way our brain works, the way the world works.
• I help them question their current beliefs

If we think our life sucks, we look for ways in which our life sucks, we will always find evidence for what we look for. If we think our life is awesome, we look for ways in which our life is awesome, and we will always find evidence for what we look for. Intrigued? Here’s a good article on the Reticular Activating System that dives a bit deeper. 
A bit part of my job is helping clients expand their current belief systems. I help them question their current beliefs in order to see that their reality is a result of their prior thinking versus anything that’s happened in their life (and how this is a good thing). I can help you step back from what you think is evidence for why you can’t have your future life and instead look at your current state of your life as the effect of your prior thinking. 

What we look for we will find. #limitingbelief #brainhack Click To Tweet
If we think it’s not possible for us to lose weight, we’ll look for evidence as to how it’s not possible to lose weight. If we think it’s not possible to have a connected loving relationship with our husband, we will look for ways that we can’ have a close loving relationship with our husband. 

Graduate Level Thinking

Do you know I used to be a high school teacher? I have my masters in education and if I were to label this post with a class name it would be called the Advanced Mindset 202 Course and last week would have been titled Limiting Beliefs 201. If you missed that, go back and listen as it’s important to understand limiting beliefs and have some awareness into where we were holding ourselves back with our own thinking of what’s possible for our lives (Plus, you always want to take the 201 before the 202 level class, lol!).
When we think something is all we deserve or all that’s possible for us, that becomes all that is possible for us, all that we are able to create. We’re essentially allowing our thoughts to put bars on our own windows. Let’s bust those down.
How do we start busting them down and instead opening the window of possibility? We get used to thinking bigger thoughts and we start dreaming a bit bigger.
This will feel uncomfortable. That’s normal. That’s called cognitive dissonance. It’s the space between what we currently believe (think over and over) and what we’re able to believe. This week I’d like you to put on your dreaming hat and get ready to go big.

Dream Big

Think of yourself one year from today: How do you want your life to be different? How do you want to feel differently?
Think of yourself 5 years from now: What do you want your life to be like? To feel like?

What is going to happen when you ask yourself these questions? You’re going to discover some of those limiting beliefs (thoughts that you’re telling yourself as to what’s possible for you and your life.) I’m asking you to ignore them for now. To suspend what you believe is reality.

Instead, dream! If you knew that everything will work out for you and your family, what do you want your life to be like in 5 years? In 10 years? What happens when I start talking like this? People start to slowly move away. They say things like:

Susie’s crazy. 
She doesn’t know my life.
She’s not in my shoes. 
It’s possible for her but not for me.
She doesn’t have my mother.
She doesn’t have my husband.
Her situation is different.
She doesn’t get me

And yes warrior, you can choose to think those things. Yet…remember last week? If you think it’s not possible for you, it’s not. You are in charge of creating your future and your reality. My question for you is:

Why are you fighting for your limitations?
Why are you looking for excuses as to why you can’t live a life you love? 

If there’s a piece of you that would like to believe it’s possible for you, keep reading because I know it is. I’ve worked with hundreds of women who have busted the bars off their windows of disbelief and now are living lives they love. 

 4 Steps To Live A Life You Love

Here are four steps to start feeling better and living that life I see is possible for you: 

1) Awareness:

Pay attention to what you’re telling yourself. What you tell yourself over and over is what you believe. Bring awareness to your current thoughts and beliefs by asking yourself the following: What are you currently believing (telling yourself over and over)? About yourself? Your life? Remember, you get to believe whatever you want to believe. 

2) Dream:

What would a life I love look like? Feel like? Be like? Allow yourself time to suspend your inner critic and inner problem-finder to DREAM BIG. What does your best possible life look like in five years? 10 Years? What do you think I see for you? Shut down your inner critic and open up to your inner warrior. DREAM.

3) Kind Questioning:

Get curious in a kind way. Pretend you’re your own coach and start to investigate why you’re telling yourself what you’re telling yourself. Start to investigate where your thoughts are holding you back by asking some of these questions:  Why are you living the life you’re currently living? Why aren’t you living your dream vision of your life now? If you were telling a friend why you’re living the life you’re living, what would your explanation be? Why haven’t you lost that weight yet? Why don’t you get the sleep you need? Why isn’t your marriage fulfilling? Why isn’t your job fulfilling or meaningful? What does you inner warrior want for you? What are you telling yourself about why that life isn’t possible for you?

4) Belief Shifting:

In order to begin to believe differently we need to begin to change the thoughts we think over and over to get to the beliefs we defend. Once you find the thoughts you’re thinking that keep you doing what you’re doing, it’s time to shift them. I like to think of a bridge and our current thought being on one side and our future self being on the other. We often need a thought to help us over that bridge to get to that new thought.

Let’s look at the example of weight loss. If you’ve been trying to lose weight for a while, what do you tell yourself about your journey? That it’s not possible for you? That everyone in your family struggles with weight? Those thoughts are on one side of the bridge. On the other side of the bridge is the thought: “I am losing weight and taking care of my body”. Yet, it’s likely you don’t believe that thought yet. In order to cross that bridge, I encourage clients to add “I’m thinking the thought” to the beginning of their thought on the one side of the bridge and “I look forward to thinking” to the thought on the other side.

Eg: I’m thinking the thought that it’s not possible for me” and “I look forward to thinking that I can have lasting weight change”. Pay attention to the old thoughts you’re thinking, add one of the two beginnings to it, and start to shift your beliefs:

• I notice I’m thinking the thought
• I look forward to thinking

Who’s in Charge Warrior?

If you want to live a life that feels free and open and GREAT, you need to take over from your brain’s automatic programming and make it happen. When doing these 4 steps, your brain will come up with excuses as to why your future isn’t possible for you. This is normal. Don’t listen. Shut it down. Re-read my post on the motivational triad. Our brains are designed to keep us alive and it does that by re-doing over and over what it’s done in the past. Guess who’s in charge? You. That’s what living consciously means. You direct your brain instead of letting your brain direct you. The people who step into the driver’s seat of their life are the ones who live lives they love. Lives that feel as good on the inside as they look on the outside. That’s what I see when I see you. 

Make It Easier

This is simple but not easy. It takes time. You can’t wave a magic wand and wake up a new person with new beliefs. There is a shortcut though. Get a coach. If you want to move through this faster, join FINDING JOY IN EVERYDAY LIFE (even if you’re tired, stressed, and have 400 things to do). It starts September 15th and enrollment is open now.

I am magical at helping people see the thoughts that are keeping them in their current struggle. I can give you a glimpse of that future possible self on the other side of the bridge and assist you as you move through the cognitive dissonance to get there. Together we rise, dear warrior! Sign up before September 1st for early bird special.