How Your Beliefs Affect Your Decisions

What you believe is a very strong part of being human. Your beliefs have a lot of control over your personal behavior. If you have the wrong beliefs, you may find it difficult, even impossible, to make certain decisions. Most people think that their beliefs are given to them and are beyond their control. In most cases, your beliefs are learned from outside influences as you grow from childhood to adulthood. As you follow through with these newsletters, you will learn that your are the creator of your own beliefs. As the creator of these beliefs, you have the ability to change them, to un-create them and re-create them however you want.

A belief can be defined as a sense of certainty about what something means. For the most part, human behavior is governed by the specific beliefs of each individual human being. Most people’s beliefs are formed in their subconscious minds. This happens when your mind makes an association between an event and the feedback you get from that event. When you do something, your mind forms an association between what you do and the resulting effect of it – pain, pleasure, good, bad. By repetition of these actions, your response becomes automatic, based upon your minds emotional association with the action. Beliefs act like a short cut, allowing you to take some action without having to make a conscious decision about what action to take. If you find yourself having to use excessive will power or conscious effort to do something, then there is most likely a belief that you have that is holding you back.

According to Henry Ford, when you say you either can do something or can’t do something, you are right. What this means is that if you believe that you can’t do something, then you will not be able to do that something. If you believe that you can do something, you will find that you are capable of doing it. Your limitations are set by you based upon what you believe that you are capable of. In order to take control of your beliefs, you need to develop the proper mind set by choosing and designing your beliefs to better serve you and your desires.

Your beliefs come from what certain events in life mean to you – nothing has any meaning except that meaning that you place on it. As long as your mind has enough information to support whatever meaning you place on something, then that will become your belief about that something.

Your mind can be retrained to change your beliefs. You can decide for yourself whether to believe something or not. You choose what you believe by the references that you focus on. It is easy to find references or evidence on any subject to support the belief that you choose to have about that subject. What you choose to focus on is a conscious choice.

In your journal, write down one important goal that you want to set for yourself, either personal or business. Once you have that goal set, answer the following questions about that goal and your beliefs that affect your accomplishing that goal – be honest with yourself when you write these down.

Example:

My beliefs about _________________(goal)________________________
1. _________________________(belief)_______________________
2. _________________________(belief)_______________________

Ask yourself “how do you know” about these beliefs. Write down the answer to this question for each belief you have.

1. _________________________(answer)______________________
2. _________________________(answer)______________________

Once you have answered the question for each belief, look at them and determine for yourself if they make sense to you. Write down the beliefs that you MUST have in order to accomplish your goal.

1. ________________________(new belief)_____________________
2. ________________________(new belief)_____________________

If you keep questioning your beliefs in this way, you will find that you will start to doubt some of the beliefs that you may have now that are keeping you from achieving your goals. Once you start to doubt these beliefs, you will be able to change them.


Your Values And How They Define Your Beliefs.

Personal values are those things that are most important to you. They are what you desire most in your life. Personal Values help define your beliefs, and together they give a definite direction to your life. Your personal values help guide you towards that which you seek as well as away from that which you wish to avoid.

Values need to be clarified based on what you want most and what you fear most. If you value success (personal or business), but fear failure (rejection), then you will not be able to fully succeed, since all success comes with some refection. In most online business ventures, the popular ratio is 3% success to 97% failure. Personal success or failure is only measurable by your own personal beliefs and values.

In order to help clarify your values, it helps to make a list of them. In your journal, make a list of the top 5 emotions or feelings that you value in order of importance to you. Examples may be: love, peace, passion, success, health, wealth, vitality, freedom, joy, happiness, etc.
1._______________________
2._______________________
3._______________________
4._______________________
5._______________________

Next, make a list of the top 5 emotions or feelings that you wish to avoid. Examples may be: hate, anger, rejection, failure, jealousy, guilt, sadness, loneliness, depression, fear, etc.
1.________________________
2.________________________
3.________________________
4.________________________
5.________________________

Once you have your list, it becomes easier to define what your life’s values are. Once you know your values, you can define your beliefs around those values, make important decisions easier, and start taking action on your ideas and desires.