Beliefs Are Your Foundation And You Are The Building

Beliefs.

We all have them.

What are they?

When someone is tied up in their beliefs, you can tell almost immediately. Get into a deep conversation with them, and they have a default mechanism that triggers one of the conversations they know how to handle.

This beliefs at play.

It is the thing that you think makes up who you are, but in reality that is not what a belief is.

Have you ever heard of the term intellectual honesty?

Intellectual honesty is all about the ability to drop a belief and change your perception of reality based on the newly presented information.

That is something we all need.

Those cemented in a belief that isn't real, or that seems to be true and holds them back, don't have intellectual honesty.

We can all believe something, but it is first and foremost a checkpoint, the foundation of who we are, not who we are.

Beliefs Are The Minds Checkpoint or Respawn Point

In video games, there is something called a respawn point.

Mostly, you die or lose a specific mission, and it sets you back to that point at which you were at before it happened.

Let's think about beliefs like that.

We have these defaults, based on the knowledge and experience that we have gotten to up to this point.

Now that doesn't mean they are correct.

It just means that we've been layering down experiences, ideas, and memories that have built this structure to be our sturdy foundation.

That is the basis of a belief.

A common scenario people face with beliefs happens when we meet someone for the first time.

What do you talk about?

Okay you've got through an introduction and a bit about the person, but where does you mind go (no not the weather?)

Yes, you default to the things that you believe.

Is this person like me or not like me?

That's the question which leads to a shit test full of commonalities or not.

Regardless of if I think this is right or not, it is how most people end up getting to know each other and seeing if they like someone or not.

Let's return to this thought of beliefs.

Beliefs Are The Foundation, But You Are The Building

What does that mean?

Quite literally, you default to these checkpoints in your mind, but that doesn't mean you stay there.

You should always be progressing, making yourself better, moving, growing and having intellectual honesty.

Yes, old beliefs will die.

And that is scary.

Beliefs become a sort of mental vice grip holding onto a location of your mind and hurting when let go.

Think about it.

When's the last time that you truly stopped believing something?

Was it scary?

How about the belief that you have to do something in life? There are no obligations for anyone to do anything, but we all live with a belief there are.

Try this tomorrow morning.

Just wake up and do what you want to do, not what you think you should do.

You'll see exactly when a belief starts to wither away.

Tom Bileu, one of the co-founders of Quest Bars, would park on the wrong side of the road and even let himself get a ticket to show that these are made up rules, boundaries, and beliefs.

Most of us don't form our own beliefs but take them as hammy downs.

Make Your Own Beliefs And Let Them Be Like Water

Bruce Lee talks a lot about being like water.

It's a phrase that a lot of people think they get.

Be like water, fluid, the rapids, it can be tough but also so peaceful.

Yes, but the fluidity is the key.

Water inherently doesn't have a rhythm, it doesn't have a fixed position, but it uses the foundations that surround it.

Think about that real quick.

Water uses the tools and foundation around it to make its shape, etc...

Just like us.

This foundation that we lay down is important because it shapes in our mind the fluidity of who we are, and when we let our beliefs become fluid as well, we allow for complete paradigm shifts overnight.

Tony Robbins talks about the fact that we don't change over time, but instead in one instance.

By being fluid, you allow yourself to change in that instance.

Be fluid, be like water, and don't be tied to your beliefs.

Austin

Photo Credit: Inja Pavlic