“Now I don’t know but I been told it’s hard to run with the weight of gold.
Other hand I heard it said it’s just as hard with a weight of lead.” — Robert Hunter, American sociologist and progressive author
It was a dream but not the usual type Brian experienced, like the times he dreamt he was flying or shopping naked at the mall. No, this dream had substance — an element of realism to it.
Brian’s dream began with an awareness that he was standing in the midst of a number of tall, dark objects. At first, he was unable to discern the details but as the scene came into focus, Brian realized he was standing in a vast library.
The objects were actually row after row of heavy wooden shelves. Each bookshelf was laden with beautifully bound books with gilded edges.
As he wandered amongst the rows of books, Brian realized each was filed under year. Further examination revealed subsections of month, week, day and even hour.
Brian withdrew what appeared to be the latest volume and turned to the first page. There was only one line on the page. It read, “Brian withdrew what appeared to be the latest volume and turned to the first page.”
Fanning the remaining pages, Brian realized the rest of the pages in the book were blank.
Imagine for a moment that your life story had been captured in a series of books.
Every detail, triumph and failure, great and dreadful thing you had ever done was captured on paper.
Now imagine that somewhere — close to the beginning of your life story — you made assumptions and accepted as true some outright lies.
As a result, every choice you made and every experience you had from that point forward was filtered through these false beliefs.
So, instead of arriving at a place of happiness, joy, and abundance, you arrived here.
Sound familiar?
Many of us end up in jobs, relationships and situations we never intended and it’s often owing to a series of assumptions and outright lies that we accepted as true and never challenged.
The lies and assumptions I am referring to were told to you by the important people in your life: parents, teachers, siblings, religious leaders and society.
The big lie was “You’re not much.” Not worthy of love or success or anything significant. The assumption you made was that it was true. Don’t be too hard on yourself.
Why wouldn’t you believe it? After all, it was told to you by some smart, influential and well-intentioned people.
The problem is it was never true. It was a lie and likely the people who shared it with you didn’t realize themselves that it was false.
Research suggests that 80 per cent of our belief system is in place by the time we’re eight years old. Eight years old. The same research suggests that the majority of us will never go back and reassess the beliefs that become our internal guidance system — the foundation of our self-esteem.
Some people have great programming — good and empowering beliefs.
Some don’t. Most of us have a little of both: the good and the not so good. No wonder we wander off in the wrong direction. No wonder many of us end up in a sad and regrettable state, no longer sure of what’s true, not knowing who we are or how we got here.
When we pause to consider the ramifications of what we believe about ourselves, the insights can be quite astounding.
For example, if you believe that you will always struggle financially — never quite make ends meet — that will tend to be your experience.
If you believe you are unlovable, you may never find love or, worse yet, attract someone who cannot love you.
That can be tough to hear, especially when we’ve used our belief system as a roadmap on our journey through life.
When you become aware that certain beliefs are limiting your enjoyment of life and damaging your self-esteem, you must change them.
It’s deceptively simple yet immensely challenging.
You see, we often invest heavily in our beliefs to the point where our beliefs define who we are as human beings.
As odd as it sounds, most people would rather stay with their self-defeating beliefs than relinquish them.
To abandon our beliefs means to abandon who we think we are or should be, and that is a terrifying idea for most people.
Realizing the books represented the story of his life up to this point, Brian stopped to pull a few choice volumes off the shelf. He wanted to read about his triumphs but when he found the appropriate sections, the stories didn’t seem quite the way he remembered them.
At last, Brian reached the first bookshelf. He pulled a volume off the shelf representing his fifth year, fourth month, third week, second day and first hour.
Under the heading of “Things I am learning about myself,” Brian read, “Brian is never good enough. Brian is unlovable.
Brian is unworthy.” Intuitively, Brian knew the statements were interpretations of his father’s words, actions and emotional outbursts. Reaching into his shirt pocket, Brian pulled out a pen and put a line through the old beliefs. In their place he wrote, “Brian is good enough. Brian is lovable. Brian is worthy.”
In this tale, realizing that the assumptions of his childhood were incorrect, Brian replaced them with new and empowering beliefs and then set out to fill the blank pages of the latest volume with new, grand and empowering adventures. You can do the same.
“Beliefs have the power to create and the power to destroy,” wrote American self-help guru Tony Robbins.
“Human beings have the awesome ability to take any experience of their lives and create a meaning that disempowers them or one that can literally save their lives.”
You can choose whatever belief you want and create whatever life you desire.
To do it, you must become aware of those beliefs that are holding you back and change them to ones that transform your life for the better.
You are the author of your life story. Why not make it a best seller?
Murray Fuhrer is a self-esteem expert and facilitator. His new book is entitled Extreme Esteem: The Four Factors. For more information on self-esteem, check the Extreme Esteem website at www.extremeesteem.ca