Awaken The Giant Within

Today I want to share with you a video that has empowered me and many people around me. You can find out more about Tony Robbins here.

The video is a bit lengthy, but his main idea is about changing the emotional patterns that disempower us and lower our quality of life.

All of our emotions, he explains, are created by motion. Like yesterday's post mentioned, emotions are what we DO. Think about your physiology when you're feeling down or discouraged. A depressed person is immediately identifiable by the look on their face, the way their head is down, their shallow breath, and soft speech. We magnify these feelings with the things we tell ourselves in our head, usually causing us to be even MORE depressed! Why do we this?  It's a result of patterns that have been triggered from different events in our lives that cause us to resort to this limited way of thinking and living. But the good news is that we can shift our focus to change our state and break our patterns.

Think of what you do when you're feeling determined and focused. What's your posture like? What are your thoughts like? What is your speech like? Compare this to what you do when you're feeling depressed, helpless or weak. Many times when we're sad, we try to get out of it by telling ourselves "I'm happy, I'm happy, I'm happy," but our bodies are still indicating a state of depression.
By changing our physiology, we can instantly change our state of mind.

Tony offers 4 steps to breaking your emotional patterns.
1) Identify where you live emotionally.
What are the emotions that empower you on a regular basis? What are the emotions that disempower you?
2) Identify the Antidote.
How can you change the emotions that disempower you? If you have fear, then courage is the antidote. It's not about eradicating the fear, but harnessing the innate power to work through our challenges and obstacles regardless of fear.
3) Exercise that Antidote.
Emotional fitness is just as important as our physical fitness. Emotion is a muscle. To get over fear, we have to practice being courageous many times before it becomes a pattern. To do 100 pushups without stopping, we have to practice doing 10 pushups without stopping first, then 20, then 30, and eventually 100. If you're feeling helpless or discouraged, get outside yourself. Your problems might not be so big if you compare and contrast them to situations that could be even worse. Get some perspective. Shift your focus. Change your physical state.
4) Condition it
Apply the awareness that we talked about last week during meditation. Accepting yourself in the moment. Be aware of the emotions that disempower you, and notice how you're physically reacting to those emotions. If it's causing you to magnify the negative emotion, you can acknowledge this, and change it. Do it as often as possible until it becomes second nature.

The fact remains that Life is not 100% certain. However, it's the uncertainty of life that enables us to grow and progress. If we knew everything that was going to happen every day, life would be pretty boring! There will always be people and circumstances outside of our control, but the one thing we will always be in control of is ourselves. A great quote from Conversations With God says, "What is happening is what is happening, but your experience of that is something you are making up."

How empowering does it feel to know that our reactions, positive or negative, can be controlled at will?

What are some emotions that disempower you on a weekly basis? How can you begin to shift your focus and change those patterns today? Find a friend that you trust to try these exercises with you and become accountable for each other. You'll find it a much more rewarding experience when you can share your progress with others.

Be Well.