This week I’m going to give an inside look at the coaching process: the magic behind how people begin to design a life of meaning.  Generating the extraordinary results they’ve only been dreaming about.

Personal development, peak performance work, often begins by picking 1 or 2 areas in your life where you’re feeling dissatisfied or may be stuck.  I invite you to take a moment and pause.  What is a place in your life where you’re feeling stuck?  Try going to a quiet place, and close your eyes if that helps you focus.   Pick one area in your life where you want to see a change: whether it’s not loving your work or your income, or feeling dissatisfied in your relationship with your partner.  Or maybe you have a goal for your physical health, and you’re not sure how to start working on it.  Get specific.  It may help guide you by asking, “What’s causing me real discomfort” or “What have I been dreaming about, yet only dreaming about?”  Now imagine if you were free of that distress, or able to make that goal happen.  How would that feel?  What would your life look like?  Take a minute and connect with the experience.  Paint a clear picture so that If someone else were to see it, they would know exactly what it was like.

So let’s say you picked a goal around physical fitness or having a job that you really enjoy.  You might develop a plan of action, taking the larger goal and breaking it down into manageable steps.  Like how to eat more healthily, what type of body movement you’d do several times a week.  For a career move, you’d develop a plan to gain training or education or apply for positions.  You could likely come up with a realistic and effective plan all on your own.  Yet you haven’t, right?  It’s okay.  You’re human.  Sometimes wanting something badly, even knowing the steps to get there, isn’t enough. 

You probably just haven’t figured out what’s been holding you back, and this is where the magic can happen for you.

Limiting beliefs: a significant contributor to your mindset   

Bring to mind the goal you picked earlier.  When you imagine thinking about getting started, making that “thing” happen, I bet you that there is some internal dialogue that throws obstacles in your way.  Things like, “It seems so hard,” being confused -- “I want it so badly, yet I have no idea where to start”.  Or “I have responsibilities to other people, so it would be selfish to go for it even if it is a dream of mine“,  “Sounds wonderful, yet it’s probably just not in the cards for me.”   Wrong: that’s all self-defeating BS.  It’s just not true.  Yet you’ve been operating as though it is true.  In the case of wanting a relationship to be different, it may be “What’s the use in trying?  They’ll never change”, “It’s just the way it goes when you’re together this long”.  For me, the self-sabotage was “Maybe I’m more of a 9-5 office therapist type: not cut out to start my own business”.  Even though doing this work lights me up.  There was a fear of pursuing a dream outside my comfort zone.

How do you change a mindset?

All that’s required is a change in beliefs: what you tell yourself about your ability to achieve something.  A shift from limitation to possibility.  These shifts are game-changers.  It still blows my mind how uncomplicated and straightforward the process is, what you can create for yourself when you shed your limiting beliefs.  For me, the growth came when I learned I often operated from the flawed belief that “I have to do things on my own”.  I knew that it was keeping me from realizing my dream of helping others live their own fulfilling lives.  The breakthrough came when I realized that I could achieve the big stuff when I ask for support.  I made this discovery by doing a deep dive with the help of coaches: how’s that for irony.  So now I intentionally bring to my mind the new belief that “I create more when I ask for and accept support from others”.    Deep dives aren’t something you do on your own because you don’t know where to look or what questions to ask yourself.  If you could have figured it out on your own, you likely would have already.  That’s why successful people seek out coaches and mentors, even if they’re already successful.

So let me break it down so you’ll understand how this could work for you.  The only reason you haven’t made that thing happen is because you’ve let limiting thoughts guide you.  By (1) learning what they are and (2) letting them go, you (3) can operate from the new beliefs that guide and support you.  It really is that simple.   

To get you started, you need to become aware of the self-talk that gets in your way.  Try this exercise to convert your language to be productive and forward-moving.  Using the guidance below, how can you positively rephrase the dialogue that holds you back?

And there’s a bonus waiting for you if you apply a new, productive mindset.  Once you make progress in one area, you’ll likely notice an improvement in other areas.  An abundant mindset leads to constructive action.  In my example, the shift from lone wolf = success, to asking for support = success has produced a richness in my relationships as well.  

I really want you to realize the following.  Successful people who realize their dreams don’t have something that you don’t.  What they do have is a willingness to focus on the prize and be aware of, and then let go of, self-imposed thoughts and behaviors that get in the way.  If there’s something you want and haven’t made happen, know that you have it within you.  To approach your life with an “I can figure this out, I can make this happen” attitude.  So if you’ve found yourself wondering, “Why not me?”  I say Yeah, why not you?  Maybe now is the time to get busy on that.

Overcoming limiting beliefs is something I’m hugely passionate about. I believe that we all deserve to live our best life. If you’re looking for a few tips to help you get started, I’d love to connect with you. You’d be surprised the difference a conversation makes: info@coachingwithlee.com