By Guest Contributor George Helou, The Mind Power Coach
There are three main obstacles to achieving our goals:
1. Stress
2. Our subconscious
3. Emotional addiction
1. Stress
The Reticular Activating System (RAS) located in the Brain Stem (Reptilian brain) is understood to allow information to pass up to our conscious awareness only if it’s considered important enough to our survival first. This important function is beginning to offer a compelling explanation as to why responding in a stressed way to our environment prevents opportunities being noticed that can help us achieve our goals.
When we are stressed it is difficult to change our behaviour because we maintain a survival-based response for the majority of our decision-making. It is impossible to change when we are already convinced we need to physically or emotionally fight, defend or run in order to seemingly ensure our survival.
2. Our Subconscious… challenging our perception
As adults, we became disconnected from our subconscious and unconscious states where our memories, beliefs, impressions and habits were formed. Hence our concept of self drives our perception of our environment, constantly interpreting how we should feel and behave in countless situations per day. Yet in the subconscious, it rarely gets challenged because of our disconnection to it.
Once we grasp the impact our subconsciously held belief systems and emotional chemistry have on our moment to moment interpretation of events and the hundreds of decisions we make every day, we realise that it is our perception that needs to be challenged in order to align our goals with our beliefs.
New research is suggesting that how we perceive our environment is ultimately determining which genes are switching ‘on’ and which are switching ‘off ‘. Our beliefs play a major role in controlling our stress levels, shaping our health, emotional well-being and environment.
This is a massive paradigm shift that is fundamental in relation to human biology because it no longer views the body as a mechanical device solely controlled by genes that switch themselves on and off. In all genetic expression and healing “it recognises that when we change our perception or beliefs we send totally different messages to our cells that reprograms their genetic expression” according to Cell Biologist Dr Lipton. Hence we ‘feel’ like doing the things that move us towards or away from our goals simply by what we have been conditioned to believe.
3. Emotional Addiction
When we feel, it is said that we are triggering appropriate biochemicals that the body learns to depend on, leading to what is commonly termed ‘emotional addiction.’
Our cells have receptor sites that are fed by our emotions via neuropeptides. Our perception of our environment “is filtered along peptidereceptor-rich sensory way stations” that are each subjected to past emotions and learning. Therefore, we are not perceiving what exists, but what we ‘feel’ exists based on our past conditioning.
We have an emotional body (a comprehensive network of neuropeptides and neuroreceptors) that is set up to determine how we should ‘feel’ and ‘think’. When we change the way we think and believe, our body’s biochemistry goes through a metamorphic process as we create new neuropeptides, close old emotional neuroreceptor sites on the cell membranes and replace them with new ones that are now able to accept the molecules of new emotions.
Put simply, when we make the decision to pursue a goal and become excited about it, we are changing our body’s relationship to our environment. The body begins to feel differently about the tasks required to achieve the goal and the confidence of overcoming the obstacles. Hence when a doubting belief is identified, our body does not ‘feel’ like listening to it and replaces the ‘can’t do’ with a ‘can do’ belief.
The body is said to take about 30 days to change a habit because this is the time required for the biochemistry to change. This is a major reason why many people break their diet or go back to smoking after many failed attempts. The body is going through the cold turkey period of changing its reliance on the peptides and receptors responsible for the eating or smoking addiction.
This process sees the cells magnify the call for the addictive neuropeptides to be manufactured and sent to the receptor sites. Hence our awareness is high jacked by the thoughts that drive us to fulfill our addiction, whether it is the foods that work against our body’s balance or the habit and nicotine from smoking. If the will and focus was maintained for over 30 days, then the body has shifted its peptide and receptor chemistry to comfortably exist without its previous addiction.
George Helou graduated from Macquarie University in Sydney with a Mass Communication Degree. As a personal development author, educator, lecturer, guest speaker, coach and trainer, George develops empowering programs that help people evolve to claim their personal freedom.
Connect with George at http://mindpowercoach.com
George Helou is a Life Coach based in Perth, Western Australia. He is the founder of EP7 – a 7 step Empowered for Purpose personal development process used in coaching, training courses and workshop retreats. He is also the author of two successful books.
He can be contacted through http://www.mindpowercoach.com
