Keeping Yourself Honest
You can change how you think.
The mind is infinitely creative, but also extremely habituating. This blinds the mind from its own creativity and flexibility. In plain language: you have the power to change. But once you get set in your ways, you forget this power. Your thought habits actually change your brain, by forming and strengthening neural pathways, much like a path in a forest is formed by constant foot-traffic. In your brain, there are infinite potential paths, but to form a new path, you must imagine it, then walk it, and let the old path grow over and disappear.
The mind is somehow pre-empting the cognitive dissonance that would occur if you were totally honest with yourself. We’ll go through some of these limiting thoughts but the first thing you want to say is “They’re all bullshit.”
If some of these limiting thoughts were true, they might be painful. I think the best thing to do when it comes to getting your mind on your side is honesty to yourself and those around you and having self awareness.
You want someone who is going to keep you honest.
Your first goal should be to develop self-honesty so that you don’t need other people. So that by habit you’re able to look at yourself and see the truth – as close as you can get to it.
The big fear about this is that If you’re truly honest with yourself, it’s going to hurt. So, you try to get away from that. The truth is, it doesn’t hurt so much. I know from personal experience, especially when I’m with people that I can talk openly with about myself without getting teased or having it thrown back in my face.
When you open up and tell somebody an insecurity you have, some are going to react negatively and some are going to react positively. When I’m around these positive people, I tend to talk more about what’s going on in my head. I don’t have to hide what I’m thinking.
When I’m with these people a lot of the time it’s very self deprecating and I’m constantly just airing everything out. Kind of like when you put shoes that smell funky outside in the sun and that’s really the best thing for ‘em, just to clear out that bacteria.
It’s really just about getting new air going through the fibers and allowing in some sunlight. It’s similar when it comes to your mind, just being able to look at your thoughts, look at your thought processes, and look at your fears without feeling a lot of discomfort – without feeling dissonance.
