“The function of our mind is to create a coherence between our beliefs and the reality we experience,” Penny Pierce, Leap of Perception

It’s one thing to make behavioral goals such as exercise more, and eat healthier.  But if you have not looked at the behavior of your own thoughts, which are derived from conscious and subconscious beliefs, then you have completely overlooked the very things that got you to the place you are trying to change.  So if you skip that step, the beliefs, thoughts, and fears will remain and they will be as strong as ever and they will direct your behaviors the same way they always have.  So you can ignore them, put a blanket over them, turn the volume up and pretend like they’re not there for now and make yourself believe in your new endeavors with the excitement of starting.  But the second it gets hard, you’ll lean on those beliefs like never before. Here’s how it works.  Your beliefs were formed before you could speak.  Throughout your life, you developed specific beliefs that painted your perception of the world around you, your experiences and other people.  These beliefs were based on the exchange between your needs and values you learned.  One of our most essential needs is nourishment from food and water.  So if those needs were not met (either by parents, guardians, teachers or later by you yourself) because they conflicted with a value such as “everything is celebrated with food or dessert”, you then learn that feelings cannot be expressed without food.  So as an adult now, you know that is not true but that is a subconscious belief, therefore there’s not much you can do about the struggle you will continually and forever face each time you go to a wedding, funeral, birthday party, block party, graduation, end of baseball season,  or every time a holiday arrives.  Or hell, a weekend.  Because we love to celebrate weekends! So this is why most of the work I do with clients is cognitive.  We can have the most elite exercise programs and routines, clean kitchen with weekly printed meal plans and for many of us that will just not be enough or the answer.  Adding more stress on top of stress spells stupid.  Well, almost.  Diet and exercise are key but those won’t work if you’re still walking around thinking everything has to be celebrated with food and treats, therefore you’ll just work off the calories later. Your beliefs ultimately steer your behavior.  So if you don’t do the cognitive (mental, emotional, spiritual) work as hard as you put in the physical work, you will always – and I mean always revert back to your former behaviors that got you where you are/were in the first place.   There is no pill, no smart phone app, no magic workout dvd etc that will allow you to take short cuts.  If any of those worked, it’d be temporary because none of them fix the fact that you will feel like a victim, left out, deprived or starved next time you go to a work function and you have to stand around watching everyone eat the boss’s birthday cake. This part of any program should not be trivialized, nor put off if you want real results.  Long term, life sustaining, true health results.  But I sympathize that it’s that hardest part.  Changing your diet or starting a workout routine can be painful, stressful, and take a lot of motivation.  But there is nothing compared to working into your own soul and tackling some very painful beliefs, and further yet, coming to grips with the fact that some of the values you’ve held onto so strongly for years actually do not serve you anymore.  It’s tough.  But you can do it. If you need any assistance, help, consults or referrals in this area of your journey, you can find me at the link below. In Health & Hypertrophy, Coach Eye www.primalfusionhealth.com  ]]>