Picture, if you will, two small children playing on a playground.
It’s previously been raining and there are still some little puddles here and there.
Both children are with their Mothers.
Child A is having a wonderful time.
She’s on the swings, then the roundabout, then the big slide, then the climbing-frame. Laughing excitedly as she goes from one to the other.
She shouts from the top of the slide “Mummy, Mummy look at me! Look what I can do” and she slides down the slide head-first.
When she gets up, her dress is dirty from the wet slide. She approaches her Mother worriedly.
But her Mother just laughs it off.
“Oh don’t worry,” she says “it’ll wash.”
“You were very brave to go up the big slide and then come down on your tummy!”
She gives her daughter a hug and sends her back to play.
Child A feels like a winner, she feels happy and secure; as if the world is a safe place.
A dirty dress isn’t going to hold her back.
She heads back to the big slide.
Child B is also having a good time.
She’s a bit nervous about the big slide and doesn’t really like the climbing-frame.
She doesn’t mind the little slide and the swings, as long as she doesn’t go too high.
When she sits down on a swing she accidentally sits in a wet, muddy patch.
She approaches her Mother worriedly to show her the dirty dress.
Her Mother shouts at her, telling her she’s stupid for sitting on a dirty seat. She complains about how much washing she already has to do, and then she ridicules her daughter for only going on the “baby” things.
Child B starts to cry, but her Mother tells her to shut up or she’ll really give her something to cry about.
She feels like a loser, like she can’t ever do anything right. She feels like the world is an angry, scary place.
And she just wants to go home.
Child B is no less lovable, capable, intelligent, attractive or worthy than Child A, but she’ll grow up believing so.
The way we are treated as children plays a huge (HUGE) role in what we believe as adults.
It’s not just our parents, its older siblings, neighbours, other kids, teachers or other leaders or care-givers.
The conditioning we are given from 0-7 will predominantly stay with us for the rest of our lives.
Unless we consciously change it.
We are effectively in hypnosis until we are 7.
Until then, we have no conscious mind. We’re just little sponges, soaking everything up and believing it all.
In our minds the grown-ups are ALWAYS right.
I explain all about this in my little E-Book – Why do I have low self-esteem and what can I do about it? (Such a sexy title 🙂 I know.)
If we grow up believing the world is a safe place and that we are loved and valued, we’ll generally grow up with a positive overall view of ourselves.
We’ll develop high self-esteem and a winner’s self-image.
We’ll go for things, we’ll take chances in life and we’ll KNOW that we deserve to be happy and treated well.
(These types of people generally don’t read my blogs).
If we grow up feeling like we’re “bad” or stupid or a nuisance or that we can’t do anything right, we’ll generally grow up with a negative overall view of ourselves.
We’ll develop low self-esteem and a loser’s self-image.
When we have a loser’s self-image, we generally have two choices.
We either accept our lot and take the bare minimum that life has to offer us – deep down, that’s all we think we really deserve (Lovelies).
OR
We work really, really, really super-hard in life to succeed and prove to others that they were wrong and that we are worthwhile (Lonelies).
Lovelies don’t tend to fight their loser’s self-image.
Lonelies do.
But unless they’ve done their inner work, they’ll still feel like a loser deep down. No matter how much success they achieve.
It’s that loser’s self-image that gives them their incredible drive to succeed in the first place.
Our self-image and self-beliefs are critical to our HEALTHY success and happiness.
The good news is it’s very possible to change a loser’s self-image into a winner’s one.
It’s NEVER too late to become the person you always wanted to be.
Here are 5 ways you can learn to live like a winner:-
- Self-Talk
Start by becoming aware of your self-talk.
What you say to yourself on a daily basis.
If you speak to yourself negatively (like your parent/carer/teacher/older sibling did), then STOP!
Start to speak to yourself the way you would speak to a special friend that you admire.
If they messed up or made a mistake, would you ball them out?
No, you wouldn’t.
So, don’t do it to yourself either.
- Limiting Beliefs
Take note of the times when you’re thinking something that disempowers or doesn’t serve you.
This is a limiting belief (LB).
LBs can be sneaky little bu****s!
They’re not always easy to spot, because we think our beliefs are absolute truth.
They’re not, they’re just beliefs and beliefs can be changed!
At any given time there is evidence and contra-evidence to back up or refute our beliefs.
Sometimes there’s MORE contra-evidence than evidence, but we IGNORE it, because it just doesn’t occur to us to challenge it.
This is because our 0-7 blueprint is running the show.
I always compare LBs to tables.
A thought can be wobbly but a belief is usually more solid – like a table that has 4 legs and a top.
We need to find ALL the contra-evidence for every LB so that we can pull the legs off the table and collapse it.
One by one we need to de-stabilise all those loser LBs that are holding us back.
We must challenge every SINGLE one.
They’re not really even our LBs; they’re someone else’s that were just downloaded into us.
When you catch yourself in a LB, such as, I don’t deserve true Love or I’m only worth a salary of £X thousand a year, switch it and come up with a new belief.
Ask yourself – what if I DO deserve True Love or what if I AM worth a salary of (3x) £X thousand?
What’s the complete opposite of your current belief?
Look for as much evidence as possible to SUPPORT your new belief.
Reinforce that new belief REPEATEDLY.
Journal, meditate, affirm, affirm, affirm again and again and again.
You MUST do this to re-program your blueprint.
- Skills, Talents and Achievements
Make a list of ALL your skills, talents and accomplishments – things that you’ve succeeded at in your life.
There will probably me many.
Celebrate every single one of them.
See that any mistakes or failures from the past were just lessons for you to learn from.
Winners make mistakes and have failures a lot of the time, but they never allow them to hold them back.
Every mistake or failure contains a lesson. Learn those lessons and just keep moving.
- Model Winners
Have some winner role models.
People you admire and aspire to be like.
Search them out.
Read biographies of people who have triumphed over adversity. If they can do it, so can you.
Personal growth is all about developing a new way of thinking.
Everything is available to you, when you take on that winner’s mentality.
- Be your best self
Every day start to live more as your best self. Hold your head up high.
Just start with baby steps and stay in the positive.
EXPECT to win in every situation. You won’t win every time, but you will win sometimes.
Stick at it. Constantly build on this.
How would you behave if you knew you couldn’t fail?
Adopt that way of being and keep thinking like a winner!
That’s it for this week.
Much Love
Christina xx