Latest / Journal for Growth / How Your Beliefs Shape Who You Become | EP 05

Transcript

How Your Beliefs Shape Who You Become | EP 05 · Journal for Growth

0:00
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever stopped to think about just how many things you believe?
0:05
SPEAKER_00: Not just the big things religion, politics, whether there's life on other planets.
0:10
SPEAKER_00: I'm talking about all the ordinary things you believe about yourself, other people, and how life works.
0:18
SPEAKER_00: What makes someone successful, what a good parent does, what it means to be responsible, how much money a person needs to be happy, what you're capable of doing, what you're supposedly terrible at, and what kind of person you are.
0:34
SPEAKER_00: We have opinions about practically everything.
0:37
SPEAKER_00: And some of those opinions we're pretty darn sure about.
0:41
SPEAKER_00: Sure enough to argue with someone who disagrees, judge someone who's doing things differently, or make decisions that affect the rest of our lives.
0:50
SPEAKER_00: But where did all those beliefs come from?
0:53
SPEAKER_00: Seriously, think about it.
0:55
SPEAKER_00: You believe certain things about yourself.
0:58
SPEAKER_00: You know whether you're intelligent, creative, outgoing, disciplined, successful, attractive, or good with money.
1:07
SPEAKER_00: You have ideas about what you're capable of accomplishing and where your limitations are.
1:12
SPEAKER_00: But how did you come to those conclusions?
1:15
SPEAKER_00: Did you sit down one day, carefully investigate your abilities, consider all the evidence, and decide exactly who you were?
1:24
SPEAKER_00: Or did you spend years having experiences, listening to other people, drawing conclusions, and gradually developing an understanding of yourself that you've been operating from ever since?
1:37
SPEAKER_00: Most of us can probably recognize quite a bit of that second process.
1:42
SPEAKER_00: We grew up in families with particular ideas about how things should be done.
1:46
SPEAKER_00: We attended schools, made friends, encountered people with different opinions, and learned what the people around us considered acceptable, important, embarrassing, or admirable.
1:58
SPEAKER_00: We had experiences that went well, and others we'd rather forget.
2:03
SPEAKER_00: We drew conclusions about what those experiences meant.
2:07
SPEAKER_00: And somewhere along the way, all that information became part of how we understand ourselves and the world.
2:13
SPEAKER_00: Most of it, we've never questioned, let alone examined.
2:17
SPEAKER_00: Except that's where this gets interesting.
2:21
SPEAKER_00: Because those beliefs aren't simply sitting around in our minds collecting dust.
2:26
SPEAKER_00: We're using them every day.
2:28
SPEAKER_00: They're directing what we think, how we interpret situations, what we expect, what we decide to do, and what we don't even bother attempting, which raises a rather uncomfortable question.
2:41
SPEAKER_00: How much of the life we're consciously choosing is being directed by beliefs we never consciously chose.
2:49
SPEAKER_00: I think that's worth investigating.
2:51
SPEAKER_00: Before we get too far into this, we should probably establish what we're talking about.
2:57
SPEAKER_00: A belief is something we accept as true, or at least likely to be true.
3:02
SPEAKER_00: That's simple enough.
3:04
SPEAKER_00: But the role our beliefs play in everyday life is a lot more interesting than the definition suggests.
3:11
SPEAKER_00: Think about someone who says, I'm not a creative person.
3:15
SPEAKER_00: That's a belief, a statement they've accepted about themselves.
3:19
SPEAKER_00: Now, they might have reasons for believing it.
3:22
SPEAKER_00: They weren't particularly good at drawing in school.
3:25
SPEAKER_00: They tried making something once and didn't like the result.
3:29
SPEAKER_00: Nobody in their family was especially artistic.
3:32
SPEAKER_00: They might have spent their entire life around people who described creativity as a talent you either have or you don't.
3:39
SPEAKER_00: Whatever the history, they've arrived at a conclusion.
3:43
SPEAKER_00: I'm not creative.
3:45
SPEAKER_00: And that conclusion has become part of how they understand themselves.
3:49
SPEAKER_00: Here's the thing: our minds need some kind of existing understanding to work with.
3:55
SPEAKER_00: We can't start every day knowing absolutely nothing and investigate the entire world all over again.
4:02
SPEAKER_00: Imagine waking up and having to establish whether the floor will hold your weight, whether your coffee cup will contain liquid, and whether your car will move when you put it in drive.
4:12
SPEAKER_00: You'd be exhausted before breakfast.
4:16
SPEAKER_00: We rely on things we've learned.
4:18
SPEAKER_00: We develop expectations about how the world works, and we use those expectations to navigate it.
4:24
SPEAKER_00: That makes sense.
4:26
SPEAKER_00: A great deal of what we've learned is useful.
4:29
SPEAKER_00: We know how to do our jobs, recognize familiar situations, anticipate consequences, and make ordinary decisions without holding a committee meeting in our heads every time.
4:40
SPEAKER_00: But there's a difference between having an understanding that helps us navigate life and assuming that everything in that understanding is correct.
4:48
SPEAKER_00: Let's go back to our supposedly uncreative person.
4:52
SPEAKER_00: What exactly does I'm not creative mean?
4:56
SPEAKER_00: Does it mean they've never produced something original, that they can't draw, that they don't enjoy artistic activities, that they haven't spent much time developing creative skills?
5:07
SPEAKER_00: Because those are very different things.
5:10
SPEAKER_00: Someone can be terrible at drawing and have wonderful ideas for solving problems.
5:15
SPEAKER_00: Someone can struggle to write a story and be brilliant at designing a garden.
5:20
SPEAKER_00: Someone can have absolutely no artistic experience and still have the capacity to learn.
5:27
SPEAKER_00: So when someone says they're not creative, what are they actually describing?
5:32
SPEAKER_00: An ability they've tested?
5:34
SPEAKER_00: A skill they haven't developed?
5:36
SPEAKER_00: A preference?
5:37
SPEAKER_00: Or an identity they've accepted?
5:40
SPEAKER_00: And how would they know the difference?
5:42
SPEAKER_00: This is one of the things beliefs do.
5:45
SPEAKER_00: They take what we think we understand and give us a working explanation.
5:49
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes that explanation is accurate.
5:52
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes it's incomplete.
5:54
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes it made sense at one point in our lives, but doesn't anymore.
5:59
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes we've taken a handful of experiences and turned them into a much bigger conclusion than the evidence supports, which wouldn't be such a problem if we simply filed those conclusions away as interesting possibilities.
6:14
SPEAKER_00: But we don't.
6:15
SPEAKER_00: We use them to direct our lives.
6:18
SPEAKER_00: Let's look at how this works in an ordinary situation.
6:22
SPEAKER_00: Imagine two employees receive exactly the same message from their supervisor.
6:27
SPEAKER_00: I'd like to speak with you this afternoon.
6:29
SPEAKER_00: That's it.
6:30
SPEAKER_00: No explanation, no indication that anything is wrong.
6:34
SPEAKER_00: Just a request to stop by the office.
6:36
SPEAKER_00: The first employee reads it and thinks, okay, I wonder what they need.
6:41
SPEAKER_00: The second reads it and immediately thinks, oh, great, what did I screw up this time?
6:48
SPEAKER_00: Same message, completely different experience.
6:52
SPEAKER_00: One person goes about their day.
6:54
SPEAKER_00: The other spends the next three hours reviewing every possible mistake they've made during the last six months.
7:01
SPEAKER_00: And by the time the meeting arrives, they've practically fired themselves.
7:05
SPEAKER_00: What happened?
7:06
SPEAKER_00: Neither employee knows why the supervisor wants to talk.
7:10
SPEAKER_00: There's no information in the message that establishes whether the conversation will be good, bad, or entirely ordinary.
7:18
SPEAKER_00: But each employee has brought an existing understanding into the situation.
7:23
SPEAKER_00: The first may generally believe they're competent and valued at work.
7:27
SPEAKER_00: The second may believe they're constantly making mistakes, or that people in authority are usually disappointed in them.
7:34
SPEAKER_00: Those beliefs direct the explanations that come to mind.
7:38
SPEAKER_00: And here's the part worth paying attention to.
7:50
SPEAKER_00: They think, I'm in trouble.
7:52
SPEAKER_00: They experience their interpretation as though it were information about what's actually happening.
7:58
SPEAKER_00: That's quite a leap to make from nine words in a message.
8:02
SPEAKER_00: But we do this kind of thing all the time.
8:05
SPEAKER_00: Someone doesn't return our phone call and we decide they're upset with us.
8:09
SPEAKER_00: A friend seems distracted and we decide we've done something wrong.
8:13
SPEAKER_00: We struggle with a new task and we decide we're not smart enough to figure it out.
8:18
SPEAKER_00: Something happens, our minds offer an explanation, and we respond to that explanation.
8:24
SPEAKER_00: Our beliefs help determine which explanations seem reasonable to us in the first place.
8:30
SPEAKER_00: They can direct what we pay attention to, what we expect, and what possibilities we consider.
8:36
SPEAKER_00: They can even affect how we feel about something that hasn't actually happened yet.
8:41
SPEAKER_00: Think about the second employee.
8:43
SPEAKER_00: They might feel anxious, embarrassed, or defensive for hours before discovering the supervisor simply wanted help with a project.
8:51
SPEAKER_00: Their emotional experience was real, but the situation they were responding to existed largely in their interpretation.
9:00
SPEAKER_00: Now let's return to the belief that someone isn't creative.
9:04
SPEAKER_00: Suppose a coworker suggests they help develop a new idea for a project.
9:08
SPEAKER_00: Someone who believes they're creative might think, that sounds interesting, I've got a few ideas.
9:15
SPEAKER_00: Our person thinks, why would they ask me?
9:18
SPEAKER_00: I'm terrible at that sort of thing.
9:20
SPEAKER_00: The opportunity is the same, but the belief changes what the invitation means.
9:26
SPEAKER_00: One person sees an interesting possibility, the other sees the risk of exposing a weakness.
9:33
SPEAKER_00: And this is where we need to start asking ourselves some questions.
9:37
SPEAKER_00: When I look at a situation, how much of what I'm seeing is actually there?
9:42
SPEAKER_00: How much am I adding through what I already believe?
9:45
SPEAKER_00: What explanations am I automatically accepting?
9:48
SPEAKER_00: And what possibilities am I not even considering because they don't fit my existing understanding?
9:55
SPEAKER_00: Those are useful questions because our interpretations don't stay in our heads.
10:00
SPEAKER_00: They affect what we do next.
10:02
SPEAKER_00: So our person who believes they're not creative declines the chance to join the team for the new project.
10:09
SPEAKER_00: Why?
10:10
SPEAKER_00: They already know they're not creative.
10:12
SPEAKER_00: They'd rather leave that sort of thing to people who are good at it.
10:15
SPEAKER_00: It's a perfectly ordinary decision.
10:18
SPEAKER_00: Nobody is forcing them to participate.
10:20
SPEAKER_00: They've been offered an opportunity, considered it, and decided not to take it.
10:25
SPEAKER_00: Except, what exactly did they consider?
10:29
SPEAKER_00: Did they think about whether the project interested them, whether they could learn something?
10:34
SPEAKER_00: Whether their particular experience might offer a useful perspective, whether creativity is something that can be practiced and developed.
10:42
SPEAKER_00: Or did they arrive at the decision using one familiar explanation?
10:47
SPEAKER_00: I'm not creative.
10:48
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, this isn't for me.
10:51
SPEAKER_00: In that case, the belief has already narrowed the decision before much deliberate consideration has taken place.
10:58
SPEAKER_00: And this is something we do in all sorts of situations.
11:02
SPEAKER_00: We don't apply for a position because we don't think we're qualified.
11:05
SPEAKER_00: We don't introduce ourselves because we believe we're socially awkward.
11:10
SPEAKER_00: We don't attempt a new skill because we've decided we're too old to learn it.
11:15
SPEAKER_00: We make decisions based on what we believe is possible, appropriate, worthwhile, or realistic.
11:21
SPEAKER_00: And those decisions determine what experiences we have access to.
11:26
SPEAKER_00: Consider someone who believes they're terrible at meeting new people.
11:30
SPEAKER_00: They get invited to a social gathering.
11:32
SPEAKER_00: They probably won't even go.
11:34
SPEAKER_00: But if they are talked into it somehow, before they even arrive, they're expecting awkward conversations, uncomfortable silences, and the unpleasant experience of standing around wondering what to do with their hands.
11:48
SPEAKER_00: So what happens?
11:49
SPEAKER_00: They stick close to someone they already know.
11:52
SPEAKER_00: They avoid introducing themselves.
11:54
SPEAKER_00: They leave as soon as it's socially acceptable.
11:57
SPEAKER_00: Later, they describe the evening as proof that they're terrible at socializing.
12:03
SPEAKER_00: But what did they actually learn?
12:05
SPEAKER_00: They learned that attending a gathering while avoiding conversations doesn't create many opportunities to meet people.
12:12
SPEAKER_00: Groundbreaking stuff.
12:14
SPEAKER_00: They haven't really tested whether they can have an enjoyable conversation with someone new.
12:19
SPEAKER_00: They've tested what happens when they approach a social situation expecting difficulty and behave accordingly.
12:25
SPEAKER_00: Their belief helped direct their behavior, and that behavior contributed to the experience they now use as evidence for the belief.
12:34
SPEAKER_00: That's a powerful pattern.
12:36
SPEAKER_00: We've explored this kind of self-reinforcing thinking in episode three, so I don't want to turn this into an entirely separate investigation of confirmation bias.
12:46
SPEAKER_00: What matters here is recognizing that our beliefs direct the actions that shape our experiences.
12:53
SPEAKER_00: And that brings us to an important distinction.
12:56
SPEAKER_00: We usually make decisions without understanding what's directing them.
13:01
SPEAKER_00: Think about that for a minute.
13:03
SPEAKER_00: We think we are choosing what to do.
13:06
SPEAKER_00: And we are making choices.
13:08
SPEAKER_00: But how many possibilities have we eliminated before we've even realized there was a choice to make?
13:15
SPEAKER_00: Our person who isn't creative could spend years declining opportunities, avoiding unfamiliar activities, and leaving creative work to other people.
13:25
SPEAKER_00: Every individual decision might seem perfectly reasonable, but all of those decisions are being directed by the same underlying belief.
13:34
SPEAKER_00: And when we repeat that process over years, something else begins to happen.
13:39
SPEAKER_00: We're not simply making choices about what to do today, we're helping determine who we become tomorrow.
13:47
SPEAKER_00: Let's follow our supposedly uncreative person a little further.
13:51
SPEAKER_00: At 15, they believe they're not creative.
13:55
SPEAKER_00: So they don't take the art class.
13:57
SPEAKER_00: They don't try writing stories.
13:59
SPEAKER_00: They don't join the theater group or experiment with music or spend much time making things.
14:05
SPEAKER_00: At 25, they still believe they're not creative.
14:08
SPEAKER_00: They choose work and hobbies that fit the person they understand themselves to be.
14:13
SPEAKER_00: When something requires imagination or experimentation, they defer to other people.
14:19
SPEAKER_00: At 45, they've spent decades doing very little that they would describe as creative.
14:25
SPEAKER_00: Now ask them whether they're a creative person.
14:28
SPEAKER_00: Absolutely not.
14:30
SPEAKER_00: I've never been creative.
14:32
SPEAKER_00: And they can point to an entire lifetime of experiences that appear to support that conclusion.
14:38
SPEAKER_00: But here's the question I want us to consider.
14:41
SPEAKER_00: Were they always incapable of being creative?
14:44
SPEAKER_00: Or have they spent years making decisions based on the belief that they were?
14:50
SPEAKER_00: We often think of identity as something that describes who we are.
14:54
SPEAKER_00: I'm shy, I'm independent, I'm responsible, I'm not athletic, I'm terrible with money, I'm the person everybody depends on.
15:04
SPEAKER_00: We develop these descriptions of ourselves, and over time they become familiar.
15:09
SPEAKER_00: But those descriptions also direct how we behave.
15:13
SPEAKER_00: Someone who believes they're athletic may be more willing to try a new sport.
15:17
SPEAKER_00: Someone who believes they're hopeless with money may avoid learning how to manage it.
15:22
SPEAKER_00: Someone who believes they're responsible for everybody else's happiness may spend their life taking on obligations they never seriously considered refusing.
15:32
SPEAKER_00: Then, years later, we look at our lives and use what we see as proof of who we are.
15:38
SPEAKER_00: I'm just the kind of person who takes care of everyone.
15:41
SPEAKER_00: I've never been good at managing money.
15:44
SPEAKER_00: I've always been shy.
15:46
SPEAKER_00: Well, yes, those may be accurate descriptions of patterns we've developed, but do they tell us why those patterns developed?
15:55
SPEAKER_00: Do they establish that we couldn't have developed differently?
15:58
SPEAKER_00: And do they mean we have to continue living that way?
16:02
SPEAKER_00: Not necessarily.
16:03
SPEAKER_00: Let's return to creativity for a minute.
16:06
SPEAKER_00: Suppose our person finally decides to try something creative.
16:10
SPEAKER_00: They take a class, start writing, or experiment with a hobby they've always dismissed.
16:16
SPEAKER_00: They're probably not going to produce a masterpiece on the first attempt.
16:20
SPEAKER_00: Imagine that.
16:21
SPEAKER_00: Someone who spent 30 years avoiding a skill turns out not to be particularly good at it on day one.
16:28
SPEAKER_00: Shocking.
16:29
SPEAKER_00: But they might discover that they enjoy it.
16:32
SPEAKER_00: They might learn techniques they never knew existed.
16:35
SPEAKER_00: They might develop abilities that were never given much opportunity to emerge.
16:40
SPEAKER_00: And they might begin to question something they've accepted about themselves for most of their lives.
16:46
SPEAKER_00: Maybe I'm not creative wasn't a description of a permanent characteristic.
16:52
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it was a belief that helped direct a lifetime of choices.
16:56
SPEAKER_00: Now think about the larger implications of that.
16:59
SPEAKER_00: Who we are today reflects the lives we've lived, the experiences we've had, what we've learned, what we've practiced, the opportunities we've encountered, the circumstances we've faced, and the choices we've made.
17:13
SPEAKER_00: And throughout all of that, our beliefs have been directing what we considered possible and what we decided to do.
17:21
SPEAKER_00: So who we are today has been shaped by the beliefs we've accepted throughout our lives, and the beliefs we continue to accept will help shape who we become.
17:31
SPEAKER_00: That's a much bigger deal than simply having a few inaccurate opinions about ourselves.
17:36
SPEAKER_00: What might happen if we began questioning some of those beliefs?
17:40
SPEAKER_00: That's where this gets particularly interesting for personal growth, because it suggests that who we become isn't simply the continuation of who we've always believed ourselves to be.
17:51
SPEAKER_00: Our understanding can change, our choices can change, and new choices can lead to experiences that weren't part of our previous understanding of ourselves.
18:01
SPEAKER_00: But before we get into all that, there's another question we need to answer.
18:06
SPEAKER_00: If our beliefs have this much to do with the direction our lives take, why the heck don't we question them more often?
18:13
SPEAKER_00: Think about how many decisions you make in an ordinary day.
18:17
SPEAKER_00: What time to get up, what to eat, how to respond to someone, what needs to get done, what can wait, whether to accept an invitation, take on another responsibility, spend money, speak up, keep quiet, or try something new.
18:33
SPEAKER_00: We make decisions constantly.
18:36
SPEAKER_00: And we don't sit down before each one and examine every belief and assumption involved, like I mentioned earlier.
18:43
SPEAKER_00: Instead, we rely on what we already understand.
18:47
SPEAKER_00: Our minds use familiar expectations and explanations to help us navigate ordinary life.
18:53
SPEAKER_00: And generally speaking, that's useful.
18:56
SPEAKER_00: The problem is that once we've accepted something as true, we tend to use it as an answer rather than continue treating it as a question.
19:05
SPEAKER_00: Consider someone who believes responsible people always put others first.
19:10
SPEAKER_00: They grew up with that understanding.
19:12
SPEAKER_00: They believe being a good person means being available, helpful, dependable, and willing to make sacrifices for other people.
19:20
SPEAKER_00: So they say yes when they're already exhausted.
19:24
SPEAKER_00: They take on responsibilities nobody asked them to take on.
19:28
SPEAKER_00: They feel guilty when they want time for themselves.
19:31
SPEAKER_00: And when they begin feeling overwhelmed and resentful, what do they conclude?
19:36
SPEAKER_00: They might decide they're not managing their time well enough, or they're selfish for wanting a break, or they're simply not doing a good enough job.
19:45
SPEAKER_00: Notice what's happening.
19:47
SPEAKER_00: They're questioning their performance, their motivation, and their ability to handle everything.
19:53
SPEAKER_00: But they're not questioning the rule.
19:55
SPEAKER_00: Responsible people always put others first.
19:59
SPEAKER_00: That remains safely outside the investigation.
20:02
SPEAKER_00: And because that belief isn't being questioned, every attempted solution has to fit within it.
20:08
SPEAKER_00: They'll try becoming more efficient, getting up earlier, organizing their schedule, doing more in less time, anything except considering whether the expectation itself deserves to be challenged.
20:21
SPEAKER_00: That's a pretty significant limitation on their choices.
20:25
SPEAKER_00: Why would someone question everything about their performance before questioning the belief directing their behavior?
20:32
SPEAKER_00: Part of the answer is familiarity.
20:35
SPEAKER_00: When we've accepted an idea for years, it doesn't necessarily feel like one interpretation among several.
20:41
SPEAKER_00: It feels like the way things are.
20:44
SPEAKER_00: Another part is that our beliefs become connected to our identity.
20:48
SPEAKER_00: For someone who believes being responsible means putting everyone else first, questioning that belief feels like questioning whether they're a good person.
20:57
SPEAKER_00: That's a lot more uncomfortable than buying a new planner.
21:01
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes our beliefs connect us to the people and communities around us.
21:06
SPEAKER_00: If everyone in our family believes a certain thing, questioning it can feel like rejecting something larger than the idea itself.
21:14
SPEAKER_00: But there is a cost when we don't recognize that our existing understanding is something we can examine.
21:20
SPEAKER_00: We can become incredibly certain about things we haven't investigated in years.
21:26
SPEAKER_00: We can defend conclusions because they're familiar, not because we've examined the evidence.
21:32
SPEAKER_00: And we can keep making decisions according to beliefs that no longer fit our circumstances, our values, or what we're actually trying to accomplish.
21:41
SPEAKER_00: Think about our person who believes they're not creative.
21:45
SPEAKER_00: They don't wake up every morning and consciously reaffirm that belief.
21:49
SPEAKER_00: They simply don't consider creative opportunities.
21:52
SPEAKER_00: The belief has become part of how they understand themselves.
21:56
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't require a debate, it doesn't demand evidence.
22:00
SPEAKER_00: It's already been accepted.
22:02
SPEAKER_00: And that might be the most important thing to recognize.
22:05
SPEAKER_00: A belief doesn't have to occupy our conscious attention to help direct our behavior.
22:10
SPEAKER_00: We can go years without thinking about why we believe something while continuing to make decisions based on it.
22:17
SPEAKER_00: So if we want to understand what's directing our choices, we're going to have to start paying attention to the explanations we've been accepting.
22:26
SPEAKER_00: Which brings us to the question at the heart of all this.
22:29
SPEAKER_00: What happens when we finally start questioning them?
22:33
SPEAKER_00: Let's go back to our person who spent most of their life believing they're not creative.
22:38
SPEAKER_00: Instead of automatically accepting, I'm not creative, what if they ask themselves why they believe it?
22:45
SPEAKER_00: What experiences led them to that conclusion?
22:48
SPEAKER_00: What evidence are they using?
22:50
SPEAKER_00: Have they actually explored different forms of creativity?
22:54
SPEAKER_00: Have they ever given themselves an opportunity to develop those abilities?
22:58
SPEAKER_00: They remember struggling with drawing in school.
23:01
SPEAKER_00: They remember comparing their work to a classmate who seemed naturally talented.
23:06
SPEAKER_00: They remember deciding that creative activities were best left to people who were good at them.
23:12
SPEAKER_00: And now they're looking at that history differently.
23:15
SPEAKER_00: They can recognize that they weren't especially good at drawing.
23:19
SPEAKER_00: Fine, that's what happened.
23:21
SPEAKER_00: But does struggling with drawing at 12 establish that they aren't creative at 50?
23:26
SPEAKER_00: Does being inexperienced at something mean they're incapable of learning it?
23:31
SPEAKER_00: And who decided that creativity was limited to artistic talent in the first place?
23:36
SPEAKER_00: Suddenly, what used to feel like a simple fact about their identity has become something they can investigate.
23:43
SPEAKER_00: They don't have to immediately decide they're wonderfully creative.
23:47
SPEAKER_00: That would simply be replacing one unquestioned conclusion with another.
23:51
SPEAKER_00: They can start examining what they actually know.
23:54
SPEAKER_00: And if they're curious enough, they can try something.
23:57
SPEAKER_00: They could take a class, write a short story, experiment with photography, design something, try an activity they've always dismissed.
24:06
SPEAKER_00: Not to prove that they're secretly a genius, just to find out what happens.
24:11
SPEAKER_00: Experiment a little.
24:13
SPEAKER_00: Now they're gathering information they didn't have before.
24:17
SPEAKER_00: They're creating experiences that weren't available while they continued automatically accepting their original belief.
24:23
SPEAKER_00: And those experiences might change their understanding.
24:27
SPEAKER_00: Or they might discover that they really don't enjoy creative activities.
24:31
SPEAKER_00: That's useful information too.
24:34
SPEAKER_00: The difference is that they're investigating rather than simply accepting an established explanation.
24:40
SPEAKER_00: And that's where awareness and choice come into the picture.
24:44
SPEAKER_00: Think about how much of our understanding of ourselves developed through experiences we weren't deliberately examining.
24:50
SPEAKER_00: We learned things, accepted explanations, and built beliefs that became part of how we navigated our lives.
24:57
SPEAKER_00: Those beliefs directed our decisions.
25:00
SPEAKER_00: Our decisions influenced our experiences, and those experiences contributed to who we've become.
25:07
SPEAKER_00: But we're not finished becoming.
25:09
SPEAKER_00: We're still learning, still interpreting, still making choices, still developing an understanding of ourselves and the world.
25:18
SPEAKER_00: The question is whether we're going to continue doing all of that without examining the beliefs directing the process.
25:26
SPEAKER_00: Because once we become aware of a belief, we have an opportunity to ask whether we actually agree with it.
25:32
SPEAKER_00: We can investigate the evidence.
25:34
SPEAKER_00: We can consider explanations we've overlooked.
25:37
SPEAKER_00: We can recognize expectations we inherited from other people.
25:42
SPEAKER_00: We can question the limitations we've accepted about ourselves.
25:46
SPEAKER_00: And we can begin making decisions based on a more deliberate understanding of what we believe and why.
25:53
SPEAKER_00: Changing an established belief isn't always as simple as deciding to think something different.
25:59
SPEAKER_00: A familiar interpretation may still show up automatically.
26:03
SPEAKER_00: We may need new experiences, repeated examination, and opportunities to practice responding differently.
26:10
SPEAKER_00: But that work begins with recognizing what we've been accepting.
26:15
SPEAKER_00: Which brings me back to where we started.
26:17
SPEAKER_00: We've spent our entire lives developing beliefs about ourselves and the world.
26:23
SPEAKER_00: Those beliefs help direct how we think, what we notice, how we interpret experiences, the choices we make, and the people we become.
26:32
SPEAKER_00: And many of them developed without us ever consciously deciding whether we agreed with them.
26:38
SPEAKER_00: That's worth thinking about.
26:40
SPEAKER_00: Because if our beliefs are directing our lives, shouldn't we have some understanding of what they are?
26:46
SPEAKER_00: And shouldn't we decide whether we still want to live by them?
26:50
SPEAKER_00: So here's something I'd like you to consider.
26:53
SPEAKER_00: Think of one belief you've held about yourself for a long time.
26:57
SPEAKER_00: It could be something as ordinary as, I'm not very good with people, I've always been terrible with money, or I'm just not the kind of person who does that.
27:08
SPEAKER_00: Don't worry about choosing the most important belief in your life.
27:11
SPEAKER_00: We're not conducting a complete investigation of your entire personality today.
27:16
SPEAKER_00: Just choose one.
27:18
SPEAKER_00: Now consider where that belief came from.
27:21
SPEAKER_00: What experiences led you to accept it?
27:24
SPEAKER_00: What evidence have you been relying on?
27:27
SPEAKER_00: How has it directed the choices you've made?
27:30
SPEAKER_00: And here's the question I'd particularly like you to think about.
27:34
SPEAKER_00: How has that belief contributed to the person you've become?
27:37
SPEAKER_00: And do you want to continue allowing it to direct who you become next?
27:42
SPEAKER_00: You don't need to come up with an answer immediately.
27:45
SPEAKER_00: In fact, I'd be suspicious of an answer that arrives before you've seriously considered the question.
27:51
SPEAKER_00: The point is to start examining something you've previously accepted without much thought.
27:57
SPEAKER_00: If you'd like to explore that more thoroughly, I've included a free companion journaling workbook with this episode.
28:03
SPEAKER_00: It will walk you through identifying a belief, examining the evidence behind it, and considering how it has been directing your life.
28:11
SPEAKER_00: You'll find the download link in the episode description.
28:14
SPEAKER_00: In our next episode for this playlist, How Growth Works, we'll be exploring how this process begins, how we start learning about ourselves and the world long before we have the ability to consciously evaluate what we're learning.
28:29
SPEAKER_00: Because understanding where our beliefs come from can help us understand why we've been accepting them in the first place.
28:36
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for joining me today.
28:38
SPEAKER_00: Bye for now.