The tool I’m about to break down for you is really important and is the first key tool in your toolbox that will help you begin to really start see your life from a different perspective. It’s when you start looking at your life from a different perspective that you’re able to start making some changes or some little shifts that will help you really pp level your life.
And when you learn to tap into that potential is when you really step up and step into this role that you were put on this planet to do. And that moment is really, really exciting. And I can say that from experience because I believe that doing this podcast is just one of the things that I’m supposed to be doing while I’m here sharing these words. These are the messages that I believe that I’m supposed to be sharing, and honestly, I had a lot of, I don’t want to call it anxiety, but there was definitely something going on that just didn’t feel right in my body and in my life. And then the minute that I started working on this podcast, on this project, things really began to shift and I was really noticing some really, really special moments. There was one point where I actually just broke out into tears because I was so happy and I was like, what is this?
This tool is the first tool that I started using that I realized I was already using to that was make those little changes. The changes and shifts need to happen because if you’re not going to do anything differently than what you’re already doing right now, you cannot expect to just wake up and for things to just magically better be better.
More money in your account won’t just appear, your problems won’t just magically disappear and the dream man or dream woman isn’t just going to be standing there waiting for you.
You have to start making changes and shifts in your life in order to live your absolute best life and step into your true potential.
Becoming self aware is the key to happiness and success
Before sitting down to record the podcast episode of this post I was on Instagram and saw the quote, “Awareness is the greatest agent for change,” by Eckhart Tolle, which was perfect because that’s what the secret tool is: self awareness.
I share this because self awareness is the first thing that I really started using in my personal development and spirituality journey. I started analyzing all of my life and when I did that, I began to realize why I was doing certain things and that understanding gave me the power to make changes and shifts for the better.
By doing certain things I mean your habits, why you do certain things after certain things trigger you. You’re able to look at your life from an outside perspective and begin to see how you’re reacting to things.
Once you understand why you do certain things and what triggers you you’ll be able to begin to make the changes that are going to help you begin to feel even better in life, to experience breakthrough moments, to experience joy and happiness and all those juicy, good feelings that you want to feel every single day.
Becoming self aware and starting to analyze your life does take a lot of work. It’s a lot of inner work and if you follow anyone who talks about personal development or spirituality, they will all say you have to do the inner work. You absolutely must do the inner work in order to receive all of the benefits of an absolutely amazing life that you’re in love with.
Self awareness activities
Keeping a journal even just for a day will help you become more self aware. But if you do it for longer you will be able to pick up on other habits that you don’t do every day.
Go through your typical day and start to jot down notes when you begin to notice things that are triggering you. Maybe someone walks over to your desk at work and whenever this one person walks over, you notice yourself getting really frustrated and then turning to your phone for a distraction or grabbing a snack or having to leave the room.
Or maybe you find yourself getting really tense when a certain topic comes up. Perhaps you feel anxiety over doing a certain activity and you find yourself shutting yourself in your room and avoiding trying new things.
Begin to notice what is trigging you but also notice what’s making you happy. Notice what’s really bringing you joy in your life. Are you sitting down every evening to watch TV? Are you actually happy while you’re watching TV or are you just happy to have a distraction and not do anything?
I think it’s totally healthy to use TV as a distraction sometimes because we live in a world where there’s just constant noise everywhere and you can’t just sit down and meditate for hours a day to help you block that out unless you’re like a monk.
There are times that it’s okay to have distractions, but begin to notice when your distractions are hurting you or benefitting you. Where you are using these distractions in your life and what’s trigger triggering you to want to use these distractions?
This is already you beginning to become self aware. Having a journal and writing things down will really help cause you’ll be able to go back and look at your day and see how often you’re distracting yourself, how often you’re getting triggered and how often you’re falling into these good or bad habits.
What developing self awareness allows you to do
What being self aware really allows you to do is to understand your beliefs because your beliefs are really what drive your habits and your actions. And we all unfortunately, but also fortunately, have limiting beliefs.
Unfortunately, because it sucks that we’ve got to change these limiting beliefs and they can be pretty hard work to change some times.
Fortunately because now you know what you can work on and what you can change in order to feel better and to feel happier.
An example of a limiting belief that I used to have is one that’s so ingrained in society. It’s the belief that you have to work hard and more to be successful. Our society believes that the more hours you put in and the harder you work, the more valuable you are.
This belief led me to have some crazy habits that involved me waking up in the morning and checking my emails first thing. I did this because I wanted to make sure I started putting in my hours right away. I wanted to make sure I responded to people as fast as possible and I got a lot of anxiety and had a lot of frustration from believing that I would miss opportunities if I didn’t check my email first thing.
I was not taking the time to fulfill myself and make sure I was my best self before I was going to work. This belief that working hard and putting in more hours was causing me to completely neglect myself and just work on anything. It didn’t even matter if it was important work. I just felt like putting in the hours was doing something and was making me valuable when it really wasn’t.
This belief also meant that I put more value on quantity over quality and we all know that more does not ever equal better.
Luckily I was able to change this limiting belief that I had, that my value only came from working harder and now I believe that working smarter and not harder is truly what attracts people to my business, helps me create great content, what helps me be able to live off of my blog full time and is what helps me achieve success.
This belief that working smarter and not harder means that I can go out and enjoy other things in life that I want to enjoy such as yoga and walking on the beach and traveling and reading with a warm cup of tea. It means that I no longer place value on how much I’m doing and instead I’m really focusing on what’s most important, letting go of all the other things that don’t necessarily need to be done in order to improve my income or my success or help me achieve my goals.
Now I’m actually achieving more and making more than I was before.
This one simple shift in my belief from believing that I had to work hard and put in more hours in order to be successful, to believing that working smarter is going to help me be more successful changing my habits completely.
What self-awareness does is help us understand our limiting beliefs. Once we understand what those beliefs are, we’re able to make the shift, which will then radically change how we see our lives, which will then help us live even better, more joyful lives.
Self awareness exercises to get over limiting beliefs
I know when I first came across the term limiting belief I didn’t think I had any. The thing is that you don’t know you have a limiting belief until you know. And you learn to know by becoming self aware.
I recommend following people on social media or through podcasts or reading books to find what other people are saying are limiting beliefs that they had. You can use mentors and outside sources as examples and you will find people who are doing what you want to be doing and see what they had to get over in order to do what they’re doing. Their limiting beliefs are probably very similar to yours.
EFT tapping also really helps because because you’re able to looking at guided tapping videos and see what other people are tapping on. I recommend seeing the hundreds of videos that brad Yates has on YouTube. I discovered so many limiting beliefs I didn’t know I had through his videos!
Financial beliefs and blocks was a really big one for me. I didn’t even realize that I was thinking certain ways about money and that if I didn’t think those ways, then I would bring more abundance into my life. I just had no idea how many things I was believing that were really twisted or backwards or limiting me and stopping me from living to my true potential.
Look to people who you find really inspiring and see if you can find what they believe. Would they believe what you currently believe?
Probably not.
Turn to family and friends and ask them what they think your strengths and weaknesses are. With that information you’ll be able to see how your weaknesses are holding you back and you can work on those. Your weaknesses are oftentimes limiting beliefs as well!
You can achieve absolutely everything that you want to, you’re just standing in your own way with your limiting beliefs and now you know just how you can become self aware and begin to make the necessary changes and shifts to live your best freakin’ life.