One of my roles as a transformational life coach is to help my clients work with their belief systems. This means unpacking those pesky limiting beliefs, understanding where they come from, and shifting them so they no longer hold you back.
For many clients, this is grueling work and at times, painful. And yet, it’s key to acknowledging your conditioning so you can move forward.
The opposite of working with limiting beliefs is installing empowering beliefs. This is extremely rewarding work and it gives me a lot of pleasure watching my clients blossom as they learn to identify the positive beliefs they already have.
Sometimes, it takes quite a bit of digging to unearth these empowering beliefs. And, when they want to replace the empty space created by shifting limiting beliefs, I show them how to create and install new, empowering beliefs.
But, what am I talking about when I speak about empowering beliefs? Do you really own them already if you’re not aware of them? And, can you magic up new ones and install them into your mind for everyday use?
Read on as I introduce you to empowering beliefs and how you can transform your own life by installing positive thoughts.
What Is a Belief System?
When I talk about working with my clients to identify their belief systems, I’m referring to the limiting and positive beliefs they hold. It’s this belief system that conditions my clients to think in a certain way and to behave in a manner that either serves them or doesn't.
Your belief system is incredibly powerful. It determines what direction you take in life and how events unfold, both negative and positive. Your beliefs are so powerful, you’re not aware of them half the time. This is why they can be extremely dangerous, especially the limiting ones!
All your beliefs come from your childhood. From the moment you came into this world, you were conditioned by whoever was responsible for your first years on Earth. It’s your beliefs that determine your emotions and guess what? Your emotions drive your actions.
Your belief system plays a huge role in the following areas of your life and influences how your life path unfolds:
Relationships
Finances
Work
Health
Personal development
Social interactions
Spirituality
Both negative and positive beliefs are born from your upbringing. This doesn’t mean to say you have to live with the negative beliefs though. You just have to work a bit harder to unravel them and shift them so they can be replaced with empowering beliefs.
What Is an Empowering Belief?
An empowering belief is something you believe about yourself. This is an unwavering belief in yourself that's positive, empowering, and useful. Empowering or positive beliefs drive your thought processes, your feelings and emotions, and your actions or behavior.
A positive belief system enables you to think positively, take constructive action that serves you, and makes you feel good.
What Are the Benefits of an Empowering Belief System?
While it may seem obvious there are many benefits to having an empowering belief system, it’s not something that most of us have. And, if shifting limiting beliefs is painful, why would you want to even go through the effort of finding empowering beliefs?
Well, if you’re serious about the following then having empowering beliefs is worthwhile, in fact essential, for a healthy life:
Better work performance: If you want to perform well in your career and see yourself climbing the ladder in the corporate sector or want to run your own successful business, you need to have empowering beliefs.
Achieve goals: Moving forward in life takes courage and belief in one’s own capabilities. By installing positive beliefs, you’re equipping yourself with the ultimate tool for changing your life for the better and achieving your goals and dreams.
More money: Believe it or not, empowering beliefs help you to manage your money and to grow it! The healthier your relationship with money, the better your financial well-being.
Healthy relationships: Having a positive frame of mind means you can connect better with people. Your emotions will be balanced which means your behavior will be in harmony with everyone around you. You’re also likely to only attract the right people into your life by developing healthy boundaries also known as the consensus circle.
Overall well-being: An empowering belief system means you can manage your thoughts, emotions, and actions in a balanced and constructive way. This is conducive to a healthy mind, body, and soul leading to feeling an overall sense of well-being.
But, how do you go about installing empowering beliefs?
Step-by-Step Guide to Installing Empowering Beliefs
Use the following steps to help you shift your belief system so it becomes empowering.
Step #1: Identify Your Belief System – Is It Negative or Positive?
Think about your thought patterns. Are they more good than bad, or worse than good? Do you find yourself feeling negative most of the time? Or, are you always hunting down the next opportunity?
Take a step back and reflect. Look at your current life. It’s a reflection of your internal thoughts so if you’re sitting in a job you hate but can’t leave it, you’ve got some limiting beliefs hindering your progress. Identify what those beliefs could be.
A few examples could include the following:
I am not worthy of a better job
Work is not meant to be enjoyable
I’ll never find another job
I’m not good enough
I don't believe I deserve happiness
If you’ve identified that you do have negative beliefs holding you back, go to the next step.
Step #2: Question Your Negative Beliefs
One of the best ways to shift limiting beliefs is to question them. Do you really believe there are no other jobs out there for you to apply for? Or, is it the general global belief that work is hard to come by?
We often resort to negative beliefs as an excuse to not do the “uncomfortable” work of putting ourselves out there. Maybe, it’s the fear of going for interviews that are holding you back rather than there “being no work out there.”
By questioning your current set of negative beliefs, you can start to identify where they come from and if they’re really YOUR story to carry. If not, then give them back to their rightful owners (your parents, your teacher, your sibling, whoever it was that started the belief in the first place!) and move on.
Step #3: Replace Negatives With Positives
Imagine now that your mind is one big empty space. You’ve done the hard (and painful) task of shifting the limiting beliefs. Now, you need to fill your mind with empowering beliefs. How exciting is that?
First, identify any positive beliefs you do have about yourself (and I assure you, there are plenty!) They can look something like this:
I’m an excellent speaker
I’m a good listener
I’m good at my job
I’m a loving and caring partner
The list goes on. By acknowledging your existing positive beliefs, you’re bringing them to the forefront of your mind and allowing you to feel them which then translates into empowering actions.
Here’s the fun part. You’re allowed to make up empowering beliefs to replace the negative beliefs. By doing this, you’re "faking it until you make it" but if you focus on them hard enough, they’ll reflect in your feelings and actions.
Step #4: Install Empowering Beliefs
Okay, so you’ve identified some great empowering beliefs you really want to believe about yourself. The trick here is to “fool” your mind and ego into believing them. The way to do this is to write them down somewhere you’ll see them every day. You’ll recite them as often as possible (similar to saying a daily mantra) until they’re firmly entrenched in your mind.
Here’s another trick though – you need to really “feel” that belief. If you don’t, then there’s no energy driving that thought. So, be inspired by your beliefs and make sure you inject a whole lot of feeling into the process.
Step #5: Celebrate!
How do you know you’ve been successful in installing your empowering beliefs? When you start noticing positive changes in your life, that’s how! You’ve achieved your goal to be a star on stage or you’ve found the perfect romantic partner because you believed you deserved it.
When you notice your life is working out the way you planned, in a positive and liberating way, then you’ve successfully installed empowering beliefs. Celebrate!
Final Thoughts
Transforming your life is not always easy. In fact, it’s downright hard work. But, with the right guidance and willingness to change, you can shift your belief system so that it serves you. Only then will the transformation start to happen.
This post was updated on May 2, 2023.