Written by: Paul Corke, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
One common theme we find in any book on mindset is the assumption that the quality of your thoughts will determine the quality of your life. The reason for this?
“Once your mindset changes, everything on the outside will change along with it.” ‒ Steve Maraboli
The answer then has to be what we think about most of the time tends to manifest itself in our lives.
Whether that is good or bad…ever noticed that when you think you are ill or not then you tend to be. If you repeat over and over again, ‘I’m not happy’ to yourself through your ongoing self-talk guess what you are not going to be happy. And vice versa hence why positive affirmations are so important they help to re-wire your brain for success. If they are positive!
So can you recondition your mind?
Part of the brain, the Reticular Activating System (RAS) makes sure that what we bring to our attention our mind focuses upon, and it looks for supporting information, data, and evidence to support what we are thinking about.
It is now understood by neuroscience that our brains are shaped by experience, but they have the ability to evolve throughout our lives. Out intelligence is not fixed like lots of people think. For every one of us in life our thoughts and behaviours change on a daily basis, which creates a shift in the neuroplasticity of the brain. With the consistent conditioning of our thoughts, feelings, and actions, we create new neural pathways with the proportion of grey matter changing, and synapses in the brain may strengthen or weaken over time.
Neuroplasticity is the ‘muscle building’ part of the brain which we can shape and change; but our repeated thoughts and behaviour over a long period of time condition us to believe we are who we are, and nothing can change us. Especially the older we get, but we are in constant flux and have the ability to continually learn new things.
We have been taught that the brain stops developing later in life, but we now know this is not the case and we can develop, shape and re-condition our brain to build new synapses and new ways of thinking even as we age. In effect, you can teach an old dog new tricks if the dog is willing to learn and has a positive mindset.
“All the experiences in your life ‒ from single conversations to your broader culture ‒ shape the microscopic details of your brain. Neurally speaking, who you are depends on where you've been. Your brain is a relentless shapeshifter, constantly rewriting its own circuitry and because your experiences are unique, so are the vast detailed patterns in your neural networks. Because they continue to change your whole life, your identity is a moving target; it never reaches an endpoint.” – David Eagelman American Neuroscientist and Author.
It is this information that gives us the option to really look at who we are, what we stand for, our values and beliefs knowing at any point we can decide to be who we want to be. If we choose to change our mindset, we can change our life and we can change who we are.
The greatest achievers in sport, business and life all stress the importance of their mindset and demonstrating the resilience of never giving up.
As Lewis Hamilton after achieving his seventh record equalling Grand Prix Title,
"It’s so important for kids – dream the impossible. You’ve got to work for it, chase it and never give up or doubt yourself."
The mindset of a winner.
But not everyone feels like they are winning so you should never give up on yourself no matter what you are facing.
Whatever you are feeling right now, especially with all the uncertainty in the world, understand no matter what your mindset is everything; you can change, you can choose your response to any situation, and you can reframe your mindset for success.
The greatest know there is an equation to success and that the mental part of how they became successful is just as important as what they do. They understand that the dream began in their mind, with choosing a mindset and maintaining that mindset to achieve everything they have.
It's simple if you want to be successful in life, if you want to be happy, mindset matters.
So here are some simple steps to take to use the power of your mindset…
Listen to what you are thinking on a daily basis and how your mind is making you feel.
Write it down in your own personal mindset diary to capture the good thoughts and your negative self-talk.
Give yourself a score for how you feel each day from 1 being not great to 10 feeling fantastic and note what part your mind plays in you feeling this way or vice versa.
Think about how you can reframe your thoughts so any negative self-talk start to reframe it to positive self-talk.
Use positive affirmations each day until they become ingrained in how you think every day.
Once you feel you are in the best place possible commit to being a 10 out of 10 every day all day.
Have a mindset that anything is possible and the sky is not your limit to achieving the things you want in life.
Remember our mindset is everything.
“What lies within us is far greater than what lies ahead of us.” – Erik Weihenmayer
Paul Corke, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Paul Corke is an author, a keynote speaker, and considered to be a leading expert on mindset, innovation, and leadership. He is currently recognized as the No. 1 Health and Wellness Thought Leader & Influencer with @Thinkers360 and is also the Managing Director of Leadership Innovators an innovative leadership consultancy. He previously spent 25 years in the corporate world with award-winning results specializing in organizational effectiveness, employee engagement, talent management, and leadership development with experience in the UK, Ireland, Europe, the US, and the Middle East.
Paul is the author of Reframe Your Mindset: Redefine Your Success, has a podcast series to support the book and has created The Mindset Journal all based on what he calls ‘The Mindset Equation for Success.’ Paul uses his research into the mindset and positive psychology along with the thinking from his books to provide thought leadership, leadership model design, leadership assessment, and solutions to help organizations build their leadership capability.
Paul has successfully built a leadership development strategy and provided solutions in the industries of Financial Services, Retail, Automobile, Charity, Information Technology, Education, and Local Government. His mission is to develop leaders the world now wants to see whilst also making a difference through B1G1working towards the UN Global Goals to help those in need across the world.
