Limiting Beliefs

“For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. “

Psalms 139:13

The verse I chose for this devotional is Psalms 139:13,  “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. “

What I feel that this verse really means is that we are ALL part of God’s plan and that we all have been given a purpose.

If you know me you know that I FIRMLY believe that we were all created for a purpose and that everything in life happens for a reason.

Yes, even the limiting beliefs that we have.

Those are there for a reason too.

But before we get too deep into those limiting beliefs. Let’s talk about what a limiting belief is.

But..

Before we do that let me just say this. If this topic scares you a little bit, that’s okay.  Talking about limiting beliefs especially mine scares the HECK out of me.

So if it is all right, for this devotional I would really like to get personal and vulnerable with you. All that I ask is that you don’t laugh TOO loud at me. (notice I didn’t ask you not to laugh at me, lol)

Anyways.

Back to the topic at hand.

What is a limiting belief?

Well, my definition of a limiting belief is anything that you personally believe that is holding you back.

Tony Robbins says that limiting beliefs are the stories we tell ourselves about who we are that hold us back from becoming who we are meant to be. These beliefs limit us from reaching our full potential.

Personally, I like his definition a little better than mine.

One example of a limiting belief that I used to have was that I am not good at reading.

I was told throughout my school career that I was a slow reader and that I wasn’t good at it by several teachers and LOTS of kids in my classes.

So I adopted that limiting belief, and lived by it.

From 3rd grade all the way through graduation I never read a complete book, except for 2 Tim Allen books (Don’t Stand Too Close To A Naked Man & I’m Not Really Here). I did hundreds of book reports and participated in class discussions, but never actually read the books.

Shhhh. Don’t tell my English teachers or parents, lol

I actually held onto this limiting belief until I was well into my 20s.  I would say I was probably 27ish when I finally broke this belief.

As a kid, I loved staying at Grandma Greer’s house (even though it was only a ½ mile away from my house) because at night she would read a book to us to go to bed.

I wanted to adopt that with my kids. So I started reading to them at night. Jenna helped me pick a book that the kids and I would like, then I started reading it to them every night I was home.

I would read for about 20-30 minutes a night.

At first, I was scared to death to read out loud because I might not get the words right. but I quickly realized that I was the only one who could see the words. The kids were in bed so they couldn’t correct me.

So, when I messed up on a word I powered through it like I knew what I was talking about.

Before long I wasn’t messing up on any of the words. And in about 3 months of reading every single night, I started telling myself, “hey you are good at reading.

It was about that time that I discovered that I LOVE to read books.

Now I listen to and read about 50 books this year alone.

The other day I was talking to my dad and we got on the topic of books and how many I read this year. And I discovered one of his limiting beliefs.

When I said that I read 48 books so far and was in the middle of another one. He asked, did you read them or listen to them?

My immediate thought was, WHO CARES????????

Do you see his limiting beliefs?

You can’t listen to a book. You MUST read it from a physical book format to get the knowledge out of it.

The thing with limiting beliefs is that they can haunt you for a long time. And the truth of the matter is that they usually aren’t really true. Like at all!!! 

It is just a made-up story that Satan helps us craft so that we limit ourselves from the full potential that God wants and NEEDS us to achieve to be ultimately successful.

I could do a whole book on limiting beliefs and how to break them. (Heck who knows maybe I will someday?!?!?!)  But for today I really want you to KNOW that God created us all for a purpose. It is our duty to do our best to live up to that purpose.

 

Take Action

This one is going to be a little tougher.

Are you ready for it?

First off I would like you to go and listen to my podcast Leading From The Middle Of The Pack There is an episode that I recently released on Limiting Beliefs. That I think would be very beneficial for you to listen to.

Check it out here https://eclipse-dot.com/podcast/

Second I would like to take a few moments to write your answers down for the following.

What are 3 of my most limiting beliefs?

What are the negative consequences that each belief has caused me so far

in my life?

How has each belief affected my life negatively by having them?

What have I missed out on by accepting each of these beliefs?

What is the WORST consequence that could happen if I keep each belief in my life?

What Belief Do I Want to replace each of these with?

This is going to be deep.

But I know that you can do it.

And just to prove that you can do it, here is mine.

Some of my most limiting beliefs are?

I am not good enough

  • I will never try hard to be enough. I will fail because I never actually will. My business will fail, my relationships will struggle, and I will stop growing. I will lose my faith because I will lose Sight of God. The stress of not having enough. Having a hard time paying bills.
  • I have missed out on amazing relationships. Success earlier in life and financial freedom
  •  Losing my relationship with Jenna.
  • I don’t deserve to be happy
  • My relationships will fail along with my business and faith. Cause my entire life to collapse on itself.
  • Ultimately it will cost me everything. Jenna could leave me, my kids could lose faith in me. I could lose everything.
  • Losing my relationship with Jenna
  • I don’t deserve success
  • I will stop trying to win. I will not grow or try to grow. I will lose sight of what is really important not only to me but also to my family, business, and clients.
  •  It has cost me true wealth. Not $$ but wealth. Being able to invest in what I want when I want and the growth of my company. It has also put stress on my marriage.
  •  Losing my company.
  • I can’t celebrate my wins
  • I will stop winning because I don’t feel like it is a win. I will stop trying to get better and will allow others to pass me up in life and business.
  • This belief hurts everyone in my life. At home, I come across as not happy or ever satisfied. I accomplish a goal and then move directly into the next one without stopping to acknowledge how good I just did. This could cause me to ruin my business marriage and relationship with God.
  • Losing my relationship with Jenna.
  • I will look dumb if I share where I am or am not business-wise with my peers.
  • I will not be able to get help from anyone because no one will be able to help me grow to the next stage. I have to stop putting on a face and move forward into that next step of opening up and letting others know where I am.
  • My entire business could collapse

What are the new beliefs I am replacing the old ones with

  • I am always enough to everyone and God Built me to Succeed
  • I deserve to be happy and blessed
  • I require success
  • I celebrate my wins with such confidence that None can contain me
  • God loves me and wants me to succeed
  • God needs me to celebrate my wins
  • God wants me to change so that others can coach me
  • God wants me to know that I am enough. He wants me to succeed, be happy, win, share, and celebrate.

Prayer

Lord, God today we come to you with heavy hearts. We know that you have created us for a reason. We understand that we aren’t supposed to be perfect. We know that we are the only thing or person that is holding us back from ultimate success.

Here is the thing. Changing is tough. But we KNOW that we can do it with your help. So today God we ask that you would place your hands on our minds and help us to BREAK these limiting beliefs that we have imposed on ourselves.

Help us to KNOW that you have more in store for us than we could ever imagine. Help us to fully understand that you can do anything. Including helping us to rewrite the limiting beliefs that we have.

God, you are amazing and can do ANYTHING! Thank you so much for all that you do for us.

We ask all these things in your precious son’s name,

We ask all these things in your precious son’s name.

Amen.

A Little More

As I sat in the middle of a crowd of 13,000 people I pulled out my phone and started taking notes.

I used to take notes with pen and paper, but then I discovered that I couldn’t read the notes I took afterward, so I started keeping them on my phone.

I looked to my left and there was my beautiful queen, Jenna sitting next to me taking notes too.

In front of us was a whole row of people and I would say that about 70% of them were playing all in.

Personally, I was there to play all in, and I was going to do whatever it took to get a real charge out of spending 4 days at Unleash the Power within. A Tony Robbins Event.

We had spent the morning talking about limiting beliefs and I knew that I had a few. I really wanted to make some changes to mine.

Then it came time to write down our limiting beliefs.

I shot up a quick prayer to help me be 100% honest and transparent. Because I knew that I was going to have to share these with other people after we got done.

I wrote down 5 of what I thought were my most limiting beliefs.

  1.  I’m Not Good Enough
  2.   I Don’t Deserve To Be Happy

As I started writing my eyes watered up. But I did not let it stop me. I kept pushing forward because I really, really wanted to push through and get a real breakthrough that would actually change my life.

  1.   I Don’t Deserve Success

This one really hurt to write. As the words were typed on my phone, the tears started coming down more. I’m not even sure why I felt this way. But it was what I truly felt at the time.

  1.    I Can’t Celebrate My Wins
  2.  I Will Look Dumb If I Share Where I Am Or Am Not Business-Wise With My Peers

After we all got done writing the answers we had to dig deeper to really discover what they were doing to us and what they would do to us if we continued to keep them as a limiting belief.

So, I played all in and dug even deeper to figure out what story I had told myself for each belief. and what caused that story to be my story.

I’m not going to go deep into every belief here because that would take pages and pages. The truth is that as I wrote them I played all in and it literally brought tears to my eyes to go through the process.

Then after that, we wrote down the belief that we were going to replace each one with.

But now comes the hard part.

We got up and shared our false beliefs with a group.

Jenna and I got up and found a few others that were looking to share and we started going through our false beliefs.

As they shared theirs, my thoughts were running wild.

Finally, it was my turn to share. I took a deep breath and started to talk about my false beliefs. Then what they have cost me. Then the most they could cost me if I kept them. Then after that I talked about the new beliefs that I wanted to replace them with.

After we finished, Jenna looked me square in the eyes and said, I had no idea that’s what is holding you back. I have noticed that you have been self-sabotaging certain things in life, but I could not figure out why. Now it makes so much sense. We are going to get through these together!

We had an amazing moment where we reassured each other that we were there for each other and that we would make sure that we worked together to make sure that the other succeeded.

I swear she gave me the BEST hug I have ever had in my entire life. It warmed me up from the inside out. It was absolutely amazing.

If you ever get the chance to go to something where you can work on yourself. DO IT.  be sure to take your partner with you. Because it will be amazing if you allow it.