Be careful of what you focus on
I have an insidious enemy that has accompanied me in my 50 year journey in this life.
My mind.
It is the primary reason I ended up drinking myself to death in a grotty bedsit, instead of living the glamorous life of a commercial airline pilot.
By the time I started my pilot training in my early 20s, I was already a full blown alcoholic. I somehow managed to get my commercial pilot’s licence, despite my frequent 3 day drinking binges.
Getting my pilot’s licence was a childhood dream of mine that started at the age of 5. So when I attained that dream, I was understandably ecstatic. I was now on my way to fulfilling my dream of becoming an airline pilot.
However…
The image I held of myself internally, didn’t identify with being an airline pilot. My countless attempts to control my drinking broadcast only one image to mind – one of myself, living in a grotty flat, drinking myself to death.
And what I saw in my mind became true, a few years later.
We truly become what we focus on internally.
Real change begins within
I made literally 100s of attempts to quit booze in the 10 years after getting my licence. I wasn’t stupid. I could see that alcohol was wrecking my life and ruining the lives of those close to me. I had every reason in the world to stop, but I couldn’t.
Then came the day I did stop.
Something happened internally, which to this day I still can’t explain. I looked around the bedsit I was living in at the time, with its broken furniture, smashed window and stinking soiled carpet, and broke down.
I had a moment of clarity in which my true (metabeing) identity just couldn’t reconcile with the reality of my life at that time. It was like having a disassociated experience – I didn’t recognise who I was anymore. This wasn’t meant to be my life.
I was having an identity crisis.
From that moment on, I resolved to never touch alcohol for the rest of my life and get all the help I could possibly get.
My identity shifted from one of being a drunk to someone who will do anything it takes to escape from my alcoholism.
Having a clear image of who you want to be
The best route to lasting change is to change your internal self image. James Clear talks about it in his excellent book, ‘Atomic Habits’.
Goals and actions can work to an extent, but if your internal identity isn’t congruent with the goals, lasting change will be a struggle.
In my drinking years I always had the goal of being sober.
However, when it came to the crunch, I still identified internally as someone who drinks, or is trying to stop drinking.
To quote Master Yoda: Do… or do not. There is no try.
Just to add as a caveat, I am not saying it is easy to quit an addiction. I struggled for years. But during those years, I was always trying, forgetting that each relapse was already happening in my mind before I picked up the first drink. Because internally, my self image identified as a drunk.
Unlearning the broken story you tell yourself
Sustained internal focus on who you want to be eventually materialises into who you become.
My internal focus became one of being sober at any cost. Outwardly I became someone who went to AA meetings everyday, practised the recovery program and helped other alcoholics.
After time, drink no longer had any power over me. I could go to bars and pubs, or walk down the alcohol aisle in a supermarket and I no longer had cravings. My identity was so infused with being a teetotaller, that the option to drink no longer existed for me.
My new internal identity led me to taking the actions that aligned with that identity. And eventually the broken story I’d been telling myself for years, was now supplanted with a new, more constructive story.
The power of visualisation
Practically every major religion involves visualisation techniques in one form or another. In more recent times, visualisation has been adopted by many New Age beliefs and thought movements such as the Law of Attraction.
A common misconception, and the reason why visualisation is dismissed by many, is the misguided notion that ‘if I imagine a Ferrari hard enough, it will somehow appear in my driveway’ as if by magic.
If you are unsure about the power of visualisation, and its impact on the physical, consider this. If we witness someone slip up on an icy cold pavement and break their leg with a painful crack, we wince.
Why?
Because internally we imagine ourselves experiencing that misfortune. We visualise it for ourselves, which elicits a physical response within ourselves. We physically sense their pain, albeit it a much watered down version.
The mind and the body are intrinsically connected. There is a wealth of research which documents phenomena such as the psychosomatic effect and the placebo effect.
And because mind and body are connected, our internal world (what we predominantly think) becomes our external world (who we become). I know this to be true from first hand experience, ending up a drunk rather than an airline pilot.
So if we are to change ourselves for the better, and grow as human beings, we first need to become that person internally. To actually start feeling what it is like to be the best version of ourselves, or metabeing.
We can use visualisation in order to help us develop a different internal self image which will drive us to start taking different actions
If you would like to change some aspect of your life try this practice:
- Write down precisely who you would like to be. What actions does this person take on a daily basis? How do they behave? How does it FEEL to be this ultimate (metabeing) version of yourself?
- Meditate for at least 10 minutes a day. Visualise yourself being this person and FEEL how being this person experiences life
- Daily practise the habits of your metabeing.
Identity shifting for true change
Most of us, at some point in our lives develop a desire to change some aspect of ourselves. Perhaps we have a habit or addiction that doesn’t serve us, or maybe we’d like to develop some aspect of our character such as becoming more confident.
This desire for personal change is often followed up by writing down a list of actions and goals to help drive us towards becoming a new version of ourselves. However, this is the difficult way to change – think of all the new year’s resolutions that are broken by the end of January each year.
The most effective way to elicit long lasting change, is to first shift your internal self image to one that encapsulates who you wish to become. With visualisation techniques to help build your new self image, you will find that the necessary goals and actions required for change, follow.
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