Tune into Your Childhood Beliefs

Were you always asked to finish all the food on your plate? Was food in abundance or barely enough? Were you rewarded for good behavior with ice-cream or pizza? Were you sent to bed hungry as a punishment? Or given cookies when you were feeling sad? Perhaps some of your eating is driven by nostalgia, i.e. eating certain foods makes you feel connected to your tribe and to your past. To what extent are these beliefs shaping your beliefs about food today? Are these beliefs still in alignment with who you are now? Are they serving you? If not, it is wise to cut the cord with them. (Visualize a cord between you and the belief and, using imaginary scissors, cut that cord). Remember, you are cutting the cord connecting you with those beliefs, not the people who “gave” them to you. What new beliefs can you put in place to build a new foundation for yourself? 

Our beliefs and habits need periodic review and renewal. Just as we change our wardrobe or the color of paint in our homes, so should we upgrade our beliefs every now and then, too. Certain beliefs need changing to continuously align with our higher purpose and values.

Another point that is worth making is that regardless of how we were raised, ultimately our life is our own responsibility. Our caregivers and parents do what they know to do. The point of visiting our childhood is to gain insight into the belief patterns that may be at play in our adult life, it is not to blame all of our challenges on our upbringing, as the ultimate responsibility rests with each one of us.

Holding on to beliefs that no longer serve us can make us sick on all levels. The disease manifestation is a process that started a long time ago in our subconscious mind and eventually expressed itself in our body as a full-blown physical symptom. We don’t see the disease in the making and we mistakenly believe it to be only physical; we thus limit treatment to just the physical aspect of who we are. Modern medicine does that quite well, hopping from symptom to symptom, bandaging them all up but rarely getting to the root cause. I have yet to meet a client whose physical symptoms did not have a big psychological component. The disease is the unresolved story or conflict that resulted from holding on to old beliefs that you know are no longer true but can’t seem to release. Masking the symptoms confuses our physiology and mentally debilitates us in very subtle, yet powerful, ways. We can’t afford to not pay attention to that!