I recently heard an expression – To know your future, look at your present.
This really struck me, and over the next several days, I found myself thinking about all of the ways this is true.
We can so often gauge the next 5 years of our lives by just looking at how we are getting by right now. For that matter, many of us can look back 10 years and see very little difference between the way we are getting by right now.
Here’s a statistic that makes me feel especially sad – 95% of people operate from a place of history. This means that Only 5% of the human population operates from a place of vision and imagination. From a place of curiosity and growth.
I believe that we are on this planet to learn. To grow. To experience life at its fullest. But how can we be experiencing the fullness of life if we are just repeating the same patterns of 10 years ago?
Where is the adventure, the excitement, the passion in that? Where is the contrast in that?
Sure, it’s true that there is a level of safety and comfort in routine. In habit. In the status quo. Change can be frightening and the primitive parts of our brain aren’t hardwired for change. It is hardwired for safety. Stay in the cave, stay safe. Follow the rules, stay safe. Don’t think for yourself, stay safe.
We may be able to actively choose the way that we perceive the world, but up to 90% of our daily thoughts are habitual. The human brain is an organic, primitive computer, programmed for survival. Survival is largely ego-based and the primary objective of this primitive state will always be to seek safety over happiness. To repeat our history rather than create a dynamic new future. So the mind keeps us in a feedback loop, re-creating yesterday, the day before, and the day before that.
Our early childhood programming plays into this, too. The brain is structured to learn intensely in childhood (2-6 or 7) then hardwire those processes into adulthood. So the Ideas and ideals of our parents and caregivers are passed down through generations, and it is rare that we want to question what is known.
Mainstream media contributes further to this, hijacking the amygdala (primitive brain) to see the negative or threatening aspects of our reality before we see the good.
But here’s the thing – if we are not moving or growing for a prolonged period of time, we are stagnant. I know this may feel like a painful truth, but stagnation is just a stone’s throw away from death.
And here’s the crux of this idea – What you do not change, you choose.
I’ll write that again, because it is so, so important.
What you do not change, you choose.
So the real question becomes; what are you choosing? Are you choosing to repeat the cycles and programs of your past, or are you redefining your present to create a better future? Are you allowing the subconscious to rule your emotions and actions based upon patterning that began in childhood? Are you actively writing your story or allowing someone else’s belief systems to dictate your reality?
Your past does not need to define you. It does not have to be your future.
The brain has an amazing ability to re-wire itself (neuroplasticity) through conscious awareness and directed focus to create new neurological programs. This means we must become deeply aware of the direction our thoughts are taking in order to alter the course of our internal dialogue and unconscious bias to change those habits of thinking – to reflect the outer reality that we wish to see rather than the one our past has created. We have to re-evaluate our belief systems to begin laying down new, happier, healthier programs; new ways of being.
This is not necessarily an easy process. Encountering the unfamiliar will always make us feel uncomfortable, and changing those long-held beliefs and hardwired programs will feel frustrating – the amygdala/primitive brain perceives change as a threat and produces stress hormones such as norepinephrine/adrenaline and cortisol to literally make us feel stressed, agitated and frustrated when we try something new. This chemical release is meant to keep us safe, but it also inhibits our ability to grow. This process is true of any change we undertake; from learning a new language or skill to healing unhealthy programs from the past.
But isn’t changing a life half-lived for a life of conscious creation and happiness worth a little discomfort?
Rory Vaden, author of “Take the Stairs”, speaks of observing the difference in how buffalo and cows address the frequent storms that come across the mountains of his native state of Colorado.
Cows, when they sense a storm coming, will turn and run in the opposite direction. The problem with this is that they often become trapped in the storm, causing distress, injury, and even death – until it blows itself out.
Buffalo, on the other hand, will wait until the storm crests the mountains, and then charge directly toward the incoming storm. In this way, they run through the storm rather than getting stuck in it.
Our neurological processes can be compared to this. Most of us just turn tail and run from change, or hunker down and hope the unfamiliar will pass us by. But here is the super-cool thing about the brain pertaining to our ability to learn and grow – when we choose to go into the chaos/face the “storm” of stress hormones and the feeling of frustration that happens when we begin to examine and address old, outdated ways of thinking, adrenaline becomes acetylcholine; a neurochemical that allows us to go into sustained “focus” mode. A flow state. Our curiosity is stimulated. Acetylcholine allows us to begin to learn new processes and belief systems. When we hold this sustained attention on learning, the brain will “reward” us with a hit of dopamine.
Just to briefly touch on how this pertains to quantum physics, when we feel good, we draw good to us. We are better able to shape our reality on a quantum level – manipulate particles to create a life of our choosing rather than one of chance and circumstance.
This also ties into the neurologic phenomenon of “mood follows action”. (“Fake it until you make it”) We have to step into the storm of frustration that those stress hormones cause in order to move through the chaos and into the feel-good, top-of-the-mountain state of dopamine release. We have to begin the action of feeling good in order to actually feel good. When we make a habit of moving into and through the storm, our baseline dopamine levels become higher and the reward we get from learning becomes greater.
I like to think of this as the “Explorer” phenomenon.
We travel to a new state to experience a slightly different culture and we get a small hit of dopamine as a reward. We travel to another country such as Ireland or England where the culture is a little different – but still familiar – and we receive a bigger hit of dopamine. We go to rural Africa, India or Indonesia where the culture is vastly different than our previous experience and we have a massive hit of dopamine. I have experienced this myself, many times. I feel more alive when traveling than any other time in large part as a result of this, I am sure.
Just imagine what Magellan, Columbus, Marco Polo or my distant ancestor, Sir Francis Drake; must have experienced upon seeing countries and cultures previously unknown to most of the world must have felt. Wow, right?✨
The neurobiological process of learning and re-programming the mind is just like this. The greater the effort; the bigger the change, the bigger the change, the greater the reward. 🥳
You have the power to create an amazing reality of freedom and joy. I hope that today, you choose to begin shaping that reality into the life of your dreams.
Much love;
- Terah💖
This Blessed Sacred Life 