Brain Pathways
If you understand your thought patterns it lets you have a healthy attitude, improving your self esteem and boosting your confidence.
When you learn something the brain connection and pathway is weak. The more frequently you think a particular thought the stronger the brain pathway becomes. Which forms a automatic and eventually unconscious habit of thinking. You are actually training your brain.
When learning to ride a bike you are training your brain. Your brain is learning how to keep balance, your eyes on the road, holding the handle bars and steering in the right direction. The more you practice the stronger your bicycle riding pathways become. Eventually you are able to get on your bicycle and ride without thinking. You are operating on automatic. You have created a strong brain pathway that coordinates everything you have previously learned about bicycle riding and compiled it into something like bicycle software, uploaded and is operating seamlessly in your mind.
Your brain works the same way in forming your attitude and what you think of yourself. As a child your attitudes and thoughts about yourself are formed from everything you’ve heard and believed from important and influential people in your life,-- parents, siblings, teachers, friends, etc... If you have had a negative experience as a child, like made fun of by classmates not invited to play with them, you probably have a negative attitude and low self-esteem thought pattern regarding friends and social situations. So as a adult all this surfaces at social gatherings you experience anxiety, fear and nervousness. --People don’t like me, --Nobody is going to talk to me, --I don’t know what to say, --I was only invited because they had to. Believing this, and with emotional energy and acted on with conviction is what’s called your dominant thought pattern or dominant attitude, it all operates on automatic, triggering conscious and unconscious feelings and reactions to the circumstances of your life.
The good news is that it can all be changed by choosing what you are feeling and thinking, when you become aware of your attitude and beliefs. With practice you can create new brain pathways by developing new thoughts and behaviors, these will replace the old patterns of thinking and attitudes.
How to create new brain pathways.
Awareness-- All change begins with awareness.--- Notice your thoughts, feelings, words and actions. Practice---Focus your attention on the present, what do you see hear smell taste and feel?
Choice-- An act of making a decision: consciously choosing the thoughts and feelings for a healthy attitude and your goals and dreams.--- Accept responsibility for your thoughts. Practice--- Choose an attitude or goal you desire. Think about it twice a day in the morning when you get up and before you go to bed.
Change-- Transform your thoughts and feelings toward your goals and attitude. Fear of failure is still going to step in but remember you have to burn new brain pathways. Practice---Change your thinking when ever you notice you are slipping back to the old you. Change is hard to do but with practice things become unconsciously easy. Sifu Hayes www.silentriverkungfu.com Stony Plain, Alberta, Canada