Breaking from beliefs

I woke up at 3 AM this morning to the sound of Billie Jean (only Ukulele, listen here to see what it’s so catchy and good) blasting in my head.

That’s right, I imagined it. Why or how — I have no idea. Definitely a first for me.

But the adrenaline rush was real, I admittedly didn’t mind the experience at the time, and there was no way I was going to be able to fall asleep.

By 6 AM, I told myself: “Today is gonna suck”

That wasn’t a particularly irrational assessment to make, there’s plenty of research to support the claim that you generally perform less well on days that you’re sleep deprived.

But then it also occurred to me that if I started my day with the foregone conclusion that it was going to go poorly, then any hopes of salvaging it were also out of the question.

I would’ve effectively taken away any chance of me being able to exhibit resilience.

So instead, I told myself: “Yes, you’re sleep deprived. But you’re going to do your best — you’re going to be fine!”

Did that miraculously jolt me awake and enable me to perform at 100%? No, I was still tired. But I can pretty much guarantee that I handled the day a lot better, and with a lot more composure, than if I’d made the determination that it was destined to suck.

Self-limiting beliefs are just that — they hold you back and down by limiting what you think is possible.

Self-supporting beliefs have the opposite effect — they do not miraculously make all challenges go away, but they give you the space to figure out how to navigate them with resilience.

If you have to get through a challenge one way or another, it’s much more useful to believe in your ability to get through it than it is to decide in a self-fulfilling way that you can’t.