How Do You Uncover Limiting Beliefs in Self-Healing?

This question came from one of my readers, and I think it is a really significant question to be asking. Limiting beliefs are often hidden from our view, so how are you supposed to do something about them if you don’t know what they are and how to find them.

Before you go looking for your limiting beliefs, let’s consider why they exist in the first place. In order to experience life on earth, we have to do so within limits. Without limits, you wouldn’t know if you are a human or a tree. There are great mystical experiences in which you can transcend those limits, remembering that we are one with everything. While those mystical moments are wonderful, so are the experiences of our limits.

Limits create definition so that we can interact with each other. That can be great fun. For example it feels really good to kiss someone. It can also be painful. It can really hurt when you bump into someone. Limits in and of themselves aren’t good or bad. They are simply necessary for experiencing life on earth. In fact, limits can help you to feel safe and that is how many limits are created
For example, when you were a child you were probably taught that when you cross major intersections on foot, you should do so with the lights. That limit was set so that you would be safe, and it is probably ingrained in your conscious and subconscious mind.

Now let’s say that your daughter or granddaughter just ran out into the street against traffic. I would bet that you aren’t going to think very hard about whether or not you should run out into the street to get her. You might run out to get her without stopping, looking for cars, or even thinking about it. You might very well break through your own limit of restraint and cross against the lights in order to protect her.

However, except in an emergency, you might find that your conditioning to cross with the lights is so strong that you have to consciously break that childhood limit. Let’s say the street is blocked off so you can cross at any time, with or against the lights. You might find it challenging to “break the law that is in your mind.”

When we get stuck because of a limit, some part of us knows we are going to have to go against what may have been keeping us safe in some way. Now the limit creates more danger than safety and we have to recondition ourselves. There can be a lot of internal resistance to that new conditioning, so a part of our subconscious mind keeps the belief hidden.

If you really want to get to those limiting beliefs to set them free, here are some of my suggestions:

1)    Know that the limits were once set for a reason and it may have been a very good one—even a way to protect you;

2)    Be willing to dive into your subconscious realms where those beliefs live;

3)    Be willing to acknowledge that the belief might still serve you in the right time and places; and

4)    Know that changing old beliefs requires risk, and consider if you are willing to give new (reframed) beliefs a real chance.

You can bring your limiting beliefs into view. If you are willing to meet them with your compassion and understanding, they are more likely to rise to the surface of your consciousness and allow you to reframe them in ways that will be more helpful to you in your self-healing journey.