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BUILDING NEW BELIEFS The Structure of Certainty

One of the most important aspects of what human beings do is that they build beliefs. Beliefs are what trap most people in their problems. Unless you believe you can get over something, get through something, or get to something, there is little likelihood that you will be able to do it. Your beliefs refer to your sense of certainty on some of your thoughts.

Most people listen to their parents, teachers, and authority figures from an early age and learn lots of limitations that they supposedly have. If you were told that you were not clever enough or not good enough at a subject or at a sport, the danger is that you believed it. As soon as we believe in something, we search for ways to prove it’s true. What we are looking for here is to learn to doubt your limitations and be more certain in what is possible for you.

In order to create any change, it’s necessary to help the person change their beliefs and build new beliefs that will allow them to maintain the change into the future. In order to change beliefs, we first need to learn a way of finding out the qualities of beliefs.

Once again, this is where submodalities come in useful. Like any thought, our beliefs have a structure in terms of their qualities. If I were to ask you, Do you believe the sun is coming up tomorrow?, what would your response be? Typically people immediately answer, Yes but there is an intervening process. In order to answer the question Do you believe the sun is coming up tomorrow?, they will usually represent this belief.

It’s important to note that if I asked you the question verbally, you would know the answer without speaking aloud. When I say, Is the sun coming up tomorrow?, typically what happens is that people flash an image of the sun somewhere in their mind. They may say, Yes inside their heads in certain tone of voice and they will have a feeling of certainty somewhere in their body which lets them know that this is true.

This is a guide for our behaviour. It allows us to make plans. It allows us to buy a book and know that we’ll read it in the future. Having beliefs as a guide to our behaviour is an important part of being a human being. It’s also an important part about knowing how to change a human being, and how to change yourself in particular.

If I were to ask you verbally, Is the sun coming up tomorrow? where is the picture in your mind? Is it to the right or to the left? How far away is it? Is it life size or is it a small picture? Is it a still picture? Is it a moving picture? Does it have any sound? Is there any voice that says, Yes? Is there anything that goes on that you hear and, if so, is it on the right? Is it on the left?

Take that feeling of certainty. Look at that picture in your mind and double it in size. Typically, your feelings will get stronger. When they do, notice where the feeling is in your body and which way it’s moving. You are beginning to pay attention to the submodalities of a strong belief.

Now, for a moment, stop and look away. Clear your mind and then come back to the pages and read with me.

Next, think about something that you’re really unsure about. Not something you doubt utterly but something that ‘maybe is’ and ‘maybe isn’t.’ Think of something you’re unsure of. It could be what you are going to have for lunch? Maybe a tuna sandwich or maybe a cheese sandwich. Something that may or may not be the case. It could even be what somebody’s going to buy you for your birthday? Maybe it’ll be this or maybe it’ll be that.

Look at it in your mind. Pause for a second, look away from the book and think about it. Then, come back to the book and come back to the idea of what you believe strongly. First, look at the image of the sun coming up tomorrow. Now look at the second image, what may be and what might not be. Compare the difference between the two.

First, are the images in the same place? The answer is probably no. If the images are in a different location then, are they a different distance? Are they a different size? Is the voice inside your head coming from a different place? Is one on the right, one on the left? One going in, one going out? The only part of this that makes a difference is the part where the difference lies between the two images.

You can begin to look at this difference more closely by studying the qualities of certainty and uncertainty in more depth. What follows below is a long list of submodalities: visual, auditory, kines-thetic (feeling), olfactory (smell), and gustatory (taste). What I want you to do is to go inside and access the belief of the sun coming up and the other image of what you are uncertain about and go down this list. Only check off those submodalities that are different between what you believe strongly and what you believe less strongly. Take a few moments and do this.

Discover How You Do Certainty

1 Think of something that you believe strongly. (That the sun will come up tomorrow.)

2 Notice what images, sounds, and feelings arise when you think about this belief and your certainty in it.

3 Go down through the list of submodalities below and note all the qualities of the belief.

4 Think of something that you doubt or are not sure of. (Maybe this, maybe that.)

5 Notice what images, sounds, and feelings arise when you think about this thought and your uncertainty about it.

6 Go down through the list of submodalities below and note all the qualities of the thought.

7 Note especially the differences between the strong belief and what you are uncertain of.

Now that you have your list, let’s take a look at it. What you know now is the difference between what constitutes a strong belief and what constitutes something that you’re unsure of. Once you know the difference between these two, you can get a semblance of control. If you’re reading this book there are probably some things about yourself that you want to change, therefore the first step is to make yourself believe that you can.

Start out and think of a problem you believe you have. It doesn’t matter what kind of problem it is. If you believe that you don’t have enough confidence or if you believe that you’re insecure, either would work. The odd thing about believing that you’re insecure is that people are always secure in the knowledge that they believe that they’re insecure.

For our purposes here, what we want you to do is to start out and, just like the belief that the sun is coming up tomorrow, you probably believe that you’ll have this problem tomorrow. Look at your problem in the same place that your belief was and the first thing to do is to look at it and say, I’m tired of this. Over the years, I’ve discovered that the moment people really change is when they simply decide that enough is enough.

Most people are not fed up enough with their problems. They may seem to be frustrated beyond belief. I’ve had people with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder whose every moment, every morning, noon, and night, was consumed with rituals designed to find comfort. They had to lock and unlock the door fifteen times, wash their hands a thousand times in a day but they became so frustrated that they finally said, Enough is Enough. I’m just not doing this any more. This is the moment where people really change themselves. But we’ll come back to this later.

The first thing that we want to do is to take a look at what it is that you want to get rid of and what you want to add. You want to get rid of your self-doubt and add more belief in yourself. You want to get rid of your fears and add more confidence. Whatever it is, when you think about your problem, you probably have believed that you were going to have it for the rest of your life.

When you look at this belief that it is going to be here for the rest of your life, I want you to do a few small things with it. Literally, push the picture off in the distance and move it over and pull it up into that place of uncertainty so, when you look at it, and you think, Am I gonna be stuck like this for ever? You say, Ehhh, maybe yes, maybe no.

In order to make it so that it sticks in any other position, it’s important that you do this very, very fast. So, to make it that you can place this old, limiting belief inside your uncertainty, you have to take a hold of the image and do something with it. You have to push it all the way off so that it’s twenty feet away, move it across your midline and pull it up on the other side into the submodality qualities of uncertainty so that what was a strong belief becomes uncertainty.

Then you need to do the opposite. You need to take the image of what you want to believe, such as that you will be free from this problem and happy and well in the future, and push this image out twenty feet, move it over and pull it up into the position and submodalities of your strong belief.

This allows you to change your beliefs and begin to believe in yourself and in a brighter future. When you have control over what you believe, you can start generating new, resourceful beliefs that help you to live happier and better than ever before. When you follow the steps to this exercise, you’ll find yourself with a plan that you can implement to help you change your expectations of the future.

The Belief Change Technique (Belief Swish Pattern)

1 Think of a limiting belief you no longer want to have. For example, that you will have your problem for the rest of your life, or for quite a while at least.

2 Think of a resourceful belief that you do want to have. For example, that you will be free from your problem for the rest of your life and live very happily.

3 Study the submoda lities of certainty and uncertainty that you have already elicited.

4 Imagine the limiting belief you want to get rid of firing off into the distance and snapping back into the submodalities of the uncertainty.

5 At the same time imagine the resourceful belief firing off into the distance and snapping back into the submodalities of the strong belief.

6 Repeat this a number of times, each time quickly.

Most problems that we face in life, as I have said already, happen in our minds. Furthermore, problems generally exist in our concept of the past and the future. The past and the future don’t exist except in our minds.

When people mentally suffer, they usually do so by feeling bad about the past, feeling stuck in the present, or feeling scared or worried about the future. In language, we talk about ‘getting over’ things and putting things ‘behind’ us. We talk about getting through what’s right in front of us. We talk about getting ‘to’ things and looking ‘forward to’ our future. For many, this is an indication of how they actually represent time. In order to change how we think about and process the past and the future, let’s explore the concept of timelines.