I had a major breakthrough! It happened March 2015, but the exact date is long forgotten. I discovered something that completely changed my life.

Saying “changed my life” is a term that some people throw around. I have never done that. I take life-changing events seriously.

There comes a point in every badly adjusted person’s life when they start to introspect more than usual. I suspect this is in their early to mid 30’s.

At this point in time, all the right tools and resources to excel at the highest levels were in my possession.

The fact is I was excelling at a good level, but in my mind, it didn’t feel like that. Consequently, I was suffering in various ways. And it was beginning to affect my personal relationships.

What I felt was a feeling of being trapped. Trapped by fear, pain, low self-esteem, indecision, paranoia, anger, fits of rage, and violent tendencies.

It was turning into a classic head case. Without a solution, I would have become insane by the age of 50.

I came to the conclusion that something was wrong with me. But I did not understand what it was.

Determined to find out what was going on, I started searching online but had no clue what I was looking for.

Then something told me to visit Steve Pavlina’s blog again. Many years ago I learned important lessons from Steve about the value of my time.

His articles changed life for me. Shortly after reading Steve’s Blog back in the day, I started freelancing full time. So I trusted his advice for some reason.

At the bottom of Steve’s home page, I found a link to an article about a man named Morty Lefkoe and a special technique he had developed. It was a cognitive psychology program (I think).

At first, it was a bit confusing. I had no idea what this guy was talking about. But I trusted Steve and knew he would not waste his readers time to recommend nonsense.

It would turn out to be the most important discovery of my life. I did Mr. Lefkoe’s free courses and everything changed for me.

The program was a method that helped a person eliminate negative and self-limiting beliefs from their mind.

Now before you start thinking this sounds like a lead in for a self-help product, you would be mistaken. I have nothing to sell with this article. I just needed to share this with you.

Beliefs are who we are. These things shape our personality and character. I would go so far to say, it changes the way our brain operates.

This was certainly the case for me. I thought I had a handle on life. But by thirty-four years of age, I knew something was wrong. Turns out I was suffering from depression, anxiety, paranoia, anger, and a few other more subtle disorders.

The psychological therapy I found is called the Lefkoe Method, after the man who discovered and developed it.

When trying to explain this to family and friends, there’s only skepticism. It turns out most people don’t think a person can change immediately.

I don’t blame them. Who has ever said “stop believing things” as a mental health remedy?

Three independent scientific studies have proven the Lefkoe Method is effective in altering a person’s mind from negative to positive.

We spend our entire lives acquiring beliefs. The positions we take, and with no deviations, are directly rooted in religion, relationships, trauma, and many other aspects of our lives.

Many beliefs are positive and enhance us to the point of being civilized beings. There are negative beliefs also. We progress in various endeavors because of negative beliefs, so they have their uses.

Many beliefs do not help us attain true peace and happiness, unfortunately.

These beliefs are self-limiting, and work against the person, the family, and the greater community. In fact, one man’s negative beliefs can affect the entire world and result in the loss of millions of lives.

That’s how powerful beliefs are. They affect our attitudes about ourselves, other people, animals, events, and anything else we can form beliefs about.

Why beliefs are like survival fuel.

I’ve been observing the people I interact with. I’m beginning to think most people have a tendency to think negatively about other people, animals, random events, and more.

This is probably a survival trigger. Trusting people who eventually betray you is something most of us have dealt with.

Trusting animals that will kill and eat you is just foolish – so we do it much less.

Thinking future events will happen based on past events is probably the brain’s way of dealing with the general danger that exists in our world.

Therefore, I understand why we humans think in a certain way. The problem is, we are most often not in a fight for survival.

What Causes Negative Beliefs to develop.

We fight to attain more than others or attain things that have more perceived value. We fight for position and status. We fight for anything.

Why do we do these things in the first place? Negative beliefs are why. According to Mr. Lefkoe, past events in your life is where beliefs are first formed.

Back then is when we start developing a negative perception of ourselves, or others. We make conclusions or interpret events in a way that often does not serve us best.

These thoughts about ourselves develop over time and become subconscious.They become ingrained in our personality.

Overcoming these core falsehoods now becomes our minds primary work. For example, a person may feel inadequate in many ways. The minds natural defense against this is often to manifest intolerance, anger, distrust, jealousy, overconfidence, machoism, bullyism, fear, doubt, regret, physical and emotional pain, addiction, and more.

They are the reasons we develop anxiety, rage, frustration, paranoia, depression, hatred, and fear.

What are these beliefs? Why do they have such a big impact on our lives?

Well here they are:

BELIEF # 1: I’M NOT GOOD ENOUGH
“I’m not good enough” is one of the most common negative belief people have. Like many others, this one often exists in the subconscious.

This belief prevents us from achieving what we truly want or are capable of. It usually starts when our parents constantly tell us we did something wrong.

Now, this is not to place the blame on our parents or anywhere else for that matter. Parents were once children, and they too developed negative beliefs that lead to the disorders I mentioned before.

BELIEF # 2: MONEY IS EVIL OR LUCKY
“Money is Evil” is a belief many people share. It’s not something I can personally speak to, I never really developed this belief. I’ve always wanted to save the world with my imagined wealth.

Unfortunately, many people do not think in this way. Some people connect money with greed, theft, lying, and general evil. They think people are either born lucky, got lucky, or did something bad in order to achieve their wealth.

In some cases, they think people become evil when they get rich. They think people change because of money. They might feel this way because the rich people become isolated, hard to reach, expensive to book, dismissive to strangers, and old acquaintances, and making controversial business decisions.

BELIEF # 3: I WILL NEVER BE SUCCESSFUL
“I will or cannot ever be successful” is often expressed verbally in frustration when we cannot get the results we want from a particular project. It’s a negative belief that exists both subconsciously and consciously.

Almost everyone thinks they cannot be successful in something – perhaps an athlete interested in public office, or a 50-year-old Doctor from India dancing Hip Hop at his daughter’s sweet 16.

But when someone has a general sense of inability to succeed at anything they were serious about, this is a negative belief that is holding that person back from trying.

BELIEF # 4: I’M NOT IMPORTANT (ENOUGH)
“I’m not that important” is a belief that again I feel most people have.

This belief often manifests itself when a person has to do something bold, like speak to the boss, or ask the manager for a refund.

An example of where this belief can come from is when a child tries to get a parents attention, only to be told they must wait while the parent finishes doing something – often a useless conversation with someone who is not a great friend. A child may think they are not that important because the other person is getting preferential treatment.

Sometimes it happens with siblings, where one is passed over for any number of reason for another. There are literally countless events in our lives where we can feel unimportant.

It’s when this becomes a general mindset that we are in trouble. We may not reach our full potential because we don’t feel like we have the juice to pull it off.

BELIEF # 5: I’M POWERLESS ( NOT IN CONTROL )

This is a very strong belief. It manifests in the subconscious. Many seemingly normal people have this belief.

The person who feels powerless often refuses to believe they can make a difference. They are often cowards in the face of adversity, and it can be seen in full bloom with rebellious teenagers.

The person who abuses drugs or alcohol often does so as a way to retake control of their lives. How that mechanism manifest in the brain is beyond this article.

How to Prevent the development of Negative Beliefs.

In his program, Mr. Lefkoe also administers something called the Lefkoe Freedom Course. In this course, he outlines the series of thoughts one must use in order to not develop negative beliefs.

This train of thought becomes a state of mind or state of being. It’s arguable that this is true freedom.

Here is the summary; events have no meaning, and words have no meaning. Anything that happens to us has no inherent meaning.

Human beings attach meaning to events, words (sounds), and anything we can observe with our senses as a survival trigger in our brains.

For example, if it’s raining outside, and you had no intention of going outside at this moment, does the rain matter to you?

What if it was Monday morning, and you have to go to work? Does the rain matter now? What does this rain mean for you today?

The rain itself has no meaning. It’s just something that happens in our environment on earth. We can explain it with science, religion, or aliens, the fact remains, it’s simply an occurring of something.

While rain is only traumatic during a big family event like a wedding, and we are unlikely to develop long-term negative beliefs about rain (actually I’m not so sure about that), this example only illustrates the mind frame we end up in because we give events meaning.

Conclusion

While beliefs are often good, many hold us back from being our true selves. Negative beliefs eventually cause depression, anxiety, anger, addiction, and a host of other mental challenges.

Using cognitive psychological therapy, like the Morty Lefkoe program, I was able to break free of these beliefs.

I’m good enough to achieve anything – it’s only a matter of what meets my fundamental objectives, intellectual aptitude, and personal interests.

I’m important always. Even if I’m just an observer, I matter. Even if my job is small or short, I matter. My voice is always heard. My pain can be felt. And I’m able to make the difference when a struggle is upon us.

Money is what I use to improve the lives of my family members and my own. With a better life, they are able to pursue more philosophical and spiritual goals. Which ultimately helps them get closer to enlightenment.

Find your negative beliefs, complete the program or similar program I did, and change how your mind works, the thoughts that develop, and your overall peace of mind.

Today, I have no depression. Literally, truly, it is gone. I needed no medication. Maybe some traumatic event in the future may cause it to resurface, but I suspect that will be temporary.

I do not suffer from prolonged anxiety. Most challenging situations today give me almost no anxiety.

I don’t care about the exact date I started becoming mentally well. It’s meaningless. What’s important is that the chains that held me down, are gone. And I have been given a powerful weapon in the fight against mental illness.