Reprogram the mind to change unwanted habits
The secret of self-transformation: how to change our behavior step by step.
Have you ever tried to change a behavior or habit, only to find yourself disappointed and dissatisfied when you were unsuccessful?
Don’t worry, you are not alone, I was one of you; He had undisciplined eating habits. Fortunately, I was able to change these habits when I learned the secrets to making a positive change.
I want to share these secrets with you, so that you can apply these transformational techniques to some of the habits you may want to change, like smoking, dieting, even negative thought patterns, and any other undesirable behavior.
Most of the time, changing a habit (self-transformation) is not a quick fix. It requires reprogramming of the mind, which takes place in the subconscious part of the mind.
Therefore, it is important to understand the function and process of the mind, especially the subconscious mind.
The human mind has three parts: the conscious mind, the subconscious mind, and the superconscious mind.
The conscious mind is responsible for logic, reasoning, and all conscious voluntary action, such as reading, listening, writing, speaking, etc.
Everything we learn for the first time is also an action of the conscious mind.
The information we receive by reading, listening and learning will be registered in our subconscious mind, the second part of the mind.
Therefore, we must be very careful about our actions, which will program our subconscious mind and also determine our attitude and the quality of our life. It’s like a chain reaction or a domino effect. If we always think that negative things will happen, this will cloud our judgment and everything that happens will seem negative. People get used to thinking, “Why does this always happen to me? Why do I deserve this?” However, it is the way our conscious mind perceives the situation that creates the negativity and keeps us in a cycle of negative thoughts and missed opportunities.
The conscious mind is the gateway to the subconscious mind.
The subconscious mind is the mind of imagination. It is a storehouse of our learned behavior, beliefs, feelings, and memories.
It is like a disk with our old data/information sanskaras. It is responsible for all our involuntary actions, heartbeat, respiratory rate, etc.
Based on the information stored by previous actions, we automatically respond and do things without thinking about them (automatic responses).
For example, when we first learned to drive a car, we had to consciously think about where to put each foot and how to use each new control. As we develop our driving skills, our subconscious mind takes over and we become so proficient that we can drive, navigate, listen to music and also talk on the phone at the same time.
The language of the subconscious mind is feelings (pain, pleasure, heat, cold), emotions (anger, frustration, happiness, sadness) and images.
Our subconscious mind cannot distinguish between thoughts created by physical events or imaginary events. It does not have the power to reason and analyze. Interpret our thoughts literally.
The subconscious mind is the gateway to the superconscious mind.
The superconscious mind is the third part of the mind.
It is the spiritual part of the mind. It is also called Supreme Power/Energy, God, Almighty, Higher Mind, Higher Self, Higher Intelligence, Universal Intelligence, Universal Mind, Universal Consciousness, Supreme Consciousness, Brahman and more… The scientific community refers to it as “The Field” or “Infinite field of inner potential”.
It doesn’t matter what label you give it; what really matters is that this is the only force that both science and spirituality have recognized as the master mind of all creations in the universe.
It has the power to create any conceivable result.
It has no borders or limitations in its power to create, from the infinitely large to the infinitely small, from the microscopic to the largest in the universe. It is described as follows:
• It is made up of all things in the past, present and future.
• It is omniscient and omnipresent.
• It encompasses all things, both the seen and the unseen.
• From the emotional perspective, the superconscious mind contains all the feelings and emotions such as love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness and self-control, as well as fear, sadness , confusion, anger, greed and resentment. . It consists of the entire individual consciousness.
Both parts of the mind, conscious and subconscious, work together to establish the connection with the superconscious mind, which is the ultimate source of unlimited power.
When the conscious and subconscious minds have some conflict, then the superconscious mind resolves the conflict, brings harmony and takes care of all the good things that we seek in our life.
Once we understand the function of the subconscious mind, we can also understand why we behave differently. We can’t change because we are stuck in old ways and our subconscious mind doesn’t know how to change.
Change process:
The process requires all three parts of the mind. Therefore,
• Act with awareness and conscious efforts. This is the function of the conscious mind.
• Take action on the subconscious mind with positive feelings: Change has to occur on the subconscious level regarding one’s behavior or habits, unwanted emotions or feelings. It can only be changed through subconscious programming, through meditation, sending autosuggestions, and creative visualization to the subconscious mind. This must be done in a very relaxed state of mind.
Seven steps to make a change:
1. Know the change you want to make or the habit you want to change (ask yourself what behavior, emotions and feelings I want to change or what I want to do differently: make a list). Make the commitment to change. For example, I became aware of my unhealthy eating habits and made a conscious decision to change them.
2. Make conscious efforts to change and support it with action and practice it throughout the day. Replace a negative activity or thought with a positive one. This will also change your “auto-response”. When I decided to change my eating habits, I made a conscious effort to change by creating a meal schedule and a list of the foods I could eat each day.
3. Relax your body (Yoga, Pranayama-Breathing exercises).
4. Relax your mind and meditate. Meditate when you don’t know what else to do. I used meditation techniques when I had a craving for certain foods.
5. Give messages or affirmations to your subconscious mind for the change you want to make within yourself. Affirmations should be in positive and not negative terms. For example: I will eat healthy food vs. I will not eat junk food; I will get up early in the morning vs. I won’t sleep late; I will do yoga and meditation every morning, etc.
6. Pray to the Higher Power and thank Him for His guidance and help, and let yourself go…
7. Self-introspection, self-assessment and practice
Keep practicing until you’ve achieved the change you want to make (a 30-day daily spiritual planner can be downloaded to help you with this process and keep you on track).
Taking actions with awareness at a conscious level will bring slow and temporary change, however, combined with relaxation, meditation, affirmation (positive and motivating messages) and prayers will bring faster and more lasting change.
Here both parts of the mind, conscious and subconscious are the part of the body (science-matter) and the Super-Consciousness is Supreme Energy (Spiritual Mind).
The change begins in Conscious Mind → Subconscious Mind → Superconscious Mind (spiritual mind)
Lastly, be patient because habit transformation is not a quick fix but rather a slow, steady, gradual process.
As Lord Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita,
“One attains peace and tranquility of mind little by little through practice.”