Positive rebellion against the societal mental conditioning

This is what Vincent Fong thoughtfully wrote about my last article titled:

A Promise Made To You Can Close Doors Of Endless Possibilities

(Read the Previous Article)

“We have less opportunity to condition our thinking than the pedagogy of our education and the influence of nurturing have.

It's likely those who can see opportunities are more likely to have been rebels in their youth who've resisted being hardwired to a way of normalized thinking that society expects.

We can of course unlearn behaviors.

It takes some effort obviously. The question is what and how does one stop being conditioned all over again when everything around us is designed to compel us to comply with expected norms?”

__Vincent Fong

The question Vincent is asking here is a critical one in a sense that our survival within a social contest depends on the answer.

Here I am going to reformulate his question using word-illustration with the example of disease. The question in my point of view will then be, “How do you experience true healing if everything around you is making you mentally believe that the way to survive is to be sick, and how do you maintain your healing, if you finally get healed, while everything around you is spreading the same virus that first got you sick?”

The answer is simple. You have to rebel—yet consciously. This rebellion is psychological more than anything. It does not require any physical attack on the system in place or any verbal debate to prove anyone wrong.

This rebellion is silent and I should say deeply spiritual. It’s called mindfulness or self-awareness.  Vincent said that “we can of course unlearn behaviors.” This is what I call the return to innocence. Jesus will call it becoming like children again. To achieve this goal one must develop a strong routine. Routine for what? For mindfulness.

For instance, ask yourself what you love doing the most. Let’s say that thing is singing. Now, the next question will be if you would like to make a career out of it.

The moment you ask yourself that second question, the voice of the mental conditioning will start speaking, “How is that going to work? What are you going to eat? Will that yield any income? Isn’t that a hobby? And so forth.”

You are getting these thoughts because the mental conditioning is more than a “brain-wash”. It’s actually a “brain-wiring”. There are neurons in your brain firing those thoughts and they have developed a relationship to hold those thoughts in place. These are called patterns. Until you break those neurological patterns, you cannot rebel properly.

So the routine is to set a time a side daily to become mindful of those thoughts, without fighting them, but simply seeing their irrational movement in your awareness using series of questions. Only with questions we build foundations. Only with foundations we establish things.

We don’t build anything assuming affirmative ideas. We strengthen instead with affirmative ideas. When answers are found from series of questions, we use those answers to create affirmative points to make our convictions strong.

Questions make us creative, explorative and innovative. And when we find answers from questions we erect foundations. So use questions to establish a neurological pattern for mindfulness to keep you aware of what is useful and necessary to you.

For example

·         Are there people out there who made a career out of what they love? YES

·         Are there people out there who are successful using their passion? YES

·         Are those people humans like me? YES

·         Have they faced challenges? YES

·         Did they survive? YES

·         Have they learned lessons? YES

·         Are those lessons available for me to have access to? YES

·         Is it possible that I can also reach my success following what I love? YES

·         Will I face challenges? YES

·         Add more questions from your own perspective

If you start practicing series of questions at least 20minutes daily and silently with full awareness, setting time aside for it, you will begin to create a reaction in the brain causing old neurological pattern to start losing their old relationship.

The brain does not know the difference between what you imagine and what you are doing. For that reason, you must begin to apply visualization to develop a new neurological patter for what you want to realize or accomplish. This is what completes the psychological silent rebellion. I just wrote from experience.

In my bedroom I have a vision board, a prayer box, a bible and books that teach on what I want to be and reach in life. When I wake up, I don’t go on my phone or to my email or start dealing with any human affairs. I pray, read and meditate on a bible verse that strengthens what I believe my purpose here on earth is and what I am ought to do to reach that purpose, then I step into my vision board seeing myself being and doing what I want to do, then I read a book. I am always on a book.

When you keep a routine for more than 28 days it will become a passion. But it must be a routine that support an intensive desire; because boring routines kill passion.

Through this practice you are actually transforming yourself by creating a filter in your brain using neurons to protect yourself against the social domestication, negative criticism, poisonous internal dialogues, strong suggestions and indoctrination.

Once the brain is supporting your mindset, you can maintain your idea and fulfill it.  The only challenge is, you have to learn to defeat procrastination, laziness and lack of consistency.

Written By:

Alain Dagba

Motivational Speaker | Life-Coach | Minister
Author of more than 100 books
Success eMagazine Editor
www.1happyliving.com