The Truth About Beliefs, Photos, Happiness and Wasting Time
The photos/photos'>photos were not ours – they were of a young girl’s birthday party.
I had left the memory stick with the photos/photos'>photo-shop and asked them to print them for me. We (mostly my son and daughter) had taken the photos while we were away during school holidays. We selected the ones we wanted to print and put them on the USB stick. But the package they gave me was the wrong one. I picked up the photos, paid and didn’t look at them. When I got home I realised they weren’t ours.
It struck me that how worthless these photos seemed to us and yet how valuable they would be to the person having the birthday. No one wants anyone else’s pictures. This seems so obvious when we look at physical photos.
Yet on a psychological level, we accept other people’s photos all the time – and live to regret it. We take other people’s pictures of reality and accept they must become part of our lives. We adopt our parents’ model of relationships; our mother’s fears about money; our brother’s attitude about sex; our boss’ view on our career; and so on, and on. And this leads you to do things you don’t really want to do – to set goals that are their goals, not yours. What a waste of time and effort!
The images that form your “picture of reality” have a huge impact on your use of time and your chances of being happy, healthy and feeling worthwhile.
I like the photo analogy because your mind thinks in images. Accepting these “images” (beliefs) is like downloading digital photos directly to your mind, without stopping to see if they are yours – just as I did at the photo shop.
Do you sometimes feel guilty? Pressured? Stressed? What beliefs (“images”) are these based on? Did you choose them? Who do they really belong to? DO THESE HELP YOU? Are these images of reality helping you achieve your goals and live your values? Keeping these beliefs wastes time and uses up energy.
Most people’s beliefs are fear-based and limiting. Yet you accept them into your own life and you start believe they are your own. If your are not careful, you pass them on to your children. Then you wonder why you, and the people you know, are stressed and time poor. All because you accepted ineffective or unhappy pictures that never belonged to you in the first place.
Contrary to what you may think, you CAN choose. You can CHOOSE your beliefs – like selecting your best photos. You can create happiness simply by focusing on and creating “happy pictures”. I have seen people make this change. Suddenly they have more time and energy. They feel happy.
Some of the beliefs that our client’s have unconsciously accepted include “real work is doing, not thinking” “being organised is anal
