Personal Belief Systems
Personal Belief Systems
In the image you’ll see this under church or relegion mountain - but they’re different.
(I was going to group them together, but they should be seperate because relegion is a group belief, and while its personal to you - like everything we’re going to be talking about in this series - relegion comes from a value system outside yourself.)
So…
What is a personal belief system?
These are the stories we tell ourselves. We are in charge of these stories… everything from, “That’s scary,” to “I’m empowered!”
These are the stories that live in our brains and bodies. That’s right - our bodies tell stories. Its called body language. Some people would also include scars, tattoos and old injuries. The way we walk and move leaves imprints on our bones too. Plus our emotions live in the body, along with how our cultures taught us to interact.
I took a course on posture and how the people of the modern Western world move is completely different than societies that don’t have modern conveniences. Through this class I learned about movement, relaxation and how trauma is stored in the body preventing us from moving like our bodies were designed to. Its called primal posture, and its mostly taught by Esther Gokhale (pronounced Go-klay). Here’s a link - Gokhale Method®. Sometimes they offer free courses.
We are in charge of the stories that live in our brains and bodies. Other people may have started them in our early childhood, or ongoing life experiences, but ultimately we can decide if we want to keep these stories in our brains and bodies.
Getting them out through healing is challenging, but worth it if these stories are teaching you the wrong things, or impacting how you feel in a manner that isn’t good for you.
For instance, no one in Western culture wants to be told they’re fat - that’s a negative feeling. There are many cultures where fat is considered unhealthy. And there are many cultures where being fat is considered a status symbol and is respected, because it means you have more than enough to eat.
But hearing, “You’re fat,” is just a story. It may be true - or you just might have ready for this??? You may have…. human anatomy and internal organs.
I recently learned that the female model quality flat bellies are not healthy or normal, because most biological women have an internal organ called a uterus, and it creates a pillow of fat around it. And that’s totally healthy if you’re a biological female. Its not fat - its normal human anatomy. The models are the ones who are abnormal and many of them suffer from eating disorders, body image issues, and hormone disorders, because they’re still hearing a negative story around the word ‘fat.’
Stress is also a hormone called cortisol - and because fat was an ancient method of survival - when we’re stressed - we all pack on the pounds regardless of gender and anatomy. This is because human biology is ancient and all stress resembles being chased by a saber tooth tiger or starving to death if we don’t turn around and spear dinner.
Short version: Your stress is either an ancient mechanism of ‘I’m going to be eaten!’ - or ‘I’m going to eat the thing that wants to have me for dinner!’ Which is an awesome lesson in confronting our fear.
We’ll talk about how build our personal belief systems into better beliefs next week.
Again the four questions to ask are:
What stories are you listening to?
Who is in charge of those stories?
What do these stories teach you?
How do these stories make you feel?
Perpetual Disclaimer for this series:
I am not a counselor or a mental health professional. I am going to attempt to avoid things which will cause alarm or harm, but I can't know what will trigger each individual. If you need to speak to a mental health professional please know that there are resources available.
Your stories are amazing!
Chronic Writer
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