5 Easy Steps to Get from Where you Are to Where You Want to Be

How do we go from where we are to where we want to be?

Let’s say, hypothetically of course, you are a late-night eater. You have ten pounds you keep dreaming about losing and know that if you could give up those evening treats you would find success.

Every night after dinner you make your way to the kitchen for “just a little snack.”   

You have tried various methods to deter yourself from indulging, but without a doubt, you succumb to the will of your desire. 

What if I told you that this wasn’t entirely your fault? That there is much more at work here than willpower. 

You see your brain spends 40% of its time on auto-pilot, being driven by habits. 

In order to get a grasp on our habits, we must determine the cue and underlying reward behind them. 

Once this is determined, we can identify the belief behind the reward.

I’ll walk you through an example.

Let’s say every night after getting the kids ready for bed, you head to the kitchen for a snack.  You eat your snack in the quiet kitchen and feel a sense of peace.

In this situation the cue is getting everyone ready for bed, the reward is a feeling of peace. 

Upon examining the reward, you find that it is accompanied with the belief “my late-night snack brings me peace.”

When we become aware of our thoughts and take action to change them, we engage in liminal thinking. 

Dave Grey, author of Liminal Thinking would say when we become aware of our thoughts, we are in a liminal state.  This is the space in-between of conscious and subconscious thinking.

Grey explains that we have two minds. Our current state of being and where we want to be. 

To get to the new state of being we don’t shame or judge our current state.  We educate and lead it to our desired destination.  

By doing this we can get to a place of triangulation, where we can see our situation from multiple viewpoints, take objective action, and create a more productive thought.

From here we can evaluate whether it is the snack that it is creating that sense of peace, or is it just some time alone. 

Chances are that it is the time alone that is creating the reward. With this understanding, we change the belief.

New belief = “Getting some alone time brings me peace.”

Finally, we can take action and replace the late-night snack with a few minutes of meditation or a walk by yourself. 

Now it’s your turn.  Follow the steps to get from where you are to where you want to be.

1.       Answer the following questions

Where are you now?

Where do you want to be?

What actions/ habits are interfering with that?

2.       Use the Habit Analysis Guide that I have created to help you identify the cue and reward behind your habit.

3.       Now that you know the reward, identify the underlying belief. What is the thought that accompanies that rewards?

4.        Deconstruct and change that belief by asking “Is this true?”

If not, “what is true?” Your answer is your new belief.

5.       Now you can act on your new belief. 

Need some guidance?

Schedule a free consultation and we’ll break down your habits and much more.  

If you are not where you want to be, take one small action every day to change that. 

You’re too precious to not live in your light.

In love and health,

Meghan