Most of live our lives in a hypnotic trance state, without questioning the beliefs we walk around with and live our lives by every day. Eldon Taylor, in an interview I did with him several years ago, said that when we watch television we are hypnotized within the first 3 minutes of watching and that it is impossible for us to avoid it. Once we are in that hypnotic state we are much more susceptible to suggestions that are made to us.
I believe, that we are also in that same state when we are listening to music and jingles or riddles. The reason I believe that is that we often find ourselves singing the songs or repeating the jingle or riddle for no apparent reason. So, today I am sharing a story and a few songs and riddles that have run my life, in the hopes that my story will inspire you to look deeper and become more aware of what is going on in your head on autopilot.
I was having a conversation with a friend and healer recently about an incident of being light headed and finding it hard to breath, when I started to get some severe upper abdominal pain that I realized was from my gallbladder. According to Louise Hay’s book “Heal Your Body” gall stones are related to “Bitterness. Hard thoughts. Condemning. Pride.” My initial interpretation before looking at Louise’s book was what is galling me / irritating me? My friend immediate asked me what would seem like a simple enough question. “What do you remember about your birth”? My initial thought was, what does my birth have to do with this. I then immediately started crying as I told her that when I was born the doctors could not get me to breath, so they instructed my mother to fill her checks with a breathe and gently and slowly puff it into my mouth. I immediately started breathing. To me the tears were representative of the closeness I always felt with my mother, but my friend pushed harder, suggesting that I look at, what she called the Shadow Side, which was “I don’t have what it takes to be on my own”.
I said I would consider that thought, but told her that I didn’t think it quite fit. I’ve learned to never take something another friend or healer suggests as fact, but I definitely take it into consideration. I also believe that anything that someone says to me, could be something I should consider and I try not to say, Oh, I’ve already looked at that or considered that. In other words anything presented to me is not dismissed until I take a moment or more to explore whether it is something I need to look at or not. If you are working with a healer, I strongly advise you to do the same and I advise my clients to do the same as well. You never know what insights might come out of what they said that may be quite different though than what they said, in fact it could be the exact opposite, which was my case.
Shortly after we hung up the phone, I was continuing to do energy work to heal my gall bladder and considering what she shared as well as whether there was anything irritating me, when the Helen Reddy song, I am Woman, started playing in my head. At first, I have to admit, I just ignored it until suddenly it hit me. My entire life has been about “I can do anything, I am strong, I am invincible, I am woman”. Notice how I say I can do anything, while the lyrics are If I have to I can do anything. Well, I never paid attention to that lead in. In looking even deeper, while in a meditative state, I heard the doctor at my birth say: “She’s breathing on her own, she doesn’t need any more help.”
In looking even deeper, my pattern has been to “Show People, I can do anything”, “I got it” or “I can handle it”, “I don’t need any help”. My entire life I have been very self-sufficient and yet lately I’ve been asking for a partner to work with me and support me with my business, so I can reach more people. So, my desire to receive help and support was the opposite of my lifelong patterns and beliefs and so I triggered the Gall Bladder issue, as well as the shortness of breath issue. When looking closer at what my friend had said, I realized my issue was the polar opposite of what she had said. That’s when I realized that frequently we only look at the “Shadow Side”, a negative belief, and yet, sometimes what may seem very positive, when out of balance, can be just as devastating and can cause just as much havoc in our lives or even an ailment. In my case instead of I don’t have what it takes to be on my own, my belief was I can do anything, I don’t need any help and I had taken that too far. We need balance in our lives. My desire to have a partner in my business had triggered all of this, because if I don’t change the pattern, I can’t attract that which my beliefs don’t support.
So back to the topic of this post, of jingles and song lyrics. You can see that I had the I am Woman song lyics playing in my head and supporting me to the point that I had taken it out of balance causing a negative impact in my life. There are many songs and even children’s stories that we can take on as beliefs, that run our lives, until we stop and question them and make decisions to change them.
Let me give you a few more examples.
“Early to Bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise”. It seems simple enough and for many of us it makes sense and we do go to bed early, we get up early and we are successful. In fact that was the case for me for my entire career in the corporate world. When I left that world, I had managed to put away over $1,000, 000 and was debt free. At the same time I decided to leave that world, I also made a promise to myself that I would not be tied to a schedule or live by the clock. I got into a pattern of going to bed late, sometime as late as 3AM in the morning. Although, I don’t sleep in all that late, with 9AM being the latest, I am definitely not getting up at 5:30AM, like I did when I was employed in the corporate world. So, with that belief in place, imagine what that did to my finances. Yep, I lost everything because I wasn’t paying attention to my beliefs and the common sayings that I had playing in my head 24 x 7, unconsciously.
With this particular issue, I had 2 choices as I saw it, I could 1) Change my sleep pattern or 2) change my belief. I decided to change my belief. What I found fascinating in the process of considering a new belief was that the old belief was still playing, not because I hadn’t done the work to change it, but because I have lived my life hypnotized with that belief and because saying that rhyme was hard to stop. So, I finally came up with a belief that can replace the entire rhyme while changing my belief to support my desire to go to bed when I want to and get up when I want to and yet still be healthy, wealthy and wise. So, here are a few different versions.
Go to bed when I say and wake up when I may and I am happy, healthy and wealthy all day
Go to bed when I say and wake up when I may and I am healthy, wealthy and gay.
Go to bed when I may and wake up when I may makes me healthy wealthy and wise.
Songs and Depression
I had a friend who was quite deeply depressed, living with me, when I started hearing him singing the lyrics to the song, Mad World, and in particular the following lyrics.
I find it kinda funny and I find it kinda sad, that the dreams in which I’m dying are the best I ever have.
After hearing them over and over, I suddenly found them playing in my head as well. I realized how quickly we can be hypnotized and caught up in to lyrics like these, and I also decided I needed to find a way to change what was playing in my head. The problem was that he was still there singing these negative lyrics, so I found it more effective to come up something that went to the same tune. Here’s what I came up with.
I find it kinda funny and I find I’m really glad that the dreams in which I’m flying at the worst I ever have.
I have to tell you singing that lyric in front of him, drove him a little mad, but he stopped singing the song and I actually like my version, so I occasionally sing it for fun.
My point here is that we are hypnotized without even being aware of it, by simple sayings that we heard as children, or songs we hear, even children’s rhymes or simple children’s stories and if we don’t wake ourselves up and question those beliefs,question the mind-chatter and lyrics that we are continually playing in our heads or even out loud, then we are allowing ourselves to run on auto pilot
What songs, rhymes, or sayings do you have that are running your life? Please share in the comments box below and I’ll give you my thoughts or ideas on how you might change them in a fun way. I also encourage everyone to chime in with your ideas as well. Let’s make this fun, a learning experience and helpful.
Jagdish – thank you for sharing your wise words of wisdom!
Human thoughts are responsible for all mischiefs. No thoughts is Meditation. Be positive in each and every walk of life. Self confidence is plays an important role.We all are in search of peace. But our mind is always chattering and chattering. It is it’s nature and habbit.To understand the life, world and religions.In short.The human thoughts have created all religions. So conflicts which ends in wars.
There is no religion higher than TRUTH. We are human beings and so humanity is the only religion. Be Good and Do Good. Kindness is the language which a blind can see and deaf can hear. When the heart is pure and mind is clear than God is near. When the ego is zero you are the real hero. Live in present with full choiceless awareness and enjoy each moment.