Liberate Your Story Podcast

You’ve heard of hypnosis right? That word comes with all kinds of pre-assumed ideas. But it’s simply accepting a suggestion. A pretty simple definition for such a mysterious, even magical feeling, word. You’ve seen the stage performances of hypnosis where people are placed in trance states and then told to do silly things like clucking like a chicken. We are either highly entertained or at the least very curious as to how this happens or if it's real. The reality is that we are experiencing various levels of trance states all day, every day. There are three levels of trance in hypnosis as described by the LeCron–Bordeaux depth scale. Light. Medium and Deep trance. Let me give you a few examples and then I’ll explain why I’m talking about trance and hypnosis in the first place.

In light trance, you will experience things like lethargy, relaxation, eye or arm catalepsy, catalepsy of isolated muscle groups, and/or a heavy or floating feeling.
In medium trance, you would experience things like Rapport, smell and taste changes, number blocks, parietal amnesia, amnesia, automatic movements (accepting a suggestion to do something), and hallucinations.
In deep trance, you would experience hallucinations (positive or negative), bizarre post-hypnotic suggestions, anesthesia (blocked sensation), comatose, sleepwalking, and…here it is…belief systems.

Our belief systems are deep trance. Why? Because they are suggestions we have accepted and so deeply integrated into our subconscious that they literally tell us how to be, what to do and how to think each day, all day.

How does that make you feel? When I learned this it was a big “YES! That’s it!”

Let me explain. When I was in grade school, I lived in a neighborhood known as the Alma Fourth Ward. I wasn’t Morman, but nearly all of my neighbors were. There was a strong sense of community, routine, and morality. Sundays were sacred church days. Mondays none of the kids could play because it was Family Home Evening. It was a cultural and religious experience every day living in this little neighborhood. Since I wasn’t a Mormon, I had lots of conversations with my Mormon friends about our religious differences and practices. I think both of us were generally interested in understanding how someone could see the world and eternity so differently. There was one question I had in the secret of my own thoughts, though. I was incredibly devout to my faith, but I couldn’t help but wonder if I had been born into a Mormon family, would I be Mormon? How would I know to believe something else or that it was the right or the wrong belief to have? Was I only a Christian because I was born into it just like my Mormon friends were born into Mormonism? Now that is one profoundly smart 10-year-old, right?! I can’t tell you how many times I have revisited these young questions of my heart. I think we ask them for a reason and we keep asking them until we have an answer.

This is how powerful our belief systems are. How we are taught to experience the world, navigate our emotions and develop our practices for being human are the result of accepting suggestions from those we trust. Without this powerful experience, we wouldn’t learn our customs and social practices. This isn’t a bad thing at all! In fact, it's quite necessary to help us navigate being human.

Where it gets sticky is when we come to some kind of conflict with our belief practices. Maybe we don’t agree with a tenant of our system or a particular practice no longer results in positive outcomes or at the least, outcomes we want. Since our belief systems are so deeply embedded or, I like the word entwined, with who we are it's often very difficult to see where our belief system stops and we begin. Don’t get me wrong here. Beliefs are very important. Even if we don’t want a belief system, we have one. You have beliefs about how to get a job, how to spend your money, whether you will buy a car or use public transportation, whether you will eat plants or meat, or both. You see, you are FULL of your belief systems. You just may not notice them until your belief system comes into conflict with your values. And if your values evolve over time, then your conflict with your belief systems likely grows as well.

The great illusion about belief systems is that they are hard, fast and the only true one. This illusion is powerful. It keeps our learning confined to a small box. It keeps us asking questions within the system rather than outside the system. It keeps our experiences limited to only the practices or culture of that system. The great illusion keeps us small.

Consider your belief system the guiding force in your life. If your belief system involves a deity, then you might think that God is your guiding force. But actually, it's your belief that a God exists that is your guiding force. If you stopped believing God existed then you would no longer be guided by God. You will be guided by a new belief system. What you believe about God within your belief system decides your practices, but it isn’t actually your guiding force. This will mess with you a bit. But consider how many belief systems believe in “God”, and even use the same name for God. And yet how vastly different the practices of those belief systems are. It would be impossible then to say that God is the guiding force unless you are willing to push this detail aside and claim that YOUR belief system has the one true God. And there we have the endless circle of debate that has the world fighting wars against each other. A little side note here….when we move into the realm of proving our own belief system to be the one and only true belief system, we have then created the parameters, the box, in which we will stop expanding and learning. That, too, is a choice within your system of beliefs.

So what power do we have in the deep trance state of our belief systems? The power we DO have is that we can change what beliefs we live by. My new approach, after decades in one primary type of belief system, is to let it all in. And if you come from the Evangelical Christian belief system, that’s not how it's done. That’s even dangerous! You might just learn yourself right out of your beliefs about God.

But what if dangerous was actually living with one small perspective and never expanding? What if dangerous was living in agenda to defend at all costs the belief system you have acquired? What if dangerous was living in captivity to a small worldview and small life experience? What if dangerous was holding onto a belief system that hurt myself or others?

That kind of dangerous was something I no longer wanted to live within. The security I was offered by my belief system was no longer safe for me or others. It was no longer offering me the security of life lived vividly now. I wanted to liberate myself from the box that had gotten really cramped. My questions had filled it up to overflowing. I was finding myself outgrowing what once grew me up. And that, my friend, is a really good thing! Outgrowing your belief system isn’t about you being immoral and faithless. It’s about you being absolutely completely normal. It’s about you seeing growth as a necessary part of your humanity and moving in flow towards more learnings! It’s you liberating from a story that can no longer contain you! It might be time to accept new suggestions, new learnings for your deep trance state.

Liberate your belief system and you liberate your story!