We all have moments (ahem, days) when we feel that we are not our best selves, that we have failed ourselves. Our confidence abandons us and we wonder why we started doubting ourselves in the first place.
It happens to all of us. Even to celebrities and CEOs of billion dollar companies.
And what’s interesting is that all of our self-doubts are rooted in this one thing. Marisa Peer shares it in this talk from A-Fest above.
Marisa is an outstanding revolutionary mind (and believe me, we’ve seen quite a few). Not only is she a best-selling author and a life-changing motivational speaker, but she has been voted Britain’s #1 Therapist and the best speaker at Mindvalley’s A-Fest.
Among numerous other impressive achievements, she has spent decades working with some of the world’s top celebrities, Olympic athletes, CEOs, and even royalty.
We know what you’re thinking: “She must do something different…”
Indeed, she does. A client will have a therapist for months, with no results; perhaps, with negative results. However, Marisa Peer will meet with a client and completely change their life around in a matter of minutes.
So, yes, we could call her brilliantly unconventional.
Many therapists focus on all of the intricate details of the mind and it’s an array of complications, attempting to diagnose one small problem at a time.
Marisa Peer, on the other hand, looks at the mind’s most basic principles. As well, she cuts to the very root of the problem and heals people, without medication — for life.
In this utterly transformative and highly engaging A-Fest talk above, Marisa Peer discusses, in easy-to-understand language and with heartfelt stories, these basic principles of the mind and the simple root cause of humanity’s biggest problems.
Compulsiveness, obesity, manic depression, bipolar disorder, disconnectedness, anger… All of these and so much more can be cured… Not with loads of pharmaceutical pills (that just mask the symptoms), but by a simple understanding of the root of the problem.
Since Marisa Peer is passionate about getting to the point, she believes that the whole psychiatrist talks about “how does that make you feel?” is a waste a time. To this, she proclaims, “Stop doing that s***! Go straight to what’s wrong with them. It doesn’t matter how they feel — they don’t feel like they are enough!”
With this, the common denominator of most of our problems is that we don’t feel like we are enough: smart enough, pretty enough, talented enough, wealthy enough, lovable enough… You get the point.
Changing the world is a big task, but I want to change people. The way to change them is by making them feel they are enough.
Marisa Peer
So, rather can prescribing lab-made chemicals to feed the brain every day, Marisa Peer feeds it 3 magical words:
I am enough.
Yep, that’s it. That’s all you really have to understand — that you are enough. This is the cure for almost all of our emotional problems.
With that being said, there are 3 simple principles that Marisa Peer wants us all to understand about the mind. These principles are:
- Your mind loves what is familiar.
- Your mind responds to what you tell it.
- You can change what you tell it!
1. Your Mind Loves What Is Familiar
This ability to love and crave familiarity instinctively comes from our tribal days; biologically, it makes sense. However, when it comes to making changes in our lives, how do we work with this principle?
We must simply learn how to re-train our minds to make the unfamiliar familiar and the familiar unfamiliar. While this may sound confusing, it’s actually quite simple: you must focus your attention to the you that you want to become.
You must tell a new story about you to yourself — tell a story of the person you wish to become.
Every time you feel those negative, familiar thoughts start to creep in, redirect them toward the person you are becoming — not the person you used to be.
Soon, because our brains love habit and crave familiarity, these new thoughts will become a habit and familiar.
In her talk, Marisa Peer uses a fantastic example of people dieting. She said that people will go through heaps of work and training to lose weight, and they do! However, immediately after a weigh in, they will celebrate with something like… Pizza.
Why? Because pizza is familiar to them. In this case, they should train their brain to, instead of thinking of the familiar (pizza), think of how good they will look when they are thin — they should fixate on that. They should start thinking of how much it delights them to eat healthy food; how much they adore that feeling of being thin and good to their bodies.
Once this adjustment in thinking happens more regularly, our brains begin thinking, “Oh yeah, I get that!” and will start making this unfamiliar habit of eating healthy familiar; and the familiar habit of eating unhealthy unfamiliar.
2. Your Mind Responds to What You Tell It
Now, understanding this principle is how Marisa Peer gets supposedly infertile 40-year-old women to become pregnant. Yes, you read that right.
All Marisa does is understand these simple principles of the brain — you tell your mind it is infertile and that you cannot have babies, and it will be. Do the opposite, and that becomes true as well.
You just need to choose the right “manta”.
It can either work wonders or horrors. Good or bad, your mind listens to what you tell it. If you say, I’m horrible at this, your mind accepts it. If you say, I’m phenomenal at this, your mind accepts as well.
So make sure you pay attention to your inner dialogue and start feeding your mind with statements that serve you and move you forward.
If your inner critique starts doubting, just change it to something it can believe. For example, every day I’m getting more and more confident.
3. You Can Change What You Tell Your Mind
This is where you get to take the wheel. You are in charge of, and fully responsible for, what you tell your mind… You can tell it anything you want!
However, did you know that what commonly makes us feel the most depressed is our own self-talk — our own self-criticism? Did you know that, for the most part, we tend to reject praise and inject criticism? This is because, unfortunately, criticism is much more familiar to our minds.
But wait — did you also know that your own praise is far more effective than someone else’s? It certainly is. How many times have you been reluctant to receive a compliment because you didn’t believe it, yourself? For all of this, it is so important to begin praising yourself for the things you wish to hear from others.
Tell your mind a new story and it will respond accordingly.
Praise yourself by saying things such as:
- I am a good daughter/son.
- I am clever.
- I am a loving and admirable friend.
- I am impressive.
- I am bold, daring, and creative.
Of all the things you tell yourself, though, remember to tell yourself this (and really feel its truth):
“I am enough. I’ve always been enough. Now that I know that I am enough, everyone else knows it, too. I will always be enough.”
As you begin to maneuver through and understand these 3 principles, Marisa Peer insists that you always do these three things:
- Make anything that is negative unfamiliar.
- Make anything that is positive familiar.
- Use the words “I am enough” as often as you can (write them on your mirror, refrigerator, arm, everywhere!).
She explains how in her A-Fest talk.
And remember, you are always, always, always, enough of enough.
Join the movement and write it on your mirror so that you can see it every single day. Share a picture with us on Instagram with #IamEnough.
If you had a magic wand that could change your own beliefs in any way, what would you use it for?
