The Lefkoe Institute

(http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/marty_lefkoe_headshots_053_2-01_edit_235-150x150.jpg) We all know people who are “victims”—people who view their lives through the filter: “It’s not my fault. They (or it) did it to me.”  When you understand what the feeling of victimization really is, where it comes from, and how it affects people, you will discover it is even more widespread and debilitating than you might think. The primary source of feeling like a victim is the feeling of powerlessness and, because we don’t like feeling that we are powerless, we tend to blame someone or something for causing that feeling. So we feel that we are a victim of circumstances or other people’s actions and we can’t do anything about it. Being a victim is experiencing yourself at the effect of something outside yourself. (http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/Photo-for-102610-blog-post-victim-271x300.jpg)   Photo credit: jillallyn   Thus the single most important belief responsible for the feeling of victimization is I’m powerless. Other beliefs that could underlie this feeling include: I’ll never get what I want, People can’t be trusted, and Life is difficult. Why feeling victimized is so debilitating The reason feeling victimized is so debilitating is that it undermines your ability to do anything about your situation.  If you are having difficulties in any area of your life, such as relationships or money, and you experience yourself as powerful and in control of your life, you can devise a strategy to improve your situation.  And if one solution doesn’t work, you can learn from your experience and try again. But if you have a victim mentality—in other words, if you feel powerless to affect your circumstances—you are likely to feel that the world is “doing it” to you and that there is nothing you can do about it. That’s why this is one of the most devastating problems you can have: If you have any other problem, but see yourself as responsible for your situation, you have the ability to look for and implement a solution.  If you have the problem of feeling victimized by life or other people, you are less likely to look for and implement a solution because you feel you can’t do anything about your situation. Most victims can be identified by their conversation, which consists of a lot of “woe is me” and “it’s not my fault” language.  However, there also is the “stoic” victim. Such people do not complain and keep a “stiff upper lip,” but underneath they experience a sense of victimization.  Such people frequently don’t even let themselves know how they are feeling. So victims are not just people who speak their victimization, but also those who have that experience underneath a veneer of confidence and “Everything’s okay; really it is.” Typical characteristics of victims Here are a few other important characteristics of victims: * People who are victims usually don’t see that the only thing in common between all the people and situations they think they have been victimized by is themselves. * Victims usually are people you can’t depend on, because they deny responsibility for their actions.  They are quick to blame other people and situations for anything that doesn’t work in their lives. * Victims don’t have resilience, which is the ability to quickly bounce back after being knocked down. * Victims generally are passive. * Victims are usually angry at the people or events they think have “done them wrong,” and underneath the feeling of anger is almost always the feeling of powerlessness. * Successful people are rarely victims.  One might be able to be a victim and still make money in rare cases, but usually it would be difficult for victims to be successful.  To be successful you need to learn from your mistakes and try again.  Victims are, by definition, people who do not acknowledge responsible for their actions and who blame outside forces.

(http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/marty_lefkoe_headshots_053_2-01_edit_235-150x150.jpg) I wrote about three types of organizational change in my book, Re-create Your Life, many years ago. Let me draw from several passages in that bo...

(http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/marty_lefkoe_headshots_053_2-01_edit_235-150x150.jpg) If you’re reading this blog post you probably are interested in transformation. But I suspect that what you mean by transformation is very diffe...

(http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/marty_lefkoe_headshots_053_2-01_edit_235-150x150.jpg) I am often asked: Can the Lefkoe Belief Process (LBP) be used to help children eliminate beliefs? My answer is that it depends on the child: Is the child able to deal with the abstractions of the process?  If the child can, then the LBP should work.  One trick is to simplify some of the steps and use language that can be understood by a younger child.  I did that when we did our study with incarcerated offenders and the LBP was effective with teens as young as 14 to 15 years old.  Since then Shelly has used the LBP with several children 12 or 13 years old, who presented a wide variety of problems including ADD and ADHD. The very youngest child who was ever successful with the LBP was my daughter Blake when she was only six years old.  I am going to summarize my conversation with her at that time because you will see how easy it can be to use the LBP with young children. (By the way, you’ll see from this example how easy it can be to use the LBP with adults when you know the belief and the source of the belief.) On many occasions, Shelly and I had taken Blake to fairs and shows where there were hundreds of people and she usually enjoyed herself at these events. One Saturday we took her to a school that was having games, face painting, and a lot of other activities for kids. We had been inside only a few minutes when Blake screamed and exclaimed, “I’m scared! I want to leave!” “What’s wrong?” we asked her. “I don’t know. I’m just scared. I want to leave,” she repeated. We tried to find out what was scaring her, but she didn’t know. The closest she could come to an answer was that there were a lot of people there. I reminded her that she had never before been afraid of crowds. What was it about this crowd that was so scary? She didn’t know. When we realized that the fear wasn’t going away, we left. When we got home I sat down with Blake and asked, “Do you remember that Mommy and Daddy talk about the work we do with people in our sessions? How we help them with things that bother them in their lives?” “Yes.” “Would you like me to try to help you figure out what is scaring you? You’ve never been scared of crowds before.” “Okay,” she said solemnly. I started to help her identify the belief. Blake named it almost immediately. “Crowds are dangerous.” “Okay, what happened that gave you that idea?” She didn’t pause even for a minute. “Remember when we went to the Italian street fair? Remember the lady who burned me with the cigarette?” I certainly did remember. The fair had been mobbed; we could barely walk. We had been there for only a few minutes when Blake had screamed in pain. A woman had walked by her, swinging a lighted cigarette in her hand, and had hit Blake’s arm with it. The woman then turned around, yelled at Blake, “Watch where you’re going!” and walked away. Fortunately the burn wasn’t bad and we had stayed for another couple of hours. “So did you decide crowds are dangerous based on your experience at that fair?” “Yes.” “I can see why you decided that. It made a lot of sense to conclude that. A lot of people would have said the same thing, honey. Now we’re going to play a little game. What else could explain what happened to you other than what you said? It really could be that crowds are dangerous. But what else would explain what happened?” She wasn’t sure what I meant, so I said, “For example, that fair was dangerous, but maybe not all other fairs will be dangerous." She got into the spirit of the game. I gave one interpretation, then she gave one: * That woman didn’t care if she hurt you, but other women would. * People carrying lighted cigarettes can hurt me; people without cigarettes won’t. * That person wasn’t careful with her cigarette, but most people would be. * I’ll get hurt at some crowded places, not others.

(http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/marty_lefkoe_headshots_053_2-01_edit_235-150x150.jpg) We are almost ready to submit an article to a major peer-reviewed journal based on a just-completed independent university study of The Lefkoe M...

(http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/marty_lefkoe_headshots_053_2-01_edit_235-150x150.jpg) I’m beginning to think that the ability to dissolve our “occurrings” is almost as important to living a happy and successful life as the ability to eliminate beliefs. Late last year I wrote several posts about the important distinction between reality and how reality occurs for us. Few people are aware of this distinction and even fewer are able to continually make this distinction throughout the day and then dissolve all their “occurrings.” Let me briefly explain what I mean by the distinction between reality and how it “occurs” for us for those of you who haven’t read my earlier posts (see December 15, 22, 29, 2009) or seen my video explanation (http://occurringcourse.com/how-occurring-works (http://occurringcourse.com/how-occurring-works/)/).  An example of “reality” is losing your job.  One possible “occurring” for that reality is a sense of victimization, a sense of disaster.  This occurring would result in feelings of despair and helplessness.  A different occurring might be: Being fired is an opportunity to discover what I really want to do with my life and then do it.  This occurring would result in feeling challenged and excited.  Neither occurring is the same as the literal event. Earlier this year I offered a tele-seminar during which I taught 20 participants how to easily and continuously make the distinction between reality and how it occurs for us.  They also learned how to quickly dissolve how reality was occurring for them, so that they were left with nothing but reality. How we experience our lives moment-to-moment is largely the result of how events and people occur for us.  So the ability to dissolve that occurring gives us the power to create our experience of life.  To make this clear, let me quote some of the participants in my current course who are mastering the art of dissolving their occurrings.  Here’s one: I've also noticed that I no longer feel the need to defend my position when criticized or when faced with someone whose point of view is different from my own. I can listen to what is being said, without feeling as if one person is wrong and the other is right. The dissolving [of my occurrings] is instantaneous in most of these situations. I feel as if this makes it possible for me to genuinely learn from the other person's perspective, where in the past, I'd have shut out what he or she had to say, focusing only on defending my point of view. Here’s another: One very positive thing to report: When I [dissolve my occurring] … the effect is very profound. I feel very relaxed. My thinking is clearer.  … Using the occurring process to identify what's going on helps a great deal. I feel more energetic and clear-headed. I feel more present and "in the moment." And finally: Petty arguments are decreasing because I am dissolving the occurring before it gets blown out of proportion. As a result I am feeling more confident and calmer throughout the day. I am also pointing out the reality in situations my oldest son is going through and he is beginning to grasp what I'm saying. How you benefit from dissolving your occurring There are several important advantages to being able to realize that how an event is occurring for you is the result of the meaning you are giving reality and is not reality itself, and then being able to dissolve the occurring. First, because all negative feelings come from the meaning we have assigned meaningless events, by dissolving our occurring (meaning) we can totally eliminate negative feelings quickly on the spot. As someone shared in my course: Some things are dissolving either instantly or very quickly; I’ve noticed that more and more, that pleasantly calm, neutral feeling is becoming my default setting. Second, because how reality occurs for us is how we think reality really is, it determines our behavior.  If we think someone is being nasty to us, uncaring,

(http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/marty_lefkoe_headshots_053_2-01_edit_235-150x150.jpg) Thank you very much for the overwhelming response to my request last week for blog topics. The questions that seem to have universal appeal I will answer in my weekly blog.  Comments and questions that deal with specific personal issues I will respond to directly as soon as possible. This week I will answer a question I hear frequently in various forms:  What should I do to get what I want? To begin with, there is no single “right” way to accomplish anything.  What works for some people, won’t necessarily work for others.  And what is effective today, won’t necessarily be effective tomorrow. Personal qualities determine success One common technique people use to figure out how to achieve their goals is to copy the behavior of successful people. Unfortunately, more often than not that technique doesn’t work.  Why? Because successful people are successful because of who they are, not merely what they do.  Obviously they do things, but their doing is a function of their being, not a function of “rules for success.” So what “are” successful people?  In Success Built to Last, by Jerry Porras, Stewart Emery, and Mark Thompson, a must-read book about what is in common among over 200 “enduringly successful people,” the authors offer a definition of success based on what these people told them: “ … a life and work that brings personal fulfillment and lasting relationships and makes a difference in the world in which they live.” I like what the book’s authors say about the conventional definition of success:  “Folks who chase a fantastic but vain hope for fame, wealth, and power—for its own sake—may even achieve it, only to become miserable and pathetic people.  … we think that the current definition of success is a potentially toxic prescription for your life and work.  It is a description that makes you feel more like a failure than a success if it’s the standard against which all meaning in your life is measured.” Let me quote a few more passages from this book that describe these enduringly successful people so you can discover who these people are, rather than what they do. These people “insist that success may never come without a compelling personal commitment to something you care about and would be willing to do, with or without counting on wealth, fame, power, or public acceptance as an outcome.” “What you do must matter deeply to you ….  It’s something that you’re so passionate about that you lose all track of time when you do it.  … In fact, you could not be paid to not do it.” Another essential element is “a highly developed sense of accountability, audacity, passion, and responsible optimism. …  Steve Jobs told us in an interview back before his famous ad campaign: Enduringly successful people ‘think different.’” (Emphasis added.) They welcome failure One of the most important qualities of these enduringly successful people is that they “drone on endlessly about learning from their mistakes. … Every experience teaches something.  They don’t use a weakness or a setback to distrust themselves.  … The question is not whether or not they won this round, but what do they do with the feedback. … [They] find it irresistible to try, fail, improve; they try again, fail again, and get even better.”  (Emphasis added.) Although these people probably worked more hours a day than most people are willing to, they were not successful because they worked harder than others or even because they knew better than others what to do.  They operated out of their passion and commitment to make a difference.  They didn’t care what others thought.  They courted failure as a way to learn what to do better the next time. What these people have in common is an absence of the negative beliefs that would cause them to fear failure and need acceptance, personal qualities that stop most people.

(http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/marty_lefkoe_headshots_053_2-01_edit_235-150x150.jpg) Every week I sit down at my computer and ask myself: What should I write about that would be useful for you, my readers? I usually choose a topic based on * what I think you would like to learn, * what I think would be useful for you to learn, * my own experiences that I think you will find useful, * general things about TLM that I think will be useful, etc. I also want my posts to be consistent with our mission: To significantly improve the quality of life on the planet by having people recreate their lives and live as the unlimited possibilities they are. My posts average about 1200 words and are written over the course of 3-4 days. I usually write a draft on Thursday or Friday and then make at least 5-10 complete edits over the next few days, posting on Tuesday. I spend about two to three hours total each week writing my blog post, except on complicated subjects like last’s week post on emotional eating, when I spent about five hours. This week I want to devote this space to asking you if there is any specific topic that you would like me to write about.  What would you like to know that would make a real difference in your life?  Obviously anything I write about will be in the framework of The Lefkoe Method. To see what topics I’ve covered already, here is a link to a table of contents for all of my posts thus far.  If you’ve just started visiting my blog, there are a lot of really interesting posts from the past couple of years that are worth reading.  I’ve included links in case you missed any of them or would like to revisit any that look interesting to you. http://www.mortylefkoe.com/table-of-contents/ Please tell me in the comments section below what you would like me to write about in the future. These weekly blog posts also exist as podcasts.  Sign up for the RSS feed or at iTunes to get the podcasts sent to you weekly. If you haven’t yet eliminated at least one of your limiting self-esteem beliefs using the Lefkoe Belief Process, go to htp://www.recreateyourlife.com/free (http://recreateyourlife.com/free) where you can eliminate one limiting belief free. Would you like to eliminate the core beliefs that keep you from having all the success you desire? Click here (http://recreateyourlife.com/store/natural-confidence.php). http://recreateyourlife.com/store/natural-confidence.php (http://recreateyourlife.com/store/natural-confidence.php) copyright © 2010 Morty Lefkoe

(http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/marty_lefkoe_headshots_053_2-01_edit_235-150x150.jpg) When I first started helping clients whose major complaint was emotional eating—eating for emotional reasons when they really weren’t hungry—I assumed that the problem was caused by beliefs and conditioning, like most other behavioral or emotional problems. But when all the beliefs and conditionings that appeared to be relevant had been eliminated, the problem usually was as bad as ever. At which point I went back to the drawing board. I knew all about “classical” conditioning, in which a stimulus is conditioned to produce a behavioral or emotional response. So rejection or making a mistake can be conditioned to produce anxiety. Or being told what to do can be conditioned to produce anger. This type of conditioning was demonstrated by Pavlov’s dogs who were conditioned to salivate by the ringing of a bell. The Lefkoe Stimulus Process can easily de-condition this type of conditioning. But that type of conditioning didn’t seem relevant for emotional eating, which involves a behavior that seems compulsive. There is another type of conditioning called “operant” conditioning. This type of conditioning is the result of rewarding or punishing a behavior. As a result you become conditioned to act in a certain way in order to achieve the “reward” or avoid the punishment. Merely desiring the reward results in the behavior. In an earlier blog post about eating (October 13, 2009) I pointed out: "… if every time you got upset as a child your mom gave you food to make you feel better, you could get conditioned to eat whenever you got upset in order to feel better. "Or, if your parents continually rewarded you for special things you did as a child by giving you a special meal with the food you really liked, you could get conditioned to eat whenever you wanted to feel acknowledged for something you did." I finally realized that almost all emotional eating involves both types of conditioning. So in order to help people with an emotional eating problem, I had to create a process that would easily, quickly, and permanently de-condition both “classical” and “operant” conditioning. I started working on a process in 1997 and it took six revisions over the next 11 years before I finally had something that worked in most situations. I call it the Lefkoe De-conditioning Process (LDP) and I’ll describe how it works in a minute. The reason it took so long is that I wasn’t working with many individual clients and, even more importantly, the problems presented by the clients I did have didn’t need operant de-conditioning. Then toward the end of last year a friend asked me to help him with his eating problem. I decided then to figure out how to permanently eliminate emotional eating, not just for him, but for others as well. So I worked with him and a few additional clients. Much to my surprise, in most cases there were very few beliefs involved. Their emotional eating was caused primarily by a combination of classical and operant conditioning. No wonder emotional eating has been so hard to stop and will power is so useless in the long run! Consider this: first someone with an emotional eating problem conditions eating to produce emotional “rewards” (relieving anxiety or any other negative feeling, feeling loved, a sense of celebration, feeling calm, etc). In other words, the mere act of eating automatically results in emotional rewards. This classical conditioning would make it difficult enough to stop over-eating. Then the problem is intensified by operant conditioning, where the behavior is conditioned to occur whenever there is a desire for the “reward.” In other words, merely desiring one of the emotional rewards (such as feeling loved, a sense of celebration, or feeling calm) will result in emotional eating, because you’ve learned that you’ll get this feeling each time you eat.

After posting on my blog a couple of weeks ago about how I felt totally safe to experience and express the love I felt for people at the Transformational Leadership Council meeting, but not most of the time away from TLC, I received the following comment: If you are the creator of the Natural Confidence program and I’m assuming you removed all the beliefs and conditionings on that program, then how could you not feel as safe expressing your love with anyone you run into? Please explain. Thank you. Here was my reply. I’ve not only eliminated all the beliefs on that program, I’ve eliminated a couple of hundred more.  But each issue or problem in our lives is caused by a different set of beliefs and conditionings. And so while I’ve gotten rid of my depression and my neediness and my concern with the opinion of others, etc., I have still not handled every issue in my life. And not feeling safe to express love all the time is one of the issues I still have to work on. And I plan to see what beliefs are causing that in the next week or so and getting this issue handled. Thanks for asking. Regards, Morty I did work on this issue as I said I would and here is what I discovered. I couldn’t find any relevant beliefs, but I did find two different types of conditioning. Here’s how I identified the first one.  There is some low level of anxiety when I feel people are “not there” when I talk to them, when I feel they are not “fully present,” or when I don’t feel fully accepted. The source of this conditioning was how my mom frequently acted when I was a kid.  She divorced when I was only three and struggled being a single mom with no money.  As a result of her constant stress and anxiety, and her frequent hysterical outbursts, I had a sense that she wasn’t really “with me” much of the time we were together and frequently felt rejected. Feeling that my mom was not fully present or was rejecting me when I was very young meant to me that she didn’t love me, which meant I could be abandoned, which meant I would die, which caused my the anxiety.  So people not being fully present with me or withdrawn from me got conditioned to cause anxiety.  I eliminated this conditioning with the Lefkoe Stimulus Process. The second conditioning required me to use a different process, the Lefkoe De-conditioning Process.  This conditioning arose as follows:  Because I felt fear when it seemed my mother seemed to be withdrawn from me, I shut down my body and my feelings to keep from feeling anxiety in that situation. Because the anxiety  diminished when I shut down, shutting down became a conditioned response. In other words, when a behavior is rewarded (in this case, the anxiety stopped), the behavior gets conditioned.  In order to not feel fear when I feel people are not fully present around me, or when I don’t feel safe around them for any reason, my body and emotions shut down.   I eliminated this conditioning with the Lefkoe De-conditioning Process. I think the issue is handled, but I’ll watch carefully over the next few weeks.  If there are any traces of the old behavior pattern, I’ll look to see what beliefs or other conditioning might still exist.  I am really looking forward to being able to “be myself” and experience and express my love for people without regard to how other people are acting. For more details on the first type of conditioning please see two earlier blog posts, on 050509 and 032310. Please share any comments you have on these thoughts on my difficulties   experiencing and expressing love in certain types of situations and how I dealt with that problem. These weekly blog posts also exist as podcasts.  Sign up for the RSS feed or at iTunes to get the podcasts sent to you weekly. If you haven’t yet eliminated at least one of your limiting self-esteem beliefs using the Lefkoe Belief Process, go to htp://www.recreateyourlife.com/free

(http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/marty_lefkoe_headshots_053_2-01_edit_225.jpg) For many years I had asked myself the questions: What is the real source of our negative emotions? Why do so many things cause fear in our lives that aren’t inherently scary? And why do some people experience negative emotions while other people don’t in similar situations? About eight years ago I wrote a paper for myself on the source of negative emotions. Today’s post is a summary of that paper. I think you’ll find some fascinating material here and I’m excited to get your responses and start a conversation. * * * What is an emotion? An emotion is the experiential, chemical, and neuro‑physiological response a conscious being has to a stimulus. (I am concerned here only with negative emotions in human beings.) If specific emotions were created by specific stimuli, then a particular stimulus would produce the same emotion in every person. In fact, different people have varied emotional responses to the same stimulus. Then what does cause emotions? Except for stimuli that are explicit threats to our physical survival, stimuli themselves do not have inherent meaning for adults. The meaning adults give to events is what triggers emotions. On the other hand, certain events can have inherent meaning for children. A specific stimulus is a necessary condition for an emotion, but not a sufficient condition. An additional condition that has to be present is a meaning given to the meaningless stimulus—that entails either a threat to survival, or a sense of powerlessness or helplessness that is indirectly, but ultimately related to a threat to survival. Thus for adults to experience a negative emotion, they require either (1) beliefs that cause a stimulus to be experienced as a threat to their survival or beliefs that produce a sense of powerlessness or helplessness; and/or, (2) conditioning, that occurred in childhood, that links a stimulus and an emotion together. (Phobias also are the result of conditioning, but that conditioning can occur later in life when there is a perceived threat to one’s survival.) (If all negative emotions ultimately can be traced to a threat to one’s survival, then the ultimate source of negative emotions is the belief/perception that we are a separate creation, a thing, whose survival really is at stake. If that is the case, perhaps all positive emotions can be traced to a feeling of inclusiveness, wholeness, a lack of separation—to the recognition that who we really are is a non-dual consciousness whose survival can never be at stake.) It is a child’s inherent dependency on others that makes it possible for him to directly experience a threat to his survival in the face of certain stimuli. Children also experience powerlessness and helplessness and these experiences are directly related to a sense that their survival is at stake. The Cause of Specific Negative Emotions Fear is our emotional response to something that we interpret to be a direct threat to our physical well‑being. All other negative emotions are the result of interpreting events as a threat to our mental/emotional well‑being. They are our response to something that is an indirect threat to our physical well‑being, namely, something that makes us feel powerless. Specifically, negative emotions other than fear are our response to something that is a threat to our efficacy, our “okayness,” our ability to act on our own behalf to do what is necessary to survive. To summarize what we’ve seen thus far: the perception that something is a threat to our survival causes fear. The experience of powerlessness, the inability to take the actions necessary to survive, is the source of all the other “negative” emotions. (Guilt is the only exception, which is more directly related to fear, as explained below.) Physical pain is a symptom of an underlying malfunction of the body. It is a sign of a dysfunctional physical/body state.

(http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/marty_lefkoe_headshots_053_2-01_edit_223.jpg) What do you desperately desire, that the more you get, the harder it will be to achieve your goals in life? Answers. Let me explain. It seems that nothing would make most of us happier than getting the answer to our questions, such as how to improve our relationships, how to make more money, and how to get anything else we want in life. But answers are a type of belief. They are a solution to a problem, the way to do or get something. And like all beliefs, answers are “a truth,” not “the truth.” Like all beliefs, answers are limiting, whereas questions are constantly pointing us in the right direction. In fact, answers actually prevent learning and change. Questions make them possible. Why? … Learning and changing are relatively easy—when we don’t think we already have the answers. Most children naturally and effortlessly acquire such complicated skills as learning how to speak and read. For children, learning is a not a difficult task. As we grow older something happens in most of us that severely hinders our learning: we think we already know the truth—we already have the answer. To make this assertion real, consider this: What do you ask a lot of when you don’t know how to do something? ... You ask questions, right? What happens to the questions when you discover how to do it? … They stop, don’t they? If you think you already know the right way to do something, how open are you to learning a better way? ... You aren’t, are you? The history of corporate icons, such as GM and Lehman Brothers, is filled with stories of companies that thought they knew how to succeed, that were convinced they had the answer for how to succeed—and that failed while still proclaiming they were doing the right thing. You see there is no “right” way to do anything at all times under all conditions. There is only the best strategy for the moment. And as circumstances change, the best way to deal with them changes also. That gives us a clue to an alternative for “answers.” Instead of trying to find the “right” way to do or achieve anything, look for the best way at the moment. And then keep asking the same question regularly. If your reality doesn’t change much, the best way of dealing with it probably won’t change much either. But when reality changes enough, the best way of dealing with it will change, and the old answer will no longer be a good one. This is why in a world that is changing rapidly strategies developed early in the year at a corporate retreat usually become inappropriate long before the end of the year. The same principle is true for individuals who are constantly looking for answers for how to achieve their goals. What worked yesterday or what worked for someone else, won’t necessarily work today or for you. Don’t ever settle for the “answer.” Always hold your answers as working hypotheses, subject to constant checking and actual revisions when necessary. Live out of questions and observe what emerges. I promise you will be more successful than if you operate out of answers derived from what worked for you yesterday or what worked for someone else. Please share any comments you have on these thoughts on why answers prevent new learning and actually can inhibit our ability to get what we want in life. These weekly blog posts also exist as podcasts. Sign up for the RSS feed or at iTunes to get the podcasts sent to you weekly. If you haven’t yet eliminated at least one of your limiting self-esteem beliefs using the Lefkoe Belief Process, go to http://www.recreateyourlife.com/free (http://www.recreateyourlife.com/free) where you can eliminate one limiting belief free. To purchase DVD programs that we guarantee to eliminate eight of the most common daily problems people face, go to http://www.recreateyourlife.com/store (http://www.recreateyourlife.com/store). copyright © 2010 Morty Lefkoe

(http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/marty_lefkoe_headshots_053_2-01_edit_222.jpg) There are two fundamentally different ways in which we can experience ourselves. First, the way most of us usually experience ourselves: as a creation—a separate entity distinct from other entities, whose survival is always at stake. Some people call this the ego. Second, as the creator of that creation—as consciousness, as Self, as non-dual awareness, as that which has always existed and always will exist. The creation is experienced as an entity that is either “good enough” or “not good enough.” The creator, consciousness, Self is not experienced as someThing; rather it is a state of consciousness in which one experiences oneself as whole and complete, with nothing missing. On the other hand, because the creation is something specific, there is always something it is not, in other words, there is always something missing. What is enlightenment? Enlightenment consists of distinguishing yourself and then experiencing (as distinct from understanding) that you already are the creator, Self, consciousness—not merely the creation—it’s just that most people haven’t experienced it yet. Therefore, transformation or enlightenment is not a place to get to; you are already there. And transformation or enlightenment is nothing more than (continually) creating that experience for yourself. Why we need self-esteem If we are going to experience ourselves as a creation, we need a high level of self-esteem. Why? Because when we experience ourselves as someThing whose survival is always at stake, we need to believe I’m able to survive (good enough, important, capable), and worthy of surviving. (Nathaniel Branden was the first person I know to point this out.) And a high level of self-esteem is more conducive to our survival than a low level of self-esteem. But when you distinguish yourself as the creator of the creation (which you can easily experience with the “Who Am I Really?” Process), then a paradox occurs: you no longer need a high level of self-esteem (because your survival is no longer in question) and you experience yourself as whole and complete, as okay just the way you are, with nothing missing, anything is possible, and no limitations—which “feels like” a high level of self-esteem. Although it is possible to change the creation (by eliminating our beliefs about ourselves, which changes how we act and feel)—the very fact of experiencing ourselves as a creation will necessarily result in experiencing something missing, some limitations, and, as the Buddha said: some degree of suffering. Some suffering seems to be inherent in the experience of ourselves as a creation, an entity whose survival is always at stake. Let me explain why. If some things are good for us (conducive to our survival), then other things are bad for us (a threat to our survival). And when we encounter anything that we consider to be a threat to our survival, we feel anxiety and suffer. Depending on our beliefs and who we think are, we can be threatened by people who are angry at us, not being liked by people, making mistakes, not reaching our goals—in other words, by anything that we consider “bad.” In other words, when anything we consider ourselves to be (a good parent, a hard worker, a sexy person) is threatened, we feel anxiety because we think who we are is in danger of extinction. When we experience ourselves as a creation with a low level of self-esteem, our lives become about acquiring self-esteem. We create survival strategies—which are substitutes for self-esteem—that run our lives, such as having people think well of us, taking care of others, or doing things perfectly. We think these survival strategies will make us good enough or important. Unfortunately, it’s an endless quest because they never really work, although they can ameliorate anxiety for the moment. The Lefkoe Method has two purposes

(http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/marty_lefkoe_headshots_053_2-01_edit_221-150x150.jpg) When you realize that you never saw your beliefs in the world, that you only saw events that had no inherent meaning, it becomes clear that you create your beliefs—and, ultimately, reality as you experience it. Thus, everything we say is “out there”—other than what we sense (in other words, what we touch, see, hear, smell, or taste)—is a distinction we create that exists only in our mind. Creation is the act of making distinctions For example, you walk down the street and think you actually see “men” and “women,” when you actually only perceive what we have defined as individual human beings. You describe these human beings as “men” or “women,” but you have never actually seen “men” or “women”; they are only abstractions you have distinguished and imposed on reality. If you were to arbitrarily distinguish people into those taller and those shorter than six feet, you would eventually walk down the street and think you are seeing “shorties” and “tallies” as clearly as you now see men and women. In Alternate Realities, Lawrence LeShan gives a simple example: Consider how we make classes of things. “Surely,” we say, “we do not create classes. We take them as we find them ‘out there,’ male and female, animal, vegetable, and mineral. . . .  We are not creating anything. We are observing things and learning their relationships.” Why then, asked one philosopher, has no one made a class of red, juicy, edible things and included meat and cherries in it? Or a class of tall, dark-haired men and women with no earlobes? It becomes clear, as we look at LeShan’s example, that we help create and maintain the reality we perceive and react to. So nothing is until you make it so. But once you do, it must be. You can no longer not see men and women.  (I once had the following printed on a t-shirt: “It isn’t until it is, and then it must be.”  Can you imagine me trying to explain what I meant by that phrase to everyone who read it and asked me?) Here is a vivid example. In The Experts Speak by Christopher Cerf and Victor Navasky, hundreds of experts are cited who were limited in their ability to see anything outside their existing beliefs. The following is just one of the beliefs that was generally accepted as “the truth” and that determined the believer’s behavior at the time. Cerf and Navasky tell of how in the 1850s, a Hungarian doctor and professor of obstetrics, Ignaz Semmelweis, ordered his interns at the Viennese Lying-In Hospital to wash their hands after performing autopsies and before examining new mothers. The death rate plummeted from 22 out of 200 to two out of 200, prompting the following reaction from one of Europe’s most respected medical practitioners: It may be that it [Semmelweis’s procedure] does contain a few good principles, but its scrupulous application has presented such difficulties that it would be necessary, in Paris for instance, to place in quarantine the personnel of a hospital the great part of a year, and that, moreover, to obtain results that remain entirely problematical.” (Dr. Charles Dubois, Parisian obstetrician, in a memo to the French Academy, on September 23, 1858.) Semmeiweis’ superiors shared Dubois’ opinion; when the Hungarian physician insisted on defending his theories, they forced him to resign his post on the faculty. Today this example seems ridiculous. Doesn’t everyone know that proper hygiene is a lifesaving factor in hospitals? We tend to view this as an objective reality—as a  fact. But Dubois and his colleagues were operating out of a different worldview, from a different set of beliefs. Semmelweis’s theory did not fit with their beliefs about hospital care, and therefore it was not and could not be the truth for them. The only thing that is “true” is that which you make true by definition. You create reality (truth) by making arbitrary distinctions out of nothing.

(http://www.mortylefkoe.com/wp-content/uploads/marty_lefkoe_headshots_053_2-01_edit_218-150x150.jpg) Last week I explained how we live in a dualistic universe in which for any “thing” or concept to exist, we must distinguish between it and a not...