State of Mind

Hey guys welcome out to another episode of Psychology Hacks. Today’s lesson Is one of my favorite productivity tips. It has helped me to improve my results dramatically and I thought it would be worth sharing. One of the reasons I have always been so interested in psychology is because the better you understand your own mind the more you can accomplish. The search for greater self awareness has taken me into many interesting areas of study, but in terms of making useful and lasting changes NLP has by far been the most effective. I touched briefly on an NLP technique in a recent episode but I want to go back and get further into everything today. Specifically I want to discuss getting into the proper state of mind before undertaking any kind of work.

I first came across the subject of changing your state from Tony Robbins. In his books he breaks down the science of the mental and emotional states quite well. In “Awaken the Giant Within” he talks about how at any given time you can change your state to suit your needs. If you walk around in a negative state for most of the day then you have a bad day. If this is a normal day for you, then I’m sorry to say it but you’re going to have a lousy life. Your minute to minute, day to day state is going to compile and eventually add up to create the quality of your life. If you don’t want to live an unhappy life, you need to start taking responsibility for how you feel at any given moment. It’s not enough to sit back and wait for things to change on their own. It’s really important to understand that your state is something that you can control. Most people don’t realize that they can consciously change how they feel at any given time. This leads to a sense of helplessness and prevents them from ever living the life they truly desire.

Your state can be affected by external factors but it is not under their control. I’m sure we’ve all had times where we had every reason in the world to be happy, but just couldn’t seem to break out of a bad mood. Or perhaps it was the other way around and despite the challenges of a situation we maintained a positive mentality. Much of this has to to with the thoughts we entertain and our body language. Marcus Aurelius said that “the quality of your life depends on the quality of your thoughts.” This is because the thoughts we allow in our heads have a tremendous impact on the way we feel moment to moment. Over time these moments add up to entire days, weeks, months and years. It is vital to start getting serious about avoiding negative thinking patterns and the best way I have found to do that is through the use of body language and anchoring techniques.

Thoughts and the Body

The self-help industry gets a lot of jokes for the way it pushes positive thinking. The idea that by thinking positive thoughts one can make any real difference in the outside world seems ridiculous to many people. But there are a few things those people don’t understand about the power of thought. First of all the unconscious mind has a hard time telling the difference between thought and reality. When you spend time thinking about stressful, upsetting things, the unconscious takes steps to help prepare you for this adversity. Whenever you dwell on negative thoughts it quickly begins to have an impact on your physical body.

Proving this shouldn’t be too hard. Just think of someone you absolutely hate. Someone who has wronged you and got away with it. Think of that person who was so selfish that hurting you didn’t even give them a second thought. Think of the financial problems you’re having at the moment. Take a second and imagine how you would feel if your significant other cheated on you. Think about how mad certain politicians make you.

It shouldn’t be difficult to find a few things that make you feel physically disturbed. You start getting a little adrenaline and cortisol released into the bloodstream and your whole mood changes. The mind is not designed to make you happy, it is designed to keep you alive. It’s going to fixate on anything that can potentially harm you and do everything in its power to protect you. Unfortunately this means that the negative scenarios you run through your head all day are going to become its focus. The unconscious will believe that these situations are real, and the proof of this is in the fact that thought alone can trigger the release of the stress hormones you just felt. Because of this it is common for people to spend most of their day in a constant state of anxiety and depression. It’s sad but it’s also true. It’s so easy to get trapped in a downward spiral because of the brains tendency to fixate on problems and its ability to create physical changes based off of nothing more than fantasy.

The good news here is that the opposite is also true. Positive thinking can trigger the release of endorphins, and if nothing else it can crowd out those negative thoughts. We all know people who are constantly complaining and are never happy. These people are difficult to deal with and often make things worse for themselves by pushing others away. They can be in the happiest place on Earth and still find reason to complain. We probably also know a few people who are the total opposite however. These individuals manage to stay positive in even difficult situations, and we can see the results in their quality of life. This should be enough to convince us that positive thinking has real benefits. But how do we keep ourselves from getting caught up in downward spirals? How do we keep our state elevated?

The Brain and the Body

If you were able to think of something that made your blood boil then you already know that thoughts can have an affect on the body. What’s good about this is that it’s a two way street. In the same way that what we allow in our heads can change our bodies, what we do with our bodies can also affect our emotions and by extension, our thoughts. For better or worse it’s a never-ending cycle. Changes in our body language cause different chemicals to be release into the bloodstream and before we know it our whole mood changes. Numerous experiments have been done to demonstrate this, and it has become a well known tool in the self improvement industry. Knowing this it should be easy to begin taking control of your emotions.

There are so many directions to go with this topic but the productivity hack I really want to focus on for today is using what we’ve talked about to keep yourself in the right state of mind when working on your goals. Let’s say you’re trying to become a successful musician. Everyday you sit down and practice playing your instrument for however long. At first you’re excited but aren’t warmed up yet, and it takes a little while before you start to really feel like the skill is there. Then eventually you’re warmed up but still a little unconfident in your abilities. Finally after an hour or two of practice you’re slouched over, zoned out, worn down and uninspired. While the practice is commendable this is obviously not the most efficient way to practice. In this scenario you’re not utilizing all the tools at your disposal.

Instead imagine that before you even pick up your instrument you’re already in an empowered state of mind. You feel good about yourself and are full of energy. The whole time you play you maintain good posture and feel energized as a result. This is something that most people overlook when it comes to their development and they pay the price in reduced output.

In a previous episode I discussed an NLP technique that allows you to get into an empowered state of mind at will. Essentially what you do is get into a meditative state and bring to mind a time where you felt successful, accomplished, confident and fully of energy. Even if you’ve never achieved any major success in life I’m sure you can think of at least one time when you felt good about yourself. You’re going to magnify those feelings and soak them up. Every time you start to feel like those feelings are at their peak you simply imagine, what would it be like if I doubled this feeling?

After you’ve spent some time building up these feelings of success, confidence, creativity and whatever else you like, you anchor the feeling to something physical. I personally touch my thumb to the last knuckle on my ring finger. After doing the exercise a few times your brain will associate the sense of touch with the powerful emotions and you can bring them back all at once by simply performing the same anchoring technique. Without doing the exercise you won’t be able to really feel what this is like. There is zero benefit from just reading about this exercise because it’s all about the brain body connection.

Another strategy here is to use modeling. With modeling what you want to do is pay close attention to the experts in your field. Watch them intently and try to pick up on all the subtle ways that they move. Match their body language, attitude and techniques as closely as possible whenever you work. Modeling your body language after those that are already successful is an excellent way to supercharge your progress. It will help you get into the mindset you need to be in. The experts have spent years and years perfecting their craft, and the subtle mannerisms that show up in their body language may be unconscious but they are not typically meaningless.

Getting yourself into the proper state of mind with an anchoring technique and then using modeling to cement that state is an incredibly powerful combination. Doing this will keep you from simply going through the motions and place you head and shoulders above the competition. This is a productivity hack that most people never even think about and because of that it gives you a tremendous advantage. Others will wonder how you are able to attack problems with so much focus and energy. After it becomes a habit you will never want to work, or even go about your day in a negative state again. Just remember that even without an anchoring technique, your body language is going to be your best tool in the managing of your mental/emotional state. Pay close attention to how you carry yourself, and watch how quickly your mood can change just by the way you use your body.