What we imagine our future to be is usually based on our past.  In other words, we use our experience of the past to determine what’s possible for us in the future and then to create goals for the future. That approach limits our possible future to our experiences in the past.

For example, if we’ve tried to create something in the past, be it a new relationship, a new business, or a new job, and we failed whenever we tried, we would likely not set similar goals in the future.

Our future is not determined by our past, but by the meaning we give the past

My new life chapter one concept for fresh start, new year resoluActually, what I’ve just written is not quite accurate. Our future is not a function of what happened in the past, but the meaning we gave what happened in the past. If something didn’t work and we say: That can’t be done—then it is not a possibility for the future and we won’t even consider trying to do something like it.  If on the other hand we say:  It didn’t work at that time, with those resources, and the way we went about it, but under different circumstances, with different resources, going about it a different way, it might well work in the future—we have a future possibility we wouldn’t have had otherwise.

Consequently, because our future is limited by our beliefs about the past, by unlearning those beliefs, we can create unimagined possibilities for the future.

Please stop for a minute. This is a simple assertion I’m making, but it has profound implications. There are two different very important points I’m making here.

First, think of your own life. Is it real that your future goals are limited by the meanings (the beliefs) you have given to your experiences in the past? (Please take a moment and really think about your own life and notice if this has been true for you.) … Second, if you unlearn some of the specific beliefs about yourself, people, and life, is it real that you could imagine and then achieve goals that would have been unimaginable with those beliefs? (Again, please take a moment and really think about your own life and notice if this has been true for you.) …

For example, if you have the beliefs: I’m not loveable, relationships don’t work, and women can’t be trusted, then the possibility for a good, nurturing, long-term relationship is slim to nil. If you unlearn those and other related beliefs, you have created the possibility for a great relationship that literally didn’t exist for you before.

There is another implication to what I’m saying here: If the possibilities for our future are limited by our beliefs and if unlearning beliefs increases the possibilities for our future, what is possible for us to imagine and achieve if we unlearn most of our limiting beliefs? … Can you get that the answer is almost anything?

Unlearning beliefs opens unimagined
possibilities for your future

The purpose of today’s post is to have you realize that unlearning beliefs not only removes the source of undesirable behaviors (like procrastination) and emotions (like the fear of public speaking or the fear trying something new)—unlearning beliefs also creates unimagined possibilities for your future.

It is possible to unlearn the beliefs that limit what you can predict (and then create) for your future. When you’ve done that you can create the future out of nothing, which can be an unreasonable future, a future that most people would tell you is impossible.  You may not achieve the unreasonable all the time, but there is no guarantee you will achieve the predictable all the time either.

Reasonable, by definition, is what’s predictable, what’s logical given what’s already happened, and what will probably happen given what’s already happened. I suggest you start making unreasonable demands on yourself by unlearning a bunch of limiting beliefs.  You’ll discover much more is possible than you ever could have imagined.

The secret to Steve Jobs’ innovation

Steve Jobs and most other great innovators made unreasonable demands on themselves and on others they worked with, and they ended up with unreasonable and unpredictable results.  And they were able to make those unreasonable demands on themselves because they didn’t have many of the beliefs that make most of us reasonable.

As I wrote in a post about Steve Jobs shortly after he died:

I’ve been saying for years that the biggest problem that most people face is not in “reality” but in people’s minds.  Beliefs are our personal view of reality that seem to us to be describing what’s really out there. Many of our beliefs are personal ones, dealing with life, people and ourselves.  I’m not good enough.  Life is difficult. Relationships don’t work. I’ll never get what I want.  For people who hold these beliefs, these are accurate statements about reality that determine what’s possible and not possible for those people.

Most people hold many versions of an “It can’t be done” belief.  Jobs did not. Jobs did not deal more effectively with the same world most people deal with.  He interacted with a different world—a world in which almost anything was possible, while most people interact with a world in which so many things “can’t be done.”

I can’t promise that eliminating beliefs will turn you into another Steve Jobs. I can promise that eliminating a bunch of your limiting beliefs will enable you to imagine and bring into existence goals that you had previously considered impossible (if you even considered them at all).

Stop having your tomorrows be merely “more of the same.” First create unimagined new possibilities for your life. Then manifest them by being unreasonable about what can be created.

A poem about creating your future

Here are the words to one of my favorite poems by John Schaar:

The Future

The future is not a result of choices
among alternative paths offered by the present,
but a place that is created,
first in mind,
next in will,
then in activity.

The future is not some place we are going to,
but a place we are creating.

The paths are not to be discovered, but made,
and the activity of making the future
changes both the maker and the destination.

We all have a fundamental choice: Do you want to discover your future when it happens one day—a future that is nothing more than an unconscious and automatic extension of your past?

Or do you want to create your future out of nothing—a future that might be totally unreasonable, one that is consistent with your vision of an ideal life?

A PERSONAL NOTE TO MY READERS:

I just came back from seeing Dr. Jennifer Lucus, my oncologist. My latest CEA blood result was 1.3; I am now told that “normal” is under 2.5, not 5.0 as I had previously thought. She said I was “really doing well,” but that she wouldn’t be able to say I was in remission until my CEA stayed under 2.5 for five years. And as long as my CEA stays under 2.5, she says there is no need to have another CT scan. Four years and ten months to go!

I am still convinced that I am in remission and will continue to get CEA readings every month or so to prove it to her and my wife Shelly.

I cannot thank you enough for the hundreds of messages of love and support. And I know that many of you who haven’t written have been sending me love and support also.

Thanks for loving me. I love you too.

 

Thanks for reading my blog. Please post your questions or comments about how you can create an unimagined and unreasonable future. Disagreement is as welcome as agreement. Your comments add value for thousands of readers. I love to read them all and I will respond to as many as I can.

If you want others to improve their lives as you have with the information on my posts, please share this blog post with them by using the buttons located below.

If you haven’t yet eliminated at least one of your limiting self-esteem beliefs using the Lefkoe Belief Process, go to our belief-unlearning program where you can eliminate several limiting beliefs free.

You also can find out about Natural Confidence, an interactive digital program that enables you to eliminate 19 of the most common beliefs, which cause some of the most common behavioral and emotional problems we face.

Copyright © 2014 Morty Lefkoe

6 Comments

  1. robert September 2, 2014 at 8:56 am - Reply

    dear morty,

    PLEASE could you describe me the differences to distinguish “CONTEXT”and “OCCURRING” ?

    THANK YOU !!!!!

    robert

    • Morty Lefkoe September 2, 2014 at 9:42 am - Reply

      Hi Robert,

      I’m not sure what you mean by context. One dictionary says: The part of a text or statement that surrounds a particular word or passage and determines its meaning. 2. The circumstances in which an event occurs; a setting.

      Occurring is how events occur for you, the meaning you give them. I don’t think that has anything to do with context. Occurring is not the setting or the words that determine meaning; it is the meaning we unconsciously and automatically give a meaningless event.

      Love, Morty

  2. Heidi August 27, 2014 at 4:31 pm - Reply

    Hi Morty,

    I just heard about your medical journey from Shelly in an interview she did. Wow! Thank you for being such an inspiration!!!!! I love your work and her work, i’m a big fan of the parenting skills you both share! Love the awarenss. About this blog, and get it and i don’t. ;-) What if the beliefs stopping us are subconscious??? I think i heard somewhere that we operate mostly from our unconscious. I feel like i’ve done a lot of work on awareness and self improvement and yet keep having these blocks. I can’t tell you how many self-help books i’ve read. So I’m beginning to wonder if these road bumps i’m hitting are unconscious things??? I just feel like my rational mind has just gotten sneaker, because I “know” all this stuff… yet i feel like i’m still not soaring like i’d like.

    • Morty Lefkoe August 28, 2014 at 5:26 pm - Reply

      Hi Heidi,

      Mos tof the beliefs that are barriers to our lives being what we want are unconscious. You either can learn to discover them yourself in the Lefkoe Method Training-2 (LMT-1 teaches you how to unlearn the beliefs once you find them) or you can have one of our Certified Lefkoe Method Facilitators help you discover and then unlearn all the relevant beliefs.

      No matter how much you learn and understand, your life is still a function of your beliefs. Very little will change until you unlearn your limiting beliefs.

      Love, Morty

  3. LaurenLL August 27, 2014 at 9:39 am - Reply

    Morty,
    So happy your health continues on the upward spiral! I love the poem and am going to save it on my computer and share it on FB. About creating something out of nothing: this is exactly what I’m doing now as I now finished my 8th day of writing for two hours in the morning. The exact words and ideas I’m creating aren’t near as important, at this stage, as what I’m creating. I am a far different person than I was even a few months ago as I continue to recognize and allow the thresholds I approach and step over. I could not have done this without eliminating the beliefs and conditionings on Natural Confidence.
    Love and Light on your Journey,
    Lauren

  4. Matt August 27, 2014 at 6:44 am - Reply

    Great post Morty! The distinctions you made in this are quite profound. It’s amazing how the meaning we give the past and the beliefs we have shape our goals and our future. I imagine one could use the Freedom process to eliminate the distinctions and meanings made about the past? Thanks and glad to hear everything is going well!

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