Monday, July 30, 2012

Life Changing Experience...

Life Changing Experience....
We've all heard of those, right? "The day _______ happened." Now, we can fill in that blank with a bazillion examples of this statement, but for the sake of time and typing, we'll just go with the ones that pop into my head first.
DUI. Win the lottery. Hit rock bottom. Read an inspiring book. Met an inspiring person. Read a powerful, inspiring, empowering blog (tee hee). Fell in love. Fell out of love. Narrowly avoided a horrific incident/accident. Ran head-first into a horrific incident/accident. See, the list can go on and on, and I'm SURE that you have a million examples in your life, if you had time to sit down and list them. How many times have you heard someone say, "That experience changed my life!"? Too many, as far as I'm concerned. Here's why...
There is NO SUCH THING as a life changing experience! No such thing. Not to invalidate the impact of any of those possibilities (both listed and un-listed) above, but an experience cannot change ones life.
If one experience could change someone's life, then it would have to happen to everyone who experienced that experience, right? If winning the lottery was a "life changing experience", then everyone who won the lottery would have a "changed life", right? I don't know about you, but I hear WAY more stories about people who win all that money, then throw it all away, and end up just as 'broke' or sometimes even worse off than they were before they won!
I also know people who have gotten a DUI, for example. Scared them to pieces, so they never got behind the wheel intoxicated again! EVER! Also know people who have taken a different path, post DUI. I know 2 separate, unrelated people who had a CLOSE brush with lung cancer. One quit smoking on the spot, the other is still going strong at a pack and a half a day. The one who quit, said, "that was a life changing experience for me!"  Can't be. If the experience was 'life changing' then everyone who had that experience would have a 'changed life' right?
Therefore, it was not the experience itself that changed anyone's life. (OH...here she comes with the punchline...)
There is no such thing as a 'life changing experience"...there is only the experience of changing YOUR MIND, thereby changing your life. Your MIND changes your life..not an experience.
I had a very dear friend of mine make a similar comment to me, when we were talking about a trip I was getting ready to take, to Italy. He said, "A trip to Italy!? What a life changing experience!"  Now, I have had a fear of flying since I was a teenager, so for most of my life, flying to Europe has been simply out of the question. It took a "Mind Changing" experience, in order for me to get to Italy...it wasn't going to Italy that changed my life.  Do you see where I'm going with this? I had to change my MIND about flying, before I was going to be able to do it for 9 hours, in order to get to Europe.
Here's the good news - you can change your MIND about any THING, at any TIME, for any REASON. You don't need to wait for an experience: bad thing to happen, good thing to happen, meet the right person, meet the wrong person, the 1st of the month, or even the ever popular, "Monday"....you can change your mind, and change your life right this very minute! Right NOW!
Give yourself a minute to think of one thing. One thing in your life that you'd like to have different. You might only have ONE thing, or you might have 95 things...doesn't matter. Just pick one. 
Now take a minute and get to the bottom of what you believe about that one thing.
Change that...change what you believe about that one thing, and you will change that experience in your life. You have got to change your mind, before you can change your life. That is the absolute truth.
Go ahead...write to me all your examples of 'otherwise'. Tell me the list of examples that you have, that PROVE that there is such a thing as a 'life changing experience'. Bring it on. Know why? Because the idea for this blog hit me over 2 months ago, and I've been kicking it around, chewing on it, trying to dis-prove it to myself, searching for the 'holes' in this theory. Every time and every thing I tried, failed the test.
That's because the fact is, if you want to change your life...all you have to do is change your mind. Don't sit around waiting for that 'life changing experience', cuz it ain't coming!...make it happen for yourself.
The funny thing is, that since I've been trying so hard to disprove this idea, I have seen amazing things happen in MY OWN life, as I changed my mind, in order to try to punch a hole in this theory!

Its the truth. It just is. Something (the thought process) had to change as a result of that 'life changing experience' in order for there to actually BE a change. No need for you to wait for an experience...because you have the knowledge, that you can change your mind, and that will lead to a change in your life. You can do it, and you can do it right now. Right this minute.

As always, please drop me a note, or a text, or an e-mail...I'd love to answer any questions you have, or even help you form that mind-change! You can absolutely do it.

Until next time,
Jill

www.thenaturalbodyworks.com
720-938-5455