Rule of the Mind #1 - The mind learns by repetition.

This concept is widely recognized. We have all heard that it takes 21 days (or 66 days depending on the source) to form a new habit. This sounds easy enough right?  If my goal is to meditate every morning for 10 minutes, I just need to dedicate a measly 3 weeks to this practice and voila, I’m a Zen Master! So, why after day 3 do I find myself scrapping meditation and scrolling through Instagram instead? Because I am making a deal with the wrong part of my brain. I am trying (and remember “trying is trying”) to create a new habit with my conscious mind but my subconscious mind is having none of it. My subconscious is saying “We wake up, we pee, and then we look at Instagram. That’s what we do.”  

So, how do we break these habits? We recognize that every habit is a habit of thought. We have between 12,000 and 60,000 thoughts per day of which 95% are repetitive and a whopping 80% of those are negative. And since we know that the mind learns by repetition, you can see how we end up in the same crappy patterns. In order for us to create a new reality, we need to create a new thought and then put it on repeat (for at least 21 days). “I wake up, I pee, I meditate. That’s what I do” will eventually get lodged in my subconscious mind and become my new reality.  

This is why the 21 day recording I give clients after RTT is so important.  Powerful words and images are repeated in the mind every day until they become familiar. The mind loves what’s familiar, but that’s a Rule for another day.

Sorry about all the peeing stuff.