The Most Powerful Affirmation Ever

Did you know what the most powerful affirmation in the universe is?  Were you even aware that most of you reading this article practice almost every single day, perhaps unintentionally and perhaps without the faintest idea of what it can lead to?  In fact, the practice is so common that even those who have absolutely no clue what an affirmation is, also practice it with unfailing regularity and possibly guaranteed outcomes.

The New Age Wikipedia states that “Affirmations in New Thought and New Age terminology refer primarily to the practice of positive thinking and self-empowerment—fostering a belief that a positive mental attitude supported by affirmations will achieve success in anything."  What it perhaps fails to mention is that owing to the fact that affirmations is merely the assertion that something exists or is true, it is not just positive thoughts, but also negative thoughts that can be affirmed. 

Affirmations become powerful when –

1. One visualizes the outcome

2. Feels in one’s physiology as if it were happening now

3. Ponders in a manner where it were congruent in the present

Affirmations (which are suggestions and commands to your subconscious mind) are maximum in Theta, optimal in Alpha and relatively ineffective in Beta. 

Now, here is the kicker!  Eager to know what the most powerful affirmation is, which many of us indulge in every single day?  Worrying.

Worrying is one activity that keeps you busy reaching nowhere.  And many of us indulge in it, or even revel in it (pardon my English) every single day!  And a few paragraphs below, allow me to explain why so many of us have the propensity to turn worry into reality!

“Worry never robs tomorrow of its sorrow, it only saps today of its joy.” – Leo F. Buscaglia. 

“Our fatigue is often caused not by work, but by worry, frustration and resentment.” – Dale Carnegie

“Worry is a thin stream of fear trickling through the mind. If encouraged, it cuts a channel into which all other thoughts are drained.” – Arthur Somers Roche

“Worry is like a rocking chair: it gives you something to do but never gets you anywhere” – Erma Bombeck

“A day of worry is more exhausting than a day of work.” – John Lubbock

Now spend a little time re-reading the above article with respect to affirmations, when and how they gain power and about worry as an activity.  Uptil now, you have no clue what we are doing to ourselves!  And also make sure, before you proceed further, that you have read the previous post on this blog, just so you understand every little bit of what I am expounding right below.

Before you proceed, presuming you have at least now read the previous post on this blog, you also need to familiarize yourself with two fancy technical terms, viz., Hypnopompic and Hypnagogic Peridos.

These two periods basically refer to the shot period when you wake up in the morning and fall asleep at night.  When you fall asleep, you go from Beta to Delta through Alpha and Theta and when you awaken, you go from Delta to Beta through Theta and Alpha states.  Twice each day, you are unintentionally connected to your subconscious mind, which is the seat and reservoir of all the programming you do.

So, at least twice each day, even if you were not a practitioner of Nirmiti Nidra or meditation, you have an irrevocable opportunity to program your subconscious mind whilst in the Alpha or Theta State. 

Now, contemplate on what you do when you go to bed worrying or when you wake up in the morning worrying!

You SUCCEED!

At -

1. Fulfilling the criteria for connecting with your subconscious (unintentionally) optimally by being in the Theta or Alpha state of mind.

2.  Programming it with your worries (thoughts) becoming affirmations (positive or negative)

3.  Empowering the Affirmations further by visualizing and feeling the emotions and adding fuel to the fire, by imagining as if it were in the present.

Is it a wonder then that most of your fears come true?  I have also had people feeling proud of the fact that their apprehensions actually fructified.  Really!

Worrying is a waste of time (irrespective of what nomenclature you use to describe the phenomenon).  Planning, however, is a necessity to alleviate future anxiety.  Stop worrying! Start living!  And, remember you can never displace thoughts, only replace them.   

“According to Vedanta, there are only two symptoms of enlightenment, just two indications that a transformation is taking place within you toward a higher consciousness. The first symptom is that you stop worrying. Things don't bother you anymore. You become light-hearted and full of joy. The second symptom is that you encounter more and more meaningful coincidences in your life, more and more synchronicities. And this accelerates to the point where you actually experience the miraculous. (quoted by Carol Lynn Pearson in Consider the Butterfly)”  ― Deepak Chopra, Synchrodestiny: Harnessing the Infinite Power of Coincidence to Create Miracles

The author, Rajesh Seshadri, is an internationally recognized Certified Leadership Coach, Certified Success Coach and Certified Life Coach.  He is also a NLP Master Practitioner, facilitator and therapist.  The basket of therapies is holistic and integrative adopting techniques from Psychotherapy, NLP, Silva, Gestalt, Hypnosis and Silva UltraMind. Additionally, he is a seasoned corporate professional who continues to serve as a whole-time Director and Board Member. You can contact him here.

The Gateway to Your Subconscious Mind

Considering that most of the readers would be familiar with the four (now five) levels of mind (aka states of mind) this article is relative concise – yet necessary, since the subsequent article on this very blog requires a more-than-sketchy understanding of this subject.

A brainwave (not the bright ideas that management gurus talk about) is simply put – an electrical impulse in the brain.  They are produced by synchronised electrical pulses from bunches of neurons (the latest estimate is there are about 100 billion of them in the brain) communicating with each other. Whether there is a thought, emotion or behavior, the primary action is communication between the neurons within our brains.

Brainwaves are detected by placing specific sensors on the scalp and measured using an electroencephalogram (EEG) which records the electrical activity of the brain. They are divided into bandwidths to describe their functions (below), but are best thought of as a continuous spectrum of consciousness; from slow, loud and functional - to fast, subtle, and complex.

Like sound frequencies, brain waves are measured in Hz, or cycles per second (cps). These have been classified into five different types (or levels of mind) – four at first, with a fifth level being added in the past decade or so.  The four levels of mind documented are beta, alpha, delta and theta.  Gamma has been the fifth (and recent) addition, very little is known as yet and it is being researched, however I do have a theory of sorts which I have put forth in this article for your perusal.

The higher the frequency of your brain waves, the higher is the level of mind and vice versa.  The higher the level of mind, the higher is the conscious activity (or hyperactivity).  Generally, the slower the frequency of your brain waves, the more relaxed you feel. A lower level of mind is a healthier level of mind and meditation, neurofeedback, hypnosis, and guided imagery have all been shown to help people control their brain waves more efficiently for better health, greater performance, and a more positive experience of life.

Level	CPS (Hz)	State
Gamma	26-40+	Superconscious?
Beta	14-26	Awake & Outer-conscious
Alpha	7-14	Awake & Inner-conscious
Theta	4-7	Sleepy & subconscious
Delta	0-4	Unconscious

The Beta state which is our normal state as adults during most of our waking hours, is where the brain operates at the highest frequency, except for the Gamma state of abnormally high brain activity.  This is the state where we are awake and alert or perhaps have taken some drugs or chemicals such as benzodiazepines or caffeine.  It is essential for our survival and our day to day activities to a certain extent. Note that being awake does not mean you are attentive.

The Alpha state is associated with a relaxed, daydreaming state of mind.  As children, until the age of 7 or 8, we would have been in this state 80% of our waking hours, but this keeps reducing until as adults, we probably spend only 20% of our waking hours in this state of mind.  As mentioned earlier, Nirmiti Nidra, meditation techniques, pranayama, neurofeedback, progressive muscle relaxation, hypnosis and guided imagery all lead you to this stage of relaxation.  In fact, the Alpha state is the gateway to all of them, whereby a few of them including Nirmiti Nidra can lead you to a deeper state of mind, called Theta. The Alpha state is also considered by almost all experts to be the initial link between the conscious and the subconscious mind. 

The Theta state, the state in which most little children and newborns are, is associated with  deeper states of meditation, spiritual experiences or higher states of consciousness.  The subconscious mind is predominant whereas the conscious mind retreats significantly.  Intuitive insights are common (for example, Mozart is known to have stated that a composition would come to him all at once with complete clarity and in its entirety when he was in a deep contemplative or meditative state; all he had to do was write it down on paper).  This state is also associated with the REM state of sleep, where dreams occur and considered a reservoir of creativity, waiting to be tapped into.

The Delta state is the sleep state, where there is little or no conscious activity.  Only the unconscious rules.  Delta waves adjourn external awareness and are the source of empathy. Healing and regeneration are said to be stimulated in this state, which is perhaps why deep restorative sleep is so much of a prerequisite to any healing process. If the Alpha state is the link to the subconscious, the Theta state is the bridge helping you cross over to the subconscious, and the Delta state (if adults could achieve this) is the bridge that helps you cross over to the collective unconscious (as Carl Jung calls it).

The Gamma state was hitherto unknown since analog EEG was restricted to measuring and recording rhythyms upto 25 Hz.  With the onset of digital EEG, higher frequences could be measured and recorded.  Although the earliest known case appears to be in 1964, it did not get much attention until about a decade ago.  A lot of research is currently undertaken and not much is known about this state. 

Gamma brainwaves are the fastest of brain waves and relate to simultaneous processing of information from different brain areas. Yet, the mind has to be quiet to access it, and not agitated as in the case of the Beta state.  This means that quieting the mind or attaining deepest levels of meditation/relaxation could actually trigger off a Gamma state.  Some researchers have speculated that Gamma relates to expanded consciousness. Researchers have also found that it is associated with bursts of insight and high-level information processing. 

A 2004 study of Tibetan Buddhist monks, who were long-term practitioners of meditation revealed that, when the monks were told to generate an objective feeling of compassion during meditation, their brain activity began to fire in a rhythmic, coherent manner, suggesting neuronal structures were firing in harmony. This was observed at a frequency of 25–40 Hz, the rhythm of gamma waves. These gamma-band oscillations in the monk’s brain signals were the largest seen in humans. 

All of the above seem to suggest that the Gamma state (when attained) possibly leads to superconsciousness or universal consciousness or spiritual ascension, but neuroscientists are not necessary convinced.

Four curious points you may wish to particularly note:

You cannot attain an Alpha state deliberately with your eyes open.  It is only with your eyes closed, yet being alert that you attain Alpha.  However, there are certain occassions where you can be in Alpha whilst watching TV or a movie, during which you may experience ’spontaneous imagery’.  Another example is in an ATM queue (not uncommon these days) you are staring at something whereas your mind is focussed elsewhere – this is also a state of Alpha. Boredom or daydreaming with eyes open can also lead to Alpha. Under hypnosis and Nidra, you can attain Alpha with your eyes open. 

You are alert in both Beta and Alpha.  However, in Beta, your attention often drifts or wanders, in Alpha it is more focussed with occassional lapses and in Theta, it is extremely focussed.

Time distortion occurs as you get into deeper, healthier states of mind.  In Alpha, you have already lost some sense of time, in Theta – you would have no clue whatsoever.  You may think that a few minutes have passed whereas it could easily be an hour.  

One of the early researchers, Elmer Green of the Menninger Clinic in Kansas, used biofeedback instruments to study Eastern yogis. He discovered that certain yogis could control their internal states merely through meditation and thought. The one thing their subjects had in common when they were controlling involuntary body functions, was that they were in the alpha or theta states of mind.

There is no doubt at all that Alpha and Theta states are the gateways to your subconscious mind. Once you have accessed it in these states, your subconscious mind willingly accepts suggestions and commands. Suggestions and commands to your subconscious mind are maximum in Theta, optimal in Alpha and relatively ineffective in Beta.

The author, Rajesh Seshadri, is an internationally recognized Certified Leadership Coach, Certified Success Coach and Certified Life Coach.  He is also a NLP Master Practitioner, facilitator and therapist.  The basket of therapies is holistic and integrative adopting techniques from Psychotherapy, NLP, Silva, Gestalt, Hypnosis and Silva UltraMind. Additionally, he is a seasoned corporate professional who continues to serve as a whole-time Director and Board Member. You can contact him here.

All You Wanted To Know About Dreams and Nightmares – Theories, Interpretations, Analysis and What You Can Do to Improve Their Quality - Part 3

Read part 1 here.

Read part 2 here.

More intriguing facts

Towards the end of this “trilogical” article, I will share tips on how you can control your dreams, learn from them, and get inspired by them.  Before that, let me share a few other dream theories – you can decide just how many of them resonate with you. 

The metaphysical school strongly believes that every dream is about the dreamer, of the dreamer and for the dreamer and that every dream reveals the person’s state of mind in the past 24-48 hours.  Dreams thus give the dreamers the ability to understand themselves and their own state of mind in a better fashion.  Unfortunately, most tend to ignore the message, pretend not to understand it, or play the victim instead.  No one, other than your own subconscious mind is responsible for your dreams!

It goes to say that if every dream is about the dreamer, than every person is truly and really you! Every single person in your dream (stranger or relative) represents a part of you.  If the person in your dream is a bully, probably you were being a bully in the past couple of days.  If the person is kind, that’s how you were.  If the person is aggressive, timid, lazy, stubborn, rushed or in panic, look back at your past 24-48 hours.

The language of the subconscious is not words but symbols.  The subconscious uses the images from our working life to communicate metaphorically, analogically or symbolically.  Regular meditators as well as day dreamers experience this state of mind even whilst awake.  For example, in your dream, a car may represent your body to your mind, a transportation that takes the mind from place to place.  If you are unable to accelerate, it may mean that you are lazy or not pushing yourself enough.  If you are going too fast, well it means you are probably burning yourself out.  Makes sense, doesn’t it?

Let us take this example a little further, so that you learn to interpret your dreams for yourself.  Only you can do it – no other person can!  It takes time and patience, but you can get there.  Upon waking up, try and recollect if the car was as good as new or looked old and damaged.  What would that mean if the car represented your body?  Was it moving or was it at rest (parked)?  Were you driving the car, was someone else driving your car or were you unable to control the car?  Was it going faster or slower than you intended it to (in the dream)?  Introspection can lead to great insights for yourself!

Some more plausible ways to interpret your dreams.  Are you dreams realistic or are they fantastic?  How do you live your day?  Are they short and sweet or long and rambling?  Do they have a logical progression or do you jump randomly from one event to the other?  Are you in a rush doing multiple things anxiously?  Now look back at your day and see if it makes sense to you.  What would you like to change?  And what you prefer to accept?

Your attire reflects how you like to express yourself.  Being naked in a dream could mean that you are being transparent in your interactions with people or you are experiencing your true self without any layers.  If you are not embarrassed, in all likelihood it means that you are very comfortable ‘in your own skin’.  People will see you for what you are.  If you are overdressed, extravagant, loud, boisterous – you do the math!

Take Charge of Your Dreams

It would be incorrect and inappropriate that we know everything about dreams.  We know very little, and we have quite a few theories.  But nothing can replace experience.  So the way to know for yourself is to try things out for yourself and see how it improves the quality of your life (and dreams). 

Here is what you can (and should) do –

1.    Stop reading and listening to standard interpretations of dreams.  As I have explained to you, only you can interpret your own dreams – no one else can, although they can guide you.

2.    Start maintaining a dream diary by your bedside and start recording your dreams today!  Try and ascertain the ones which recur – as a theme, as an event or as a fantasy.  What does this mean to you?

3.    Start interpreting your dreams as much as you can.  There are a few guidelines above, nothing can ever be exhaustive or comprehensive when it comes to interpreting dreams.  Identify the areas you need to work upon, areas of change, areas of contentment.  Identify the different parts of you and decide how you would like to be as a person.

4.    Take time to de-stress and meditate every day, if only for a few minutes.  Practice Nirmiti Nidra^TM.  Work on your affirmations, align behavioural conditioning with thought conditioning. Start observing the changes in your dream patterns, get encouraged to work on yourself some more. 

Look for solutions in your dreams.  In a state of Nidra, ask for solutions to your problem.  Or just before you go to sleep, ask yourself how you can resolve a particular issue.  Don’t forget to record your dreams!  Stay blessed.

The author is the founder of Nirmiti Nidra, one of the easiest effortless techniques to connect with and program your mind in addition to de-stressing at will anytime anyplace.  In addition to being a corporate board member, he is a Certified Leadership Coach, Life Coach and Success Coach.  He is also an NLP Master Practitioner and therapist. Know more about him at www.rajeshseshadri.com

All You Wanted To Know About Dreams and Nightmares – Theories, Interpretations, Analysis and What You Can Do to Improve Their Quality - Part 2

Read part 1 of this article here.

Dreams are a reflection of your emotions

If you are in a constant state of tension and worry during the day, you would most likely get some scary dreams which reflect this emotion.  Desires and emotions which are suppressed also find their way into dreams.  There is also a community that believes that events that cannot possibly materialize into your current life situation often find a way to channelize themselves in your dreams. 

The positive side of this is that when you are fretting and fuming over a problem which you cannot resolve, plausible solutions are offered by your subconscious mind through dreams.  You can try this for yourself – before you sleep, ask yourself HOW you can resolve a particular problem or situation.  There are so many people who will vouch to the fact that they were inspired when they were asleep and found solutions as a result of dreaming.

 

Visions are rare, but occasionally your current state of the mind may lead your subconscious mind to portray certain events before they actually happen.  This gives you a sense of déjà vu.  Although it is quite rare, almost all of you reading this article would have experienced a sense of déjà vu at least once in your lifetime.  Time travel and Astral travel occur in dreams more frequently than you think, but it is not always that you remember them. 

By the way, you must know that toddlers do not dream about themselves until around the age of 3.  From then until the age of 8, they have more nightmares than adults do, as the mind is busy venting the unwanted stuff.  I do not have data to prove this, but think that it is more likely that children in these modern times have more nightmares than children of the earlier generation.  And a peculiar fact that I happened to read is that you cannot dream whilst you are snoring.  Is that good news?

Bewildering facts about dreams

As I have mentioned before in other articles on this blog, time gets distorted in the subconscious mind or in a hypnotic state.  You would therefore hardly be able to keep track of time in your dreams.  Lucid dreamers report that the hands on a clock do not appear to move.  Each time you look at a clock in your dream, it will tell a different time. 

Likewise, reading in dreams is extremely rare.  Since dreams are either processing, predicting or venting, books have an extremely limited role to play.  Do comment below if you are one of those who has been reading a book or an article in a dream. 

Surf the internet and you will find that there is a large batch of people who engage in lucid dreaming or conscious dreaming.  Through various techniques, these people learn to assume control of their dreams – awaken to consciousness in their dream state – which enables them to fly, pass through walls or go back in time.

You may have dismissed precognitive dreams, but it is apparently documented and on record that Abraham Lincoln dreamt of his assassination, many victims of catastrophes had dreams forewarning them, and (if I remember the number correctly), around 20 people had precognitive dreams of the Titanic catastrophe.

Contrary to what is generally believed, our brains show more activity during dreams (more areas light up) than during the normal waking state. This aligns well with the fact that our subconscious is more powerful and capable of doing much more than our conscious mind.

The faces of people you see in your dreams are typically only those you have already seen in your real life, somewhere, sometime, someplace.  The face you see in your dreams is always familiar to you (in your dream) and never a stranger.  However, you may be unable to recollect (upon waking up) as to where and when you have seen that person.  Remember, dreams are metaphorical and the person may have nothing to do with the situation, but represents a time or place or event symbolically.

Research also reveals that dreams generally tend to be more negative than positive.  No prizes for guessing that if a preponderance of the thoughts that we have during the day are negative, do you expect your dreams to be otherwise.  If you are constantly worried and multi-tasking, your dreams will probably tend to reflect the same panic and anxiety. The most common emotions experienced are apparently fear, anxiety, anger, helplessness and sadness.

You may be surprised to learn that dreams have inspired some of the greatest inventions and discoveries.  Examples are Google, AC generator by Tesla, the sewing machine, DNA’s double helix spiral form, etc. Creative breakthroughs have also been inspired by dreams.  James Cameron was fighting a 102-degree fever when a vision of a robot dragging itself along the floor with a knife came to him in his sleep – this eventually found a place in the ‘Terminator’. Apparently Cameron brainstorms best in a dream state: it’s how he thought of Avatar as well.

As many as 12% of the populace only dream in black and white.

Continued.. part 3

The author is the founder of Nirmiti Nidra, one of the easiest effortless techniques to connect with and program your mind in addition to de-stressing at will anytime anyplace.  In addition to being a corporate board member, he is a Certified Leadership Coach, Life Coach and Success Coach.  He is also an NLP Master Practitioner and therapist. Know more about him at www.rajeshseshadri.com

All You Wanted To Know About Dreams and Nightmares – Theories, Interpretations, Analysis and What You Can Do to Improve Their Quality - Part 1

It is not easy to decide where to begin, especially on this subject.  In every workshop that I have conducted, a percentage of the participants always have questions about dreams and their need to interpret them.  There are so many theories, explanations and wild guesses that I have come across over the years. 

This article is intended to tell you all that you need to know and being a fairly lengthy one is posted in three parts. 

In order to understand our dreams, we must understand the issues that plague us during the day. “We talk to ourselves all day long while awake. That doesn't change when we sleep,” says Loewenberg, a professional dream analyst and author of, “Dream On It, Unlock Your Dreams Change Your Life”. She advises, “the better conversation you have with yourself while awake will ensure better dreams at night.” 

If you spend your entire day in a state of panic, anxiety, tyranny of the urgent, worry, fear, anger and aggression, it is almost equally likely that your dreams turn into nightmares.  Before we get down to how you can manage it yourself, this fairly lengthy article intends to tell you more about the subject itself. 

Before we proceed, there are five important things you ought to remember at all times –

1.    No one can interpret your dreams, only you can do for yourself.

2.    It is in your hands to sleep well and improve the quality of your dreams – no one can do it for you.

3.    The quality of your dreams is a reflection of the quality of your day.

4.    The subconscious is always awake, whereas your conscious mind is asleep during dreams.  Certain parts of the brain become dormant, whilst others become highly active during the dream state.

5.    The language of the subconscious is metaphorical – thus you are thinking in pictures, symbols and emotions and not in literal terms or with words, logic and reality as we know it may not have a place in dreams.

Let us take the classic example of a snake that appears in one’s dream.  For someone who is scared of snakes or hates them, this dream has a completely different interpretation as compared to someone who is a devotee of Lord Nagaraja who feels blessed.  If the quality of dreams depend upon the quality of your day as aforesaid, who else can improve upon their quality but you?  It is in your hands – not playing victim to circumstances and events.  Likewise, it is in your hands to be aware of your thoughts and emotions throughout the day – the mindless chatter that goes on incessantly.  It is in your hands to take control of your mind, slowly but diligently. 

Among all the theories that abound, let me share a few that apparently make the most sense and have also been researched or reported by lucid dreamers.  You may also wish to read more about lucid dreaming or other fascinating facts about dreams.

Stages of dreams

Contemporary hypnosis research suggests that even as we move from a conscious state to a subconscious state during sleep, we pass through a natural hypnotic state as the mind goes into an alpha state upto theta and sometimes even upto delta.  All of this is explained in detail at the Nirmiti Nidra workshop.  In a state of sleep, we pass through three dream stages, viz., processing dreams, predictive dreams and venting dreams. Typically, a dream analyst would equally divide the total hours of sleep into these three stages.

The Sub-conscious mind is a repository of all our experiences and memories of past, present and future lifetimes.  Soon after you fall asleep, the mind is processing information that wasn’t processed during the day, classifying what stays and what is going to be rejected. All the inputs our mind has absorbed ever since the last sleep we had or those that haven’t been processed yet due to lack of sleep too are processed by the critical mind during this part of the sleep.

Based on previous experiences and certain actions that have been taken or determined, the mind predicts future events from available information.  During predictive dreams, either our sub-conscious mind or our higher self is purportedly guiding us about events about to happen next, based on events which have already happened and decisions taken.

During the third and last stage of sleep, we experience Venting dreams. These can oftentimes be very confusing, scary and frightening dreams and we invariably wake up panting or disturbed when we view these as nightmares. Most such dreams are a natural way for our mind to release an overload of negative emotions like fears, traumas, anger, guilt, etc. accumulated during the day or from the sub-conscious.  It is usually early in the morning just before you wake up and it is believed that quite often the symbolic content is getting rid of information and messages that are of no importance in the future. 

Continued... part 2

The author is the founder of Nirmiti Nidra, one of the easiest effortless techniques to connect with and program your mind in addition to de-stressing at will anytime anyplace.  In addition to being a corporate board member, he is a Certified Leadership Coach, Life Coach and Success Coach.  He is also an NLP Master Practitioner and therapist. Know more about him at www.rajeshseshadri.com

How to Power Your Imagination and Visualization

Our imagination and powers of visualization reside in the subconscious. Our willpower resides in the conscious brain. Your conscious brain represents one-sixth of your brain's thinking power. Our subconscious brain represents five-sixths of your brain's thinking power.

It is therefore quite easy to determine which part of our brain is more important to control?  The subconscious has five times the power of our conscious mind.  Therefore, anytime there is a conflict between willpower, which functions in the conscious mind (1/6), and imagination, which functions in the subconscious mind (5/6), the winner is the subconscious! Vsualization and imagination  trumps will power every time!

There is another scientific principle involved here. The mind sees only in pictures. If I were to ask you to close your eyes and remember what you did first thing after you got up this morning, you would see this in pictures. You would not see this written on a page of notebook paper in your mind!  Because you are aware of what you think consciously, your conscious mind can see things and think things through and filter out negative pictures and give thoughts (mind-pictures) true meaning or perception. However, the negatives from the subconscious thoughts cannot be filtered out because we are not even aware of what that thinking (or picture) is!

So when we say to ourselves, "I will not overeat!" our conscious mind (1/6) can give this true meaning, but the subconscious mind (5/6) sees a picture of, "Overeat!" "Overeat" (and lots of food)!  And our subconscious is an excellent listener and obeys us perfectly! It is not at all uncommon for people who want to lose weight to actually gain weight!  Have you ever said to your younger children, "Whatever you do, don't spill the milk!"? Five/Sixth of their brain, sees a perfect picture of what? That's right! "Spill the milk!" Most young children who listened well always spilled the milk.

Knowing the scientific basis, the solution is obvious!  Obviously, we have to access the subconscious mind and even more obviously, use the imaginative faculties to visualize all the positive benefits of reducing weight and becoming healthier.    In the above example, we can visualize doing all the things we are able to do after reducing weight, we can visualize the benefit of that goal.  Then the whole brain (1/6 + 5/6) is working in the same direction!  Willpower isn’t required anymore!

Willpower is overrated but, it's still important. The initial decision to change requires willpower. But once that decision to change is made with willpower, visualization and imagination is all that you will ever need! Procrastination slowly recedes, persistence and success and achievement take its place. You are programmed for success, automatically.

It takes about 21 to 30 days to create a neural pathway.  After about thirty days of imagining and visualizing, focused learning of new information or situations we are exposed to in our subconscious mind, the brain will have created a different neural pathway - neurons linking together in new ways - so that it will automatically take the steps necessary to reach your goals.  These new pathways become stronger the more they are used, causing the likelihood of new long-term connections and memories.   To know more about neuroplasticity, visit http://www.whatisneuroplasticity.com/pathways.php

Easier said than done?  Well it is not too difficult and definitely not impossible.  It does however require desire, dedication and practice.  And it does require a few minutes of your daily time, amidst all the routines.  Nirmiti Nidra ™ makes it easier to access the subconscious levels of your mind and by doing that, POWERS your imagination and visualization to greater heights.  It helps you to retain your focus on only those things that you want to achieve during those few minutes that you dedicate to yourself.

Did You Know You Think At Six Levels But Are Conscious of Only One of Them

Imagination ALWAYS Wins Over Will-Power!  Think about it.  You might WILL yourself to not want to indulge in that plate of cookies you know is sitting in your kitchen; after all, you KNOW they won't help you reach your goal of weight-loss, but what is the imagination/your subconscious thinking about?  Rich, chocolatey cookies.  Which will win in the end?  Logic or the imagination?  My bet is on imagination/your subconscious, and you are heading for those cookies.

How about those who smoke?  We know what logic tells us about smoking, but during certain times of the day, what calls to you?  Logic?  Nope, the imagination calls...and you submit time and again. You are subconsciously following images that are embedded in your mind; you are confining yourself by the walls those images have built.

It doesn’t matter whether you are a Life Coach, a Therapist or a Buffalo Farmer, you have a have a finite amount of will power at your disposal every day.  How much you do have will be dependent on a multitude of reasons other than your genetic predispositions.  For example, if you’re tired, drunk, stressed or not feeling very well you’ll have less willpower than if you’re feeling especially bright eyed and bushy tailed.

The former is the reason why people often give in to temptation during such times.

Throw somebody who likes a beer and is trying to quit smoking into a busy smoke filled bar and tell them drinks and smokes are on the house, and there’s a very high probability they’ll cave in.

From a neurological standpoint, at such times you simply don’t have enough glucose in your pre-frontal cortex to help you say no to the pleasure seeking part of your brain, or your nucleus accumbens as it prefers to be known.  At such times your brain is diverting all the crucial energy you need for exercising willpower to deal with with your other issues that it sees as more important to your immediate survival.

You can give yourself a short-term boost by consuming a high glucose sports energy drink, but in many respects that is the last thing you want to be doing if you’re tired, stressed or feeling ill, because what your body really needs is sleep.  One of the best methods of not falling victim to temptation is to remove it from the equation. 

Now this sounds great, but how does this work scientifically? Most sources of self-help tell you "what" you should do. But very few tell you "how" things work. Knowledge is the real key to success. Revolutionary brain-science discoveries have been made in the last few years. In that research lays the proof of the above theory and how we can put this to use in our life to overcome procrastination, and reach transcendent levels of success.

While using a PET scanner to verify that indeed most people solve math problems in the left side of the brain, neuroscientists made a startling discovery. A PET scanner is used to take a scan-image of the brain. The subject is injected with a very small amount of radioactive isotopes, then placed in the scanner, in which an electromagnetic device passes a very thin electromagnetic field through their brain. The part of the brain that is "thinking" at that time will have excess amounts of blood-flow, which, due to the radiation, shows up on the PET scan.

In the math function tests, each of the subject's brain scan lit up in a similar area of their left-brain. But something else occurred that the scientists had not predicted. The brain scan also lit up in 5 other areas of the brain! This was a startling discovery, in that it verified that your brain is constantly "thinking" on six or more levels at once. In additional testing, subjects were given a math problem to solve and a sedative that was slowly increased, until they fell asleep. What happened? The light on the scan image representing the math thinking, went out! But the other five areas of the brain scan that were lit, stayed lit.

CONCLUSION? You are constantly thinking on 6 levels at once, but only at the conscious level, are you aware of your thoughts and ideas. The other five areas are known as your non-conscious brain or what used to be called the subconscious brain by non-neuroscientists. When the scan-light went out for the conscious thinking and math problem-solving, as each subject fell asleep, all of the other areas stayed lit. This means that you are always thinking at your non-conscious levels. No matter that you may be consciously asleep.

Nirmiti Nidra ™ is about accessing those subconscious levels with ease.