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  • About goal setting

    One of the key comments that our mentors on this board keep telling everyone is about goal setting. Today, I got this (long but worth it) email from Tom Venuto's weekly newsletter. It is quite interesting! Enjoy!

    --------------------------------------------------
    Metaphysics & Brain science merge and prove that
    positive thinking and goal setting literally
    create your body and your entire life experience
    ---------------------------------------------------


    Last week on a special edition of CNN's Larry King Live,
    Mr. King interviewed a panel of "mind experts" about how the
    thoughts you think literally turn into the events you
    experience, the material things you possess... AND even
    the health of your body.


    For years, "positive thinking" and goal-setting were
    often criticized as "pollyanna" and "the law of attraction"
    was relegated into the category of "new age" fluff


    On last week's show, panel experts Bob Proctor, John Assaraf
    and others who were featured in the movie 'The Secret' explained
    that recent breakthroughs in neuroscience along with understanding
    mental laws, reveal why goal setting, the "law of attraction" and
    "positive thinking" all work, regardless of whether you look
    at them from a metaphysical or a scientific perspective.


    Scientists have even identified specific parts of the brain,
    such as the reticular activating system (RAS), which works
    with the visual parts of our brain to call our conscious
    attention to things that are important to reaching our goals and
    to filter out those things that are unimportant.


    The RAS is activated by "programming" goals into our sub-conscious
    minds. Our sub concscious mind is the "power center" and THIS is
    the mechanism that explains why goal setting and positive thinking
    are now being accepted as scientific methods for change.


    We are discovering that our brain is cybernetic in nature, which
    means that it is literally like a computer, waiting for a program
    to be installed.


    Here's the kicker - the subconcsious is completely neutral and
    impartial - it will carry out any instructions you give it.


    Unfortunately, many of us are still running negative programs we picked up
    from others as children when our non-conscious minds were totally
    open and impressionable, or which we developed over the years as
    a result of repetition of our own negative thinking.


    As it turns out, our own thoughts, repeated daily, are one of the
    primary ways that our "mental computer" is programmed on a sub-conscious
    level, which is the level of beliefs, habits and automatic behavior.


    To change your results, you must overwrite old negative programming
    and install positive new programming into your subconscious.


    This can be achived through such techniques as written goal setting,
    positive self-talk (affirmations), and mental imagery (visualization).


    In the 1970's, the Soviets and East Germans were the first to formally
    use structured mental rehearsal, and at that time, they dominated in several
    olympic sports. This was reported in great detail in Charles Garfield's

    landmark book, "Peak Performance." Today, virtually all elite athletes use
    visualization extensively, as we now know that the brain cannot differentiate
    between real practice and practice that is vividly imagined.

    If you are getting more of the same negative results in your life - such as
    the same health problems, or the same body fat continues to return even
    after you lose it, then you have probably been un-consciously running old
    negative programs and re-inforcing them with negative thought patterns.


    You can begin the positive mental reprogramming process by writing down
    your goals, changing your internal dialogue and taking a few minutes
    to relax, quiet your mind and perform a session of visualization or
    mental rehearsal every day (seeing yourself in your "mind's eye" not
    as you currently are, but as you ideally would like to be).


    These methods, repeated often enough, will begin to program the non-
    conscious portion of the mind, which is the same part of the mind that
    controls your heart beat, digestion and new cell production, all on
    "automatic pilot."


    In the last decade, neuroscientists discovered that you have the capacity to
    create an almost infinite number of new neural connections in your brain
    when you run new thought patterns.


    The Old neural pathways are like grooves in a record, and if you are
    struggling with your health related behaviors or behaviors in any other
    area of your life, you have been playing the "old records" over and over again.


    If you were to carve a new groove into that record, it would never play the
    same way again. the old pattern would weaken and the new one would take over.
    Brand new, positive thoughts, feelings and images begin to create new
    neural patterns.


    Psychologists estimate that it takes 21 to 30 days to establish a new
    pattern in your brain. During this time, the focus on sticking with
    your practice and repeating your new thought patterns is critical.


    Is this easy? For most people, no it's not. In fact, controlling your
    thinking and keeping it constructive may be one of the most difficult
    challenges you have ever faced. Fortunately, writing goals and reading
    affirmations can help get you started.


    You can take some of the pressure off yourself by simply accepting that negative
    thoughts and self criticisms will pop up from time to time. Just observe
    them, without mulling over them or adding to them, and change the polarity
    of the thought by quickly repeating one of your positive affirmations or
    by changing your mental pictures.


    So is there something to this whole "positive thinking" thing?

    The philosophers and theologians have been saying yes for the entire span
    of recorded history: "As you think, so shall you be." Variations on this
    proverb can be found in every spiritual and philosophical tradition.


    But... if you are the left-brained, "prove-it-to-me" type, you dont
    have to go on faith anymore. Scientists are beginning to prove more
    and more convincingly that thoughts are powerful things. Even Larry
    King seemed impressed with what his panel of "mind mentors" had to say.
    In fact, I just found out that larry will be airing part two of this
    "Power of positive thinking" show next week on CNN.


    So how soon are you going to begin your mental training right alongside your
    physical training? When are you going to learn how to harness this power
    locked up inside your mind?


    Guess what? You're already using this force every day because you cannot
    turn it off. Whatever you are thinking and picturing in your mind repeatedly
    on a daily basis is already on it's way to you, so it's simply a matter
    of HOW you are using it, not IF you are using it.


    What do you say to yourself every day? Do you say, "I am becoming leaner,
    healthier and more muscular every day?"... or do you say "I am a fat person -
    Ive tried everything, nothing ever works?"


    The fact is - you can think yourself thin and healthy or you can think
    yourself obese and ill. Maybe not in the literal sense...but most certainly
    as the critical part in the chain of causation...


    You see, there's a lot of talk these days in the personal improvement world
    about law of attraction, manifesting, intention, visualization, affirmations and

    of course, positive thinking

    Without understanding that there is an orderly, scientific basis underneath
    all of these things, many people will simply remain skeptics, while on the opposite
    extreme, others may get the idea that you can sit around meditating and
    visualizing, then expect a mystical "law of attraction" to kick in and then
    "poof!" a great body materializes out of thin air... along with the perfect
    relationship, a nice bank account and fantastic career success.


    What really happens is "Positive thinking" and related methods quite literally
    re-program your brain, which in turn creates new behaviors that move you
    physically toward whatever you have been thinking about and focusing on.


    So success is achieved through positive thinking + positive doing....
    attraction + action. There are two sides to the coin. Without paying
    attention to both, you may continue to struggle... often against nothing
    but yourself.


    If you want to transform your body or any other aspect of your life, then
    you have to change on the inside (the mind) first and then everything else
    will follow.

    F/40/5'2"
    Start: 7/24/06




    Current: Lost 49.25 pounds & 49.4 inches
    For weekly stats: http://www.atkinsdietbulletinboard.c...ad.php?t=38056
    Mini Goal: 90 kg/198 lbs <= MET Wk 13 - Oct 23
    Mini Goal2: 83 kg/182 lbs<= MET Wk 19 - Dec 30
    Mini Goal3: 75 kg/165 lbs (drivers license weight from YEARS ago!)
    Long Term Goal: 20% body fat! THEN I've made it!

  • #2
    Re: About goal setting

    Thanks so much for sharing this. I totally agree. The power of positive thinking and changing my attitude is one of the things that has helped me. I had to work at changing my habits into positive ones and positive thinking, but now it comes naturally. We can all do it....and when we do....watch out!!
    Starting Date 3/12/04 285/165/145 - F



    Dedication gives wings to our dreams and keeps them in flight! In One Word...COMMITTMENT.

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    • #3
      Re: About goal setting

      Great post
      ~Lauren~



      support? Isn't it time to give some back?
      Ask a mod how today.

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      • #4
        Re: About goal setting

        That is a great article, thanks, just what I felt like reading today too.
        f/5'6"/38 started Atkins 9/19/06
        HW308/SW231/CW159/GW149
        adios to 79 inches so far on Atkins! I've lost over a vertical jimmiejo
        Owl Rung 8

        Pledging Flights ~ Stair Climbing Challenge: Buildings all done Mountains all done!
        Chimneys & Masts: Aqaba Flagpole, done.
        Now Climbing: Junglinster Longwave Transmitter, Luxemborg /95 flights

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