Your conscious mind is in charge of decision-making, and you’re in constant contact with it. The subconscious mind, on the other hand, is in charge of how you actually react to everything in your life; it has a powerful influence not only on your happiness but on how successful you can be at manifesting the life you desire.
The ancient Hawaiians worked with the subconscious in order to release a buildup of negative emotion and boost well-being and this is something you can learn to do too. If you want to train and control your subconscious mind, try these six tips and tricks.
(Before you continue, you might want to read this article here to understand how you can program yourself for abundance by training your unconscious mind).
You’ll get the most mileage out of working with your subconscious if you view it as a potential ally and not an enemy. It has important roles to play and can offer you unique wisdom that should be honored rather than rejected.
So as you apply the techniques you learn, try to take a gentle and curious approach instead of beating your subconscious into submission.
Research suggests that one of the subconscious mind’s main goals is to ensure that your physical body’s survival at all costs. So, if there’s a behavior you want to change (such as a bad habit that’s holding you back), try to show your subconscious mind how that specific behavior is hurting your body in some way.
You can do this by distilling the connection into a straightforward sentence and repeating it several times (similar to an affirmation).
For example, you might say “If I didn’t get so stressed over little things then I wouldn’t get so many bad headaches” or “If I could respond with calmness instead of anger, I’d lower my blood pressure and protect my heart.”
Your conscious mind doesn’t have power over your body’s basic functions (such as your immune system, heart rate and so on); these domains are instead influenced by your subconscious and unconscious mind.
Some experts believe that these parts of you not only have insight into how your body is now but also how it would be if it was in best condition.
So, try looking to signs from your subconscious (such as dreams and gut feelings) to discover what you need to do to attain better health; this is not so much a way of training your subconscious as it is a way of training your conscious mind to speak to your subconscious.
Your subconscious mind is a lot like a child of about 7 or 8. It likes to be useful, responds only to very clear instructions, and takes what you say entirely literally.
In other words, if you use a helpful metaphor like “My boss is a pain in the ass!” your subconscious mind can actually find some way to make sure that you’ve got achy hips when you’re in the office.
Further, your subconscious has a moral compass that’s also similar to that of a child; it takes messages from your parents very seriously. So it may believe things you’ve since rejected as an adult, and you need to directly engage with those damaging messages (and their causes) in order to give your subconscious productive new beliefs.
Therapy is one way to access and rewrite these old assumptions, but you can also do something like this by using Law of Attraction exercises that target limiting beliefs.
As well as understanding very little literal language, the subconscious utilizes strong emotions to get your attention.
So, for example, you may feel extremely afraid all of a sudden, and this will be because your subconscious has picked up on something it believes may threaten your survival.
If your subconscious is getting it wrong sometimes (e.g. if it’s producing a fear response due to old trauma and not direct danger), you can help to train it by deliberately inducing positive feelings in triggering scenarios.
Positive music can rewrite these types of emotional responses, as can the company of a loved one who makes you feel safe.
Due to your subconscious mind’s “young” approach to information, it prefers pictures to words. It often generates unhelpful pictures if you use negatives when making plans!
So, if you say “I don’t want to forget how to explain this!” before a presentation, your subconscious generates a picture of you fumbling through your presentation!
Learning how to think and talk in positives rather than negatives (e.g. “I want to do a great job explaining my key points in this presentation”) helps your subconscious to understand your intent, at which point it can throw its full power behind your goals!