The human mind is often filled with beliefs about experience - what will happen if we do one thing or another. Those beliefs are often based on past experience. You might have placed your hand on a hot stove and ever since you have had the belief that touching a hot stove hurts - makes sense. However beliefs are also based on what other people have told you: If you do that, you will get in trouble, and since that moment you have had the belief of doing that is bad. Today we will look at how to burst some of the belief bubbles that keep us safe from the fuller experience of life.

The human mind often treats beliefs as absolute truth, which tends to be detrimental when those beliefs are false, or when your motivation to defend those beliefs consumes your entire life.

But can that really happen?

Yes it can. Anyone that admits a belief that he or she has is false also admits that the way they acted in agreement with that belief in the past was false. Going ahead and admitting that is both liberating and difficult. It is liberating in terms of being able to act in a new way, without being held down by those previous notions. It is difficult in terms of having to take responsibility for personal choices and possibly being wrong about what you thought to be true at the time.

Let go of your attachment to being right, and suddenly your mind is more open. You are able to benefit from the unique viewpoints of others, without being crippled by your own judgment.

Ralph Marston

Your beliefs might well be holding you back, because what you allow yourself to experience is limited to the scope of what you believe.

Do you have faith in God, or the idea of a God?
Do you love a particular person, or do you love your idea of who that person is?

The lure of beliefs is that of someone whose house is burning down, while he is sitting in his room starring at the sunset. The sunset will always be there, but the house will most certainly always burn to the ground.

Putting forward a perspective of open-mindedness makes a person vulnerable, but the experiences undergone in that vulnerability expand their self-awareness. Holding onto a belief system that blocks an open-minded perspective limits self-awareness. Such ideas as religion, for instance, are often either renounced with closed fists or embraced with open arms, but seldom is there a middle ground. To investigate all possibilities, and to label none of them as absolute truth, is a skill worth developing.

If we do not develop this skill then we are bound to fall back onto our subconscious beliefs that await our slumber like warm and comfortable bed cushions unwilling to change or motivate us in other directions except sleep.

3 Steps to Burst Your Belief Bubble

Ask yourself these 3 questions.

1. Is it rational?

Someone once asked me how I would define Truth. The response I gave at the time was: Truth is where there is no separation between self and experience. Ask yourself whether your actions and beliefs are based on your subjective preconceptions or whether they are a part of your real experience. Here is an example:

I will not go to Church because I went once and got pestered into joining some of the local events the Church had set up.

The above is one small part of the experience, yet it defines the entire experience and all future experiences of a like kind. Is it rational to hold on to this experience as a net for filtering future experiences?

2. Is it helping me?

Often our beliefs end up doing us more harm than good. Ask yourself how productive your actions and beliefs are. Is it applicable that I believe in aliens from Mars? Is it applicable that I believe this is the right job for me? Instead of labelling your beliefs as good, bad, real, or unreal, consider them in terms of usefulness and pragmatic value.

If there is a belief that is not helping - let it go. You cannot let go of experiences but it is possible to let go of the beliefs surrounding those experiences. People feel pain, happiness, and sorrow, not in the experience itself but upon dwelling on their belief of what the experience is. There is almost always a gap between our belief about what happened and what happened. Live by experiencing, not by dwelling on the experiences.

3. Is there an alternative?

Once we are set in our ways it can become difficult to see alternatives. Our belief bubble is so thick that it filters all of the possible experiences and keeps just the experiences that we let in based on previous judgments. Step back from your beliefs and ask yourself - Is there an alternative? Is there any other possible outcome in the universe that could occur?

The first few times the answer might be no, but when the creative mind begins to expand outside of these belief-based confines new methods of approaching life and the greater possibilities of experience become evident.

From the Blogosphere

• 6 Questions That Will Change Your Life