No Need To “Fake It Till You Make It” If You Do This:

Everyone has heard the term “fake it until you make it,” which is designed to help people who are afraid that they aren’t good enough at something persevere until they get better. And, while this is certainly better than giving up, or going around fearing failure, I believe that there is a better way.

This “better way” incorporates information on how the brain processes data. For those of you who follow my “Life from the Top of the Mind” philosophy, this means identifying who we are when we are coming from the upper 80% of the brain (the neocortex) and practicing these more purposeful ways of being until we become skilled at living this way. This actually involves creating and strengthening new neural pathways that go from the middle brain (the limbic system) up to the neocortex, while allowing those old neural pathways (from the limbic system down to the brainstem) to fade from atrophy.

Of course, we first have to have a pretty good idea of what we want to practice, and, therefore, when I work with individuals, I actually encourage them to create a list of twenty of these qualities and/or characteristics of them at their best. Many people balk at the idea of having to come up with twenty, however, I’m doing this so that they gain clarity about what they have to draw upon as they go forward.

Now, as we practice bringing the best of who we are to each aspect of our day and life, we aren’t needing to “fake” anything, but, instead, are simply making a purposeful choice about the qualities and characteristics we want to live by, and allowing the repetition of these choices to become our new way of being.