What Is Mindset And Why Does It Matter

In this episode, I go deep into mindset! First, I discuss what mindset is and what factors are involved in creating your mindset. I then talk about some of the effects a positive vs. negative mindset can have on your life and give an example from my own life of a crappy mindset I had and how I turned it around. Then I end by giving you some suggestions on how to improve your own mindset right now! Please note that this talk does contain explicit language and is not suitable for children.

Transcript

Hey guys,

So today is a very special episode of the podcast because it is also a live stream,

Which is super,

Super,

Super exciting and just a little bit nerve wracking if I'm totally honest.

I have a really super juicy and big topic to talk to you about today.

And so you're going to have to be a little bit patient and bear with me,

Because I do have to like I have notes.

So I'm definitely going to be reading a little bit today to make sure that I cover all the juicy things that I want to say.

So if you're listening on YouTube,

But you prefer to listen to it on the podcast,

You can find that on iTunes,

Google,

Stitcher,

Podbean,

Anchor,

My website,

Www.

Canvasalacia.

Com slash podcast.

And if you're listening on the podcast,

You can also find this on YouTube if you're interested.

So today is all about mindset mindset mindset mindset mindset is my jam.

This is like my favorite topic to talk about.

It's like basically what I focus on in my entire life.

And yeah,

I'm just super excited to chat with you guys about it today.

And so I'm basically going to be breaking down what mindset is and how it affects our lives and like how you can kind of work on your mindset to become happier,

More balanced and to like really,

You know,

Make it so your mindset serves you in like really difficult moments.

So let's start off by talking about what is mindset.

So mindset is the thoughts,

Beliefs and emotions that you hold true about your life and which ultimately affect the actions that you do,

Or don't take.

Okay.

And so mindset is typically influenced by your state of being meaning what you're feeling in any given moment.

Now,

There's a really important distinction to make here between feelings and emotions.

Usually,

In like the English language,

You can use them interchangeably.

It's actually really important here that we don't use them interchangeably.

So when I say feelings,

I am talking about something that pops up.

So you feel something and you don't necessarily like,

Oftentimes,

We do know where it comes from.

But maybe sometimes you don't like you might just be feeling a certain way.

Emotions are the things that we have control over in this particular example.

Okay,

So I want to make that distinction really clear.

I think it's really important that we understand that they're not the same in this case.

So where I kind of want to start with this discussion is talking about like,

Okay,

You find yourself in a positive experience,

And you're manifesting things and you feel love and support and you're loving and supporting other people.

And you're tolerating you know,

That person that you can't stand,

But like when you're happy and you're feeling good,

Anything is possible.

And that's because when we are feeling good,

Our mindset is positive and solution oriented.

So we look for the good instead of having to sorry,

We look for the good,

And we find it.

Let's stop it there.

Instead,

I'm sure we've all had these like Debbie Downer moments where we're like driving in our car and there's traffic and then we like show up to work and we're late.

And you know,

Like this classic scenario,

Like you've got to run in your pantyhose and you spill coffee on yourself and your partner says something stupid and you're mad at him and whatever else.

And it's almost like this like snowball of crap energy and you end up feeling like,

You know,

Really bad.

And usually this kind of negative attitude or negative mindset stems from when we're feeling sleepy,

Sad,

Down,

Angry,

Frustrated,

Whatever,

Whatever it might be.

But we find ourselves in a position where a negative attitude or a negative mindset begets negative circumstances.

So we kind of perpetuate and these are two different examples,

But they're really important because we kind of stepped just slightly out of mindset work and we're talking a little bit about law of attraction where negative mindset brings negative results,

Positive mindset brings positive results.

So it's really important to note though,

And I know that it's probably not easy to hear this,

But you are fully in control of this.

So when you're having a crap day or when you're having a great day,

Both of those are decisions that we've made and our mindset really has the biggest impact on the way that we live our day to day lives.

So if you have a positive mindset and if you learn to build a positive mindset,

You will inevitably experience more positivity in your day to day life.

That's just the way it is.

It's it sounds really simple and in theory it is and in practice it's not necessarily,

But it is something that you can work on.

It is something that you can build over time and that's kind of what we're going to talk about today.

So mindset in my opinion at least is the foundation of our lives.

So what we feel,

Remember what pops up,

Okay,

Our state of being,

Okay,

Influences the thoughts that we think,

Okay,

And the thoughts that we think and the words that we choose,

Super important,

The words that we choose that create the thoughts that we think,

Influence the emotions that we feel and that influences the beliefs that we hold about what's true about ourselves and the world around us and our lives and which ultimately influences the actions that we do or don't take.

So your mindset,

Good or bad,

Okay,

Doesn't matter,

Is creating the reality,

Good or bad,

That you see in front of you.

So it can be hard to accept that we are that powerful and that we are that in control of our lives,

But the sooner that we realize it,

The better that our entire existence will be.

So you literally have the most control over your life and it's funny because in the spiritual realm we talk a lot about how,

You know,

We have to co-create with the universe and to surrender control to the universe and that's absolutely true and that's exactly what we should be doing,

But we also have to recognize where we do have control and this is it.

This is the area where we have control.

We are in control of the thoughts that we think,

We are in control of how that then subsequently affects every other aspect of our lives.

The one thing that I want to be mindful of is I don't want to encourage you to like beat yourself up for the emotions that pop up.

Emotions,

Or sorry for the feelings,

Oh I just caught myself in my own little error there,

For the feelings that come up.

So whatever you're feeling is fine.

It's great,

It's good,

Even if the emotion is bad,

It's there,

Sorry if the emotion is bad,

It's not bad,

If the emotion is negative,

It is there to teach you something and that something is super super super important,

Okay?

So I want you to feel as safe as you possibly can in creating a life and feeling what you feel,

Both.

Because whatever you're feeling,

Whether it's positive or negative,

The best thing that you can do is not judge yourself but just allow yourself to feel that emotion and then move from that space of acceptance to changing it.

So we all have days where we wake up and we feel something,

Maybe we feel down,

Maybe we feel sad,

It's okay to be in that space and then to recognize that later you want to change it but first you do have to like kind of sit in that.

It's not,

We're not trying to talk about Pollyanna bullshit here,

We're not trying to like make it so you don't feel what you're feeling or you pretend that everything's sunshine and rainbows if something sucks because it's life and shit happens and we are here to feel the full spectrum of human emotion and to allow ourselves to be whoever we are in that moment and then to work on you know maybe making things more positive or making positive changes.

Okay so it can be like I said hard to realize that we're in control but it's really important that we take that control and we take our power back and we start creating in a really intentional way.

So your mindset is at play in every single area of your life.

No part of your life,

No matter what you think,

Is immune to your mindset.

Not a one,

Not a one.

And for better or for worse it's you know for better or for worse for easy or hard it is your responsibility,

Your divine responsibility,

As a functioning member of society to get that shit into your control.

So when you control your mindset you can control your world.

What do I mean by this?

I don't mean that you're gonna have some super freaky you know super powers that allow you to control other people.

No I mean that you'll be in control of the only thing that you are ever in control of and that is yourself.

Because going back to what I said earlier,

Mindset is controlling or choosing or intentionally creating the words that you you know choosing the words to intentionally create the thoughts that you think which affect the emotions that you feel,

Which affect the beliefs that you hold about your life,

Which influence the actions that you do or don't take.

Okay when your mindset is on point you are in control of your own reality.

Period.

You can literally write whatever story you want to write about your world and it's that simple and that challenging because I don't want to make it seem like it's easy.

I have been in the personal development world for a very very long time and I think it's only within the last like three years I've really seen changes and I got into this in 2008.

So I've been in living in this world for over 11 years now and it was really challenging at the beginning because there's a certain amount of kind of watching your thoughts and in order to in order to create a better mindset and that can be really frustrating especially when we haven't fully stepped into that place of acceptance of how we feel and accepting responsibility that we are in control of it and that we have the power to change it.

That can be really challenging and it's okay to give yourself time and it's okay to cut yourself slack in order to do that in a really in a really positive way and in a mindful way and in a way that feels really fucking good in the moment.

Okay yeah that's that's just that's the best thing I can say to you.

Love yourself throughout the whole journey.

So I want to give you an example of my own crappy mindset and how I changed that and how it affected my life.

So I love this story because it's embarrassing and because it showcases a really powerful change that I made.

So I live in Lucca in Italy and I've been living here for four years and when I first moved here I had a really I had a really pervasive story about how difficult it was to make friends.

So Lucca is a peculiar city beautiful as all ghettoed but if you talk to people they will literally describe themselves as the ancient wall that surrounds the city.

So they will kind of say you know all the people here kind of have this kind of wall around them and that's how they live their lives and it's a little bit of a cliquey city more so than other cities that I've lived in in Italy but I allowed this definition that I was given by people from the city and that I had kind of created and accepted myself to literally define my reality.

So people were telling me it was hard to make friends.

My experience was that it was hard to make friends and so my reality ended up being that it was hard to make friends and it was really difficult to get out of this and in saying this I also manifested a lot of problems in the relationships that I did have because the story that I was telling myself was how everybody is closed off and no one really wants to make friends and it's really challenging to make friends and I just perpetuated this really bad cycle that I didn't even want to be in in the first place.

So I created my own reality okay let's let's leave it there and it was well over a year I think maybe even a year and a half of me living here and kind of telling myself this crap story when I finally realized that I was telling myself this story like it's so stupid because I wasn't even aware of it at the beginning and that's kind of where I was saying to you guys like you know I've been living in this world for 10 years but it's only like really recently that the chips have all kind of started to fall into place and part of that is for the decisions that I made and part of it is just because you know it takes time to like really incorporate these tools and to kind of reinforce new habits when you've been living a certain way for a really long time but I remember exactly where I was I was at a coffee shop and I was talking to myself not out loud but I was having like a little chat with myself and I realized like I had been telling myself this really really ridiculous and pervasive story about how hard it was to make friends and I was creating my own reality and it was reflecting this crap story and it wasn't just hard meeting new friends was actually impossible because I decided that it was so and so that day I literally decided and I know that that sounds really simplistic but I did I decided that I was no longer going to tell myself this story and that this was no longer true for me and I was going to have a new positive attitude about everything and the minute that I made that decision everything changed for me literally two days later I started meeting a bunch of people and I started going out more and I mean I know that sounds exaggerated and I know that it sounds like oh that's magic or it only happens for her or whatever it might be but no literally two days later I met a girl that I'm still friends with now and we hang out all the time and another couple months after that I met even more people and I started joining these other groups and I started going out more and I started really like engaging with the community and kind of fostering this sense of community myself I also put myself in situations to meet people who were maybe a little bit more transient so I wasn't necessarily meeting people who were like going to be in Lucca forever but I was meeting people from all over the world I actually started hosting people in what is now my office this is actually our spare bedroom in our house so but yeah I just really I put myself in the way of finding new connections of finding new people and I managed to do this because one day I decided that the story that I was telling myself the mindset that I had around making friends which was extremely harmful and extremely negative was no longer serving me and would no longer be a part of my reality I literally just decided and something that's really important to understand with this is that our words have power okay do not understand do not underestimate the fact that your words your thoughts your emotions your beliefs and your actions are influencing your reality right now they are I mean there's really nothing else for me to say and I'm going to reiterate what I said earlier it can be really annoying to hear this because a lot of us especially when we're starting out on our personal development journey are stuck in victim mode so we want to believe that it's them it's our boss it's our partner it's our friends it's the city that we live in it's the circumstances that we find ourselves in but the reality is is like you've chosen every single one of these you chose it either literally by making a choice to work where you work or to live where you live or to do the things that you do or to spend time with the people that you spend time with or you've chosen it by the way that you speak about your reality so the way that you talk about you know the the things that you see around you or the way that you think about the things that you see around you or the the actions that you take you know and the way that the the that the situation that you find yourself in makes you feel but you really are in control and you really did choose and create this and I'm not going to say it lightly I'm going to just put it out there when I first started my personal development journey I fucking hated this I fucking hated this I did not want to hear any amount of bullshit about how I created my reality because I wasn't ready to accept the fact that I did I was living like a little bit too much in victim mode and if you would have asked me then I would have said no I would have said that I was not a victim and I was totally accepting responsibility for my actions and I was totally accepting responsibility for you know the situations that I found myself in and I think to an extent I was but I was not under any circumstances accepting responsibility for the words that I was choosing and the action or sorry and the thoughts that I was thinking I wasn't I felt way more comfortable blaming my boyfriend at the time this is in 2008 I was at SFU and I was having some problems there with the with the guy that I was seeing at the time and then with the friends that I had so yeah I but I felt way more comfortable blaming all of them and blaming the weather in Vancouver for the fact that I was depressed and blaming this side of the other thing I mean literally anything other than the fact that I chose to be in that situation I chose the thoughts that I was thinking and I chose the words that I was using to create those thoughts so yeah it's it can be really it can be a really tough pill to swallow and I can totally respect that but I'm really here as a wake-up call for you that if you want to live the life that you you say you want to live you need to get your shit together and you need to start with your mindset period okay it starts by thinking about your pain sorry paying attention to the thoughts that you're thinking and it can feel a little bit like you're policing yourself 24-7 so there it can be a little bit rocky at the beginning we can find ourselves feeling like oh I said that like fuck I need to stop saying that or shit I can't say that anymore like you know you're so stupid for saying that and you know better why are you doing that like it can be a little bit negative when we're first starting out and I definitely experienced that myself I would really love to encourage you though to approach this process with as much kindness as you can muster and you don't need to do it perfectly you just need to do the best that you possibly can you need to love yourself to your to the best of your ability while you're going through this process it can be really frustrating and really hard feeling like your mind is working against you but you have neural pathways in your brain that you have fostered for as long as you've been alive and if you're trying to change that now that's amazing and like I am so proud of you and I'm so here to support you and like whether or not our paths cross I am cheering you on on your path but it can be really frustrating to think that to think a different way than you've been thinking for the entirety of your life give yourself a break okay it's going to be challenging but it's going to be worth it when you come out on the other side and your life looks exactly how you wanted it to look because you got your shit together and you like took control of your mindset so it does get better and easier over time and you know it never gets perfect and there's never a moment when you're not working on your mindset I am and I would consider myself an expert in mindset I'm a mindset coach and I still work on my mindset every single day I take action every single day to help me positively influence my mindset because I know that that's the number one thing that I need to do to live the life that I want to live um so I'm sorry if you were looking for a quick fix solution but there isn't one um I wish I could lie and tell you otherwise but mindset work and personal growth isn't one and done I say it all the time it just it isn't this is the journey of a lifetime and we are so fucking lucky to be you know alive and to be able to be on this journey so let's take advantage of that so now some tips and this is my favorite part of the podcast I love giving you guys like tips and tricks to make your life better and uh here we go so number one you have to recognize what feelings states thoughts emotions beliefs and actions are currently limiting you and holding you back you have them trust me we all have them the best thing that you can do here is write them down so whenever you catch a limiting belief whatever it might be write it down okay or if you hear a negative thought write it down um our words are usually our limiting beliefs and if they aren't exactly the limiting belief they are a gateway to them okay so this is what I said about recognizing so you have to first begin to recognize the thoughts that you're currently thinking in order to change them in the future okay you need to then step two take stock of the thoughts that you have about yourself so look at your habits here it sounds really similar to step one but it's a little bit different because I want you to acknowledge where you're not speaking kindly to yourself I want you to acknowledge where you don't necessarily think highly of yourself maybe the area maybe the topic that you know the specific topic where you don't think highly of yourself I want you to ask yourself if you feel capable of achieving your goals and really like sink into the way that you think about yourself and the words that you use to describe yourself do you feel positively about yourself and do you feel like you're capable of affecting positive change in your life that is step two step three is after you've kind of recognized and analyzed a few of your limiting beliefs I would really encourage you to dig deeper almost always when we start off talking about limiting beliefs we start at a surface level and the root of the problem is much lower so you might say to me like I don't feel capable of achieving my dreams and I would encourage you to ask yourself why and keep doing that and keep digging and digging and digging until you get to like whatever the core issue is and you might find that as you go through like your thoughts and you start asking yourself this question to kind of dig deeper you might find that the root of a lot of your limiting beliefs is actually one there might be one route for multiple thoughts that you're thinking this is honestly what I usually see with clients when I'm working with them one-on-one is that they come to me with like X number of problems or X number of concerns or X number of goals and when we talk about why they can't or haven't achieved them when we boil it down it usually comes down to one thing and we can then work on that on the route right because if you deal with things at a superficial level you're gonna get superficial results if you're willing to kind of like put your you know like galoshes on and like really start digging through your own shit then you will actually find the golden nugget which is the problem and the problem also within it holds a solution so if we don't start there it's really hard to move forward the next step is to reframe whatever limiting belief you have about yourself so this works both on a superficial and on a deeper level obviously on a superficial level it's a little bit easier and then on a deeper level it the change happens a little bit slower and over time so you've discovered a limiting belief that you have about yourself whatever it might be let's take my example my limiting belief was it's hard for me to make friends so here I want you to reframe what you're thinking so I want you to take the negative thought and turn it into a positive one this one for me is really easy it's super easy to transform it it's hard for me to make friends it's easy for me to make friends I know that sounds really banal and kind of simplistic but this is where you start this is the start of the of mindset work okay and so then instead of thinking this thought I would try to think the more positive thought how do I do that well anytime this thought of it's hard for me to make friends pops up I would switch it no you know hang on it's easy for me to make friends you know I make friends all the time I have a history of making friends you know people love me and I can go on do you see how I kind of built a really positive story off of that root negative story that's kind of what I want to encourage you to do and when I say like you have to reframe your thought I mean every time you think it I know that's really hard and at the beginning it's not going to be every time maybe it's going to be once per day and then after a couple of months or a couple of weeks it's going to be twice a day and then after a year it's going to be five times per day even still I find myself thinking negative thoughts it's not about not thinking them it's not about not feeling negative emotions it's not about not being in negative states it's about being there recognizing it acknowledging it accepting it and then reframing it quickly and moving on mindset work is about being in a positive state as often as you positively as you possibly can and then moving quickly from a negative state to a positive state when you find yourself one okay the turnaround time for me has lessened significantly where before I would have been mad at a bad or at a negative situation or like if something kind of bad happens in my life I would be pissed off for maybe days now it's like hours or minutes in some cases like literally somebody pisses me off I have a series of tools available to me you know at my disposal that I can use and I can turn my seat around in like a couple minutes half an hour an hour a couple hours a day whereas before it could have been much longer okay so yeah you want to really think about what you're saying pay attention to it catch it reframe it say the new story and really do so with loving kindness which is what I've been saying to you throughout this whole kind of mini course here really really really focus on loving yourself through the entire process speaking kindly to yourself when you do catch yourself in a negative state feeling a negative emotion sorry or thinking a negative thought okay and the last step involves the continued use of this positive thought how affirmations my friends affirmations so this is not about being Pollyanna super super super important that you recognize that this is not about fake it till you make it although there you know there is a certain amount of that and you can use that as a tool to move forward this is about maintenance I saw the negative thought I recognized it I analyzed it I asked myself if I believe it's possible for me to change it I reworded it in a positive way and now I'm going to continuously think that thought and I can either do that in two ways I can wait till the negative thought pops up and reframe it or I can use the positive thought as an affirmation at my choosing so like for me I have all of my affirmations on my phone and I have them set to pop up at different times per day so whatever it is that I'm working on I have a show up on my phone so that every day I am focusing on what I want to achieve I am choosing to be in a positive mindset and seeing these positive phrases throughout the day helps me be really present with what I with what I want to change and it really helps me make accelerated change yeah I think that's pretty much it guys I really hope this served you really quickly I'll recap everything so recognize your feelings states thoughts emotions beliefs and actions and how they're currently creating your reality I want you to take stock of your thoughts this is step two ask yourself do I speak kindly to myself do I think highly of myself do I feel capable of achieving my goals do I feel capable of of of making changes step three step three good lord like step three is to dig a little bit deeper into your limiting thoughts ask yourself why so whatever belief or limiting thought that you've recognized in step one and two I want you to ask yourself why do I feel this way and then continue to dig deeper until you get to the root of the problem remembering that dealing with a problem on a superficial level is going to get you superficial results results nonetheless you're still going to be making positive change but it might not have the long lasting or really deep effect that you're hoping for otherwise okay so really try to get to the root of the problem and then step four is to reframe that problem so whatever issue whatever the limiting belief is whatever the ultimate limiting thought is to reframe it in a positive way so this could be anything so if if you don't know where to start with this or if you get to the root of a problem and whatever you find there is maybe a little bit too comfortable I would encourage you to start with the affirmations that Louise Haye the literally the fairy godmother of personal development she always encourages people to start with I love and accept myself and I approve of myself and she says that you should say this a minimum of 400 times per day and to be honest with you from what I've seen in my own practice and my own my own personal experience with affirmations and reframing limiting beliefs she's absolutely right 400 times per day might not be enough and that's why I kind of say to choose affirmations and then put them in your line of sight that's why I keep them on my phone so that every day I'm repeating these things to myself and I'm you know consciously creating a positive environment in which I can I can flourish and I can grow so yeah reframe the limiting belief and then step five is to use it as an affirmation so if you don't know where to start what I was saying is I love and accept myself I approve of myself I am worthy of my desires like those are all really solid places to start because they really do get to the root of self-love and really accepting who you are in this moment in order to create a positive foundation moving forward so yeah that's it I really hope that you loved this I really hope that it served you I really hope that this video has such a fucking positive effect on your life um I think you can see like I get kind of like I'm almost buzzing because talking about this is so flipping exciting like this is my jam I freaking love this and it's like pretty much every conversation I have with people ever I feel like I probably annoy my friends and family but I don't really care because I'm happy as fuck and I love my life and I really make an effort to create the reality that I want to see around me and I really really really really really want that for you okay however you want to create that if that's by reading books or following positive people online or engaging with positive material in whatever way you can watching you know positive tv shows um positive movies avoiding negative stuff um and then also you know working with a coach that is how I got into coaching in the first place was I actually chose to work with a coach and it had a massive effect on my life and um yeah I just if that's something that you feel called to do then know that I'm here for you I'm actually running a program starting um next week so it starts after the 14th of September and it's called September is the new January and it's a one-on-one coaching intensive we meet once per week for an hour and it's all about finishing uh 2019 strong and achieving all that you set out to achieve and the reason why this um program is so close to my heart I thought about it last year and I didn't really have a chance to launch it I wasn't really in a space where I was feeling super confident my mindset was a little bit you know more limiting and it was kind of lack I didn't feel good enough about myself to launch this and this year was the year because I finally got my shit together and cut my mindset in order enough to launch and share this beautiful program with all of you so uh it's all about achieving uh the goals that you set out to achieve in January of 2019 before 2020 we talk so much about mindset because you can't even talk you can't even begin to have a conversation around setting and achieving goals without working on the way that you think period it's just it's not possible so it's all about mindset and uh teaching you like tools and techniques and strategies for reframing limiting beliefs and you know tapping into your higher self and connecting with yourself and really making it so when our series is over you can go out into the world and achieve all that you set out to achieve so making sure that 2020 is a massive success you know and giving you the tools to actually set intentions and set goals and achieve them so yeah I I if you're interested I would love to work with you and you can find out more about this program on my website at www.

SeptemberIsNew.

.

.

No what am I doing www.

CandiceElisa.

Com slash September I've had like a lot of brain farts today and I'm not really I'm not really sure why but it's probably just because I'm like so excited and vibing but yeah um if you'd like to work with me I would love to if this program doesn't sound right or if you're not able to start in the next couple weeks that's totally fine you can head to my website and you'll see all of the different coaching packages that I have available I offer one-off sessions I offer one month intensives or three-month programs and I also have bespoke packages meaning you come to me and we discuss what level of support serves you best so we can really create whatever package works best for you I'm happy to collaborate and co-create that way because coaching is ultimately all about you and whatever it is that you want to achieve and getting you from where you are now to where you envision yourself being all right so yeah I hope that this serves you love you guys so fucking much and yeah I can't wait to see you next week on the podcast and I hope you enjoy this have a really good day bye

Reviews

Great information! Very useful and can’t wait to start working!

Very true. Great reminder!