New Resolutions: How do we change the way we think?

Recently, my grandson has told me how good he is at something—math, football, baseball, basketball, reading—there is no shortage of confidence. At first, I thought that I should teach him some humility. But then I thought about it some more. Based on some recent research which looked at key leadership issues in over 7,000 organizations and 48,999 leaders, one of the top 20 issues is understanding how others perceive them and recognizing their impact on others –along with improving their confidence, approachability and communication style, especially when delivering difficult messages. I have also found this to be a very common issue at the senior leadership level.

This is a difficult issue to attack from a consulting and coaching perspective because it often comes from a stronghold and those are difficult to identify and address. Research shows that we form attitudes and beliefs early in our childhood. We absorb our mental attitudes from our environment in two primary ways. First, we assimilate them into our minds through prevailing experiences such as the homes in which we were raised, the schools that we attended, or the neighborhoods in which we played. These values are not taught, they are caught. Different children will respond to the same environment in different ways. Therefore, they evaluate these things differently. We also develop mental strongholds through traumatic experiences like a divorce in the family, a death, or different kinds of physical or emotional abuse. As a result of these life situations, we are in bondage to the lies that we believe because of those experiences.

I would define strongholds as mental habit patterns of thought. They are memory traces burned into our minds over time by the intensity of traumatic experiences. Some psychologists call them defense mechanisms. What makes them difficult is that they become ingrained in how we think about ourselves and others. They are like deep tire tracks in a muddy road. After the ruts have been made and left to dry over time, the driver doesn’t even have to steer anymore. The car will just follow those ruts and every attempt to steer out of them will be met with resistance. And mentally, if we follow those neurological pathways for six weeks, a habit will be established and if that happens a stronghold is formed.

As I work with executives, I find a common problem with what I would call an inferiority complex which is a mental stronghold. No one is born inferior to another. But in this competitive world it is almost impossible to not feel inferior to someone who is faster, stronger, smarter, or better educated. Thus, soon enough, my grandson will get some negative feedback from the world we live in. Or will he?

Another example would be the unhealthy characteristics exhibited by children of addicts or alcoholics. An illustration of this is an addicted father with three children. The oldest stands up to his father. The middle child accommodates his father and the youngest runs away and hides. Years later, those three children are each confronted by a difficult situation. Odds are that the oldest one will fight. The middle one will accommodate and the youngest will run away and hide.

But if we have been trained wrongly, we can be retrained. If we believed a lie, we can now believe the truth. And if we have programmed our mind wrongly, we can be reprogrammed. We can be completely transformed by the renewal of our mind.

Science tells us that it takes four to six weeks to replace these thought patterns. Every time the thought comes into our mind we need to replace it with a new thought, clean thought, or positive thought. If we continue to put garbage in, we will get garbage out. But if we put good things in, we will get good things out.

Imagine your mind as a pot filled with coffee. Because we mix water with lots of coffee grounds the liquid is dark and dirty. But let’s suppose that we let that pot sit on the table and each day we put an ice cube in the pot. At first we won’t notice any difference,, but after two weeks we notice that the pot of liquid is much lighter. If we keep doing this for six weeks, we will not be able to smell taste or see the coffee in the pot. This works as long as you don’t add coffee. In other words, if we clear up the thinking that led to the stronghold and do not let it reenter our minds, our mind will be renewed.

I work a lot with renewing the minds of senior executives in their businesses and organizations. And it certainly helps them improve their performance. But thousands of years ago, the secret was known. A prophet named Isaiah said, “You will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in God.” Scripture talks about “...being made new in the attitude of our mind,” and instructs us to guard our heart for everything we do flows from it. It says, "For as he thinks in his heart so is he.” So maybe, just maybe, we can be made new not only in the organization, but also in the way we live. Maybe there is a way to guard our minds against the input from the world we live in.