Unconscious Belief Systems, Thoughts, and Behavior

Don Miguel Ruiz said, "You are the way you are because that is what you believe about yourself." He’s bringing awareness to what I call the unconscious belief-thought-behavior cycle. Similar to our unconscious use of words and language, much of our thinking is unconscious too. Unconscious thinking leads to unconscious doing. Doing is the tangible creating of your life. Doing and thinking are frequently motivated by unconscious beliefs. Until you can see this, the cycle has created your life more than you have.

Ram Dass, a spiritual teacher and author who was previously a Harvard Professor says, “Identify with your soul, not your role.” The roles he is referring to are the variety of human roles that you play in the tangible world such as your gender, cultural and familial roles, and nationalistic roles. For example, I was born a male, Catholic, Caucasian, middle-class American. Role identification, while helpful for some normal operations in the real world, is one of the primary obstacles to life with the deepest level of Awareness.

Your gender role has the most significant influence because it’s the first and broadest identification you have. Either prior to your birth or immediately after you are recognized by either your penis or vagina, and immediately the world relates to you from a perspective about you as a male or female. I’ll refer back to my very first example in this book one last time about the events that shape your perspective to illustrate this. I said that the little boy decided to play baseball more instead of paint more based on his father’s positive response to him playing baseball. But why did the father respond so positively to seeing his son play baseball (which then influenced his son’s perception)? Because of another layer of cultural conditioning. Perhaps the most frequent and normal comment I hear among fathers with young children is something like “my son is naturally gifted at sports” with a hopeful tone and an authentic grin. It reflects an unconscious conditioned perspective that being good at sports is very important for little boys. And why would this be so important? It’s certainly not the most likely route to safety and security as only about five percent of high school athletes play in college and of those only another five percent will ever play at a professional level. The perspective is very closely linked to a parent’s first projected fear about their child experiencing criticism for not being normal—in this case masculine or athletic. It’s a caring, yet misguided hope from the parent that the child can avoid some of the experiences they themselves feared most—primarily feeling like an outcast or abnormal during adolescence, which is one of the most significant times in the psychological development of fears relating to socialization.  Or it’s a parent not wanting to feel outcast themselves in their existing social circles assuming they are being judged by other parents based on their children’s performance. Either way, all of this automatically shows up in a father showing excitement toward his child when he sees him playing baseball. The cycle begins to transfer without a father ever considering the idea of watching to see which activities and interests the child expresses the most authentic joy in. Without awareness, the father unknowingly directs the boy toward things considered by society to be appropriate for boys rather than supporting the child’s early authentic expression. Throughout a boy’s life in western culture, this might include giving toy guns as gifts, encouraging him to study courses that require very logical thinking and then encouraging professions that are considered stable. Along the way boys learn to express their emotions less and keep them inside. The boy doesn’t initially equate any of this to being male, but along the way he becomes conditioned that way based on his father and his environment appearing supportive of these traits. Generally speaking, this would be very different than if the boy studied dance and went into the arts which is considered more feminine and certainly less stable.

Of course little girls, who eventually become women, have the opposite characteristics but the same cultural conditioning experiences based on their gender. They are encouraged to be pretty, creative, open, and expressive.

Without awareness of this very first identification, we grow toward gender-based roles instead of our natural, soul level expression. Each gender develops patterns at the mental and emotional levels to match the way the world relates to them instead of growing into the world with their True Self that just happens to be male or female.

These patterns are significant because they frame the strategies  we develop to feel connected to others. Men’s unconscious minds see that characteristics like wealth, intellect, and power garner attention from others. On the surface it appears to be the “how-to” of never being alone and of being validated. Women’s unconscious minds see two other strategies. One is to be beautiful to attract men. The other is to have children. Similar to men, these appear to be the “how to” of ensuring love in their lives based in our confusion between what love is and what being needed or validated is.

As a result, many people live entire lifetimes with role identification and programmed thoughts and perspectives dominating their experience versus a perspective centered at the level of the “soul” to use Ram Dass’ words.

This is not to be confused with any social position about how men and women should be. The point I’m making here is that you have been significantly influenced merely by the genitals you were born with. It simply means that your gender is a role, but your soul has no gender. In the real world, this could unlock anything from your true sexual preference to simply explaining why you’ve always liked love songs but felt embarrassed to admit it. It does not mean that we are all neutral along the spectrum of masculine and feminine. It simply means that no matter what gender you are, it is not who are. Most likely you are a mix of characteristics and authentic interests that if seen categorically would include some things more masculine and others more feminine. The more you get to know yourself the happier you will be.

            I use the world cultural as a synonym for environmental. For the purpose of this section, I’m going to limit this to our Nationalistic and Religious influences as they are consistently strong, yet different across the globe.[AM6] 

            While associating with any group of people from sharing a favorite sports team to participating in an Alumni club can have obvious benefits on one level, our national and religious identifications have a long history of being obstacles to life with Awareness and producing consequences including resentment and violence.

            As an American I don’t recall anyone specifically saying to me “You are better than other people because you’re an American,” but I did become aware that was part of my perception and then asked myself if it was true. I quickly processed the following simple thoughts:

Question: Why am I an American officially?

Answer: Because I was born here.

Question: Did I have any influence in this?

Answer: No, I was just born here.

Question: So why would I think I’m better than somebody not born here, especially if none of us controls where we were born?

Answer: I don’t know.  

With that basic realization it was easy to review the news stories that were relevant when I was a kid as well as recall the way messages were delivered through media and American leadership. For me, it was the United States versus Russia and later the Persian Gulf war. The very basic message was always “we are right” and “they are wrong.” As an average American who said the pledge of allegiance every day at school, who had not traveled to foreign cultures to experience them for myself, and without an Aware parent or mentor, it was easy to fall into the cadence of our culture exemplified by this country song lyric sung by Toby Keith:

“Justice will be served

And the battle will rage

This big dog will fight

When you rattle his cage

And you’ll be sorry that you messed with

The U.S. of A.

`Cause we`ll put a boot in your ass

It`s the American way”

But where in there is compassion and discernment?

            The reality is that Awareness in the forms of compassion and discernment could still exist even where battle is selected as the strategy. But more often we fight from an emotional reaction instead. When this is multiplied by nationalism or other unconscious over-identifications, it is an obstacle to life with Awareness.

I remember shortly after the 9/11 attacks Deepak Chopra was being interviewed on Larry King Live. Deepak asked the viewers “Who did this to us?” After a number of angry responses including accusations towards “the terrorists,” and Muslims, Deepak revealed that “we did this to us.”

This was a profound moment for me. I was twenty-six years old,  enjoying a quickly growing income and some of life’s first luxuries. I was a proud American. I too thought “they” attacked “us.” But for one of the first times, I knew that “they” were “us.” “They” are “we.” [AM8] 

We may have been born on different land masses, with different color skin, different languages and today we carry passports with different country names on them, but we are not separated by anything other than our beliefs that we are and the identifications that we so often associate with unconsciously.

All seven billion people on the planet make up the collective consciousness among humans. And of course we can identify ourselves as members of our countries, but let’s do it with Awareness. Awareness that the majority of wars and violence on this planet are the result of being told “we” are separate from “them” and “they are our enemy.” Awareness that our cultural resentments are almost all something we were taught rather than having had a personal experience with. And awareness that even if we were legitimately harmed by someone or some group,  we have a choice to be good or evil, even in the face of evil.

Religious identifications without awareness are similar to nationalism except that instead of separating ourselves from each other based on geographic boundaries, we do it on the basis of “my” God versus “your” God as if there’s evidence to support that one is more true than another. The result is the same. Only the words are different.  “I’m a Christian and you’re a Muslim” or “I’m Catholic and you’re Protestant.” I am against you because you’re different and somewhere early in my life I was taught to resist you instead of love you, even though I don’t know you.

Resolution to these conflicts begins with awareness in your life. We cannot erase history, but with awareness we can look and see that our outward identities don’t need to perpetuate ill will a moment longer. The same elements of Awareness—acceptance, love, compassion and Oneness—can be put into play anytime. In real life, this might look like reading a book about a different religion or travelling to a new culture to observe for yourself what has influenced the people there. Even more powerful is having a conversation with somebody with different religious identifications than yours and doing so from the Awareness that nobody is right or wrong. You simply have different perspectives.

 There are dozens more role identifications that you have: your political affiliation, professional roles and clubs, socio-economic status, and even family titles like mother, father, and child. Each of these has the potential to overshadow who we are at our highest consciousness or soul. Simply bringing Awareness to each of these roles enables you to still play the role without over identifying with it to the point of it becoming an obstacle to life with Awareness.

You can see yourself as a Doctor, Professor, or Business Owner, knowing that’s a role you play, but it’s not the same as who you are. You begin to shed the fear that without these titles you will not be needed or loved. You can see yourself as a wife and a mom from outside the role of wife or mom. With Awareness you may very well want to keep doing exactly what you are doing and how you are doing it. Or you may find that some of these were chosen from unconscious mind patterns and without discernment. If so, you evaluate the situation and then repeat the keys to Awareness beginning with getting in touch with your authentic desires.

Let’s reverse engineer the cycle to reveal your true beliefs and the fundamental level where change starts from with some simple exercises. These are so simple that you can answer to yourself while reading or you can write them down if you prefer. The only requirement for this to be effective is that you be honest with yourself.

 

Exercise 1: Answer these questions:

Where do you live?

What’s your occupation and how much money do you make?

What religion do you identify as or what is your spiritual practice?

Do you vote liberal or conservative?

Are you in a relationship or single? If you’re in a relationship, with whom?

How do you spend your free time and with whom?

Exercise 2: Add the question “why?” before each question and answer again.

Why do you live where you live?

Why do you have the job you have? Why do you have the salary you do?

Why do you have the religious or spiritual affiliation that you do?

Why do you have the political affiliation that you do?

Why are you in the relationship you are in with the person you are with? Or why aren’t you in a relationship?

Why do you choose to spend your time the way you do and with those you do?

You may or may not know the answers immediately.  Or you might find yourself defending or justifying in your reply. For now, simply continue to be honest with yourself and observe the answers.

Normal responses often include:

“I always have” or “I moved here for a job” or “this is where my family is.”

“I needed work,” “It pays the bills for my family,” “I was trained to do this” or “I have a degree in this field.”

 “It’s what they offered to pay me.” “It’s a good salary,” or “I only have eighteen more years until my retirement package vests.”

“Because my parents did and their parents did too.”

“Changing would upset my family.”

“We’ve been together for a long time.”

“We stay together for the children.”

“It would be scary to try something else.”

“It’s all I know.”

Your answers in exercise 1 are your behavior—or what you do. Why you do what you do is revealed in Exercise 2 and this is how you currently think. In other words, you do what you do because you think what you think.

But why do you think and do what you do? Your thoughts come from and are a reflection of your belief systems. In other words, you think what you think because you believe what you believe. It might not be pleasant to discover, but no matter what you say you believe, an honest look at your life tells you what your beliefs are. Your life is a reflection of your belief systems.

 [AM6]I think there is value in talking about both nationalistic and religious identifications and their potentially limiting power.  But, you spend 8 paragraphs talking about nationalism and 1 talking about religion.  See Comment 145

 [AM7]Resources section—here you would need the song title, song writer(s,) and the album title, along with the date of release

 [AM8]You could eliminate this portion—as a way to even up the discussion between nationalism and religion.

 [AM9]Delete the ***.  The first sentence in the religion paragraph is a suitable connective transition.