By LAURA LEONARD
Doctor of Chiropractic
Los Alamos

Have you ever felt stuck in a certain aspect of your life? The answer to this question is likely a yes for most of us. It is human nature to find ourselves struggling with repetitive patterns that we feel powerless to change.

The key to escaping from the hamster wheel is digging into our subconscious beliefs which lurk below the surface of awareness.

A great image to depict this is of an iceberg floating with only the tip sticking out of the water. What lies above is the conscious mind and what lies below is the subconscious mind. The question is why? It created an evolutionary advantage for our ancestors.

Threats could be categorized and stored in a vast database without affecting day to day cognitive function. With the slightest sign of a threat, the subconscious engages causing an automatic emotion and behavior. Very useful when we were cave dwelling and didn’t have google to rely on. The best way to know which system you are operating with is to take note when you are angry, sad, uncomfortable, anxious. This is your subconscious system kicking in. If you are analyzing, planning and using logic you are using your conscious mind.

Think of the subconscious mind is analogous to cloud storage. All of your photos, files and data are stored in the cloud just like your experiences stored in your subconscious. The reason why childhood experiences occupy more of our subconscious database is that the file folders used to organize future data are created when we are young.

Unfortunately, because of our need to remember where the poisonous berries were in our cave dwelling history, many of these file folders contain negative information from past experiences. Not exactly ideal when we desire big changes or even small changes in our lives. What files are in your cloud database that keep you stuck in repetitive patterns? The two keys to discovery are having the desire to change and being aware of our patterns.

The trick of determining patterns is simple. It all lies in looking at our repetitive emotional triggers. Begin to take note of what or who makes you uncomfortable, angry, anxious and think about why? Take your emotional reaction and bring it into your conscious mind by thinking about it logically. What is the primary thought or theme in the triggers? Once you start noticing common themes in certain aspects of your life, you are one step closer to transformation in the areas where you are stuck. Once you discover these negative file folders, you can work on permanently deleting and creating new files with positive emotions attached.
There are some simple tools you can use to re-script your subconscious files which I will dig into in next week’s column. For now, here is some food for thought….

“Whatever we plant in our subconscious mind and nourish with repetition and emotion will one day become a reality.” -Earl Nightingale

“It is psychological law that whatever we desire to accomplish we must impress upon the subjective or subconscious mind.” –Orlson Sweff Marden

Dr. Leonard’s practice focuses on posture and performance using a combination of soft tissue release, adjustments and exercise recommendations. She also coaches patients on nutrition, self-care and body awareness so they can manage themselves in between visits. Los Alamos Chiropractic Center is in the Mary Deal Building on Trinity Drive.