Remember the fun we had playing with water? Watching those first droplets
flowing together, forming a tiny stream. Fascinated we would always add more
and more water to see how the the stream becomes bigger and wider. I guess we
all wanted to create another Mississippi, but were always interrupted by some
responsible adult spoilsport.
One night though, my brother and I did not close the outside tap properly. It kept dripping for a day or two, and two our astonishment, when we eventually got to play river-river again, we found that the dripping tap caused a deep and wide river, ruining mom’s flowerbed.
I dare to compare the forming of neural pathways to the above images. When we
initially have a thought, a tiny stream of connections forms in the brain. If that
thought is not being repeated in a period of 24 hours, the tiny stream dries up
and disappears. As that thought is repeated again and again, the stream, or
neural pathway, becomes stronger, wider and deeper, causing us to act in a
specific way.
To make it more interesting, these pathways can form negative associations, also
affecting our behaviour. Remember the embarrassment of that school photo
where you sneezed the very moment the button was pressed? Your brother
started wiping his face every time he saw the photo, and for a long time every time
he saw you. Dad showed it to Granny, laughingly asking if he should really pay for
such rubbish. Mom made a fuss, maintaining that she could not believe the
photographer did not take another photo. So, you ended up with negative
associations about having your photo taken. And guess what, to this day you look
uncomfortable on every photo you ever had to pose for.
The good news is, we are not stuck with current brain pathways. They can
be changed by concrete and positive information repetitively, like “I look
stunning in photos.”
Note, these affirmations are as concrete as possible, e.g. Not “I can look
stunning photos”, but “I look...”
It is in the present tense, not “I am going to look....”
My statement reflects positivity and excitement “...stunning photos”
How long does it take before you can get that selfie stick out? Different
factors and individual responses cause for uncertainty. In general, it is said
to take roughly 20 to 200 repetitions of the same proclamation. Believe
what you are telling your brain and keep repeating that proclamation, soon
you’ll look like Miss Personality 2021 on every photo.
https://lifexchangesolutions.com/neural-pathways/
Neural Pathways: How Your Mind Stores the Info
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