Three stages of belief
According to Tony Robbins, there are three stages of belief. The first one is opinions. This is a weak stage where you can change your stance under certain circumstances. The second one is beliefs. This is where you build your opinions based on your experiences and background knowledge, and they are a bit more difficult to change. Lastly, there are convictions. You believe in something so strongly that you won’t change what you believe. This stage can be both empowering and deeply discouraging.
After I read about this, I realized it really fits into my own experience.
Second-guessing
When I was younger, my mom always told me that I get distracted too easily and can’t follow through on anything. It was merely her opinion, and I got offended. At the time, I didn’t believe it and could just ignore it.
As I grew older, I gained some experiences of quitting. Those experiences made me second-guess if I was a quitter, just like my mom said. Once I got suspicious about myself, this small part of my mind started to accept it before I knew it.
As time went on, there were more times when I experienced quitting. Consequently, I guess I started to become certain about it. Of course, it affected everything I started.
It turned out that I secretly thought I was going to screw things up halfway through and end up giving up. This mindset meant I never fully threw myself into anything, even when I believed I had finally found what I truly wanted to pursue in life.
What stage I am in?
Yes, it was definitely a discouraging conviction. For all those years, I thought it was entirely because of my mom and blamed her for her poor parenting. Looking back, I was just making excuses every time I couldn’t follow through with what I started because I was so embarrassed to prove that she was right.
I could have refused to accept those unfounded opinions and proven that my mom was wrong. Instead, I provided her with living proof. I’ve always said that I didn’t want to let anybody else take the initiative in my life. But look how I just threw it away to others.
I would say that I’m lucky to figure it out before I die because I still have time to rewrite my story and change it.
What a relief I didn’t quit on thinking about it.