BITESIZE | The Powerful Daily Habit to Break Unconscious Patterns & Create Lasting Change | Dr Joe Dispenza #599
Dr. Joe Dispenza, a best-selling author and researcher, discusses how to break free from unconscious patterns by leveraging the critical morning hours. He emphasizes intentional programming over reactive engagement with external stimuli, highlighting the profound impact of thoughts and feelings on one's personal reality.
Deep Dive Analysis
9 Topic Outline
Introduction to Dr. Joe Dispenza and Morning Routines
The Subconscious Mind and Brainwave States
The Problem with Reaching for Your Phone First Thing
How Thoughts and Feelings Create Your Reality
The Importance of Mental Rehearsal and Unlearning Old Patterns
Dr. Joe Dispenza's Personal Morning Routine
The Pre-Meditation 'Think Box' Ritual
Evolving Your Meditation Practice and Daily Behavior
Addressing the 'No Time' Excuse for Self-Work
7 Key Concepts
Subconscious Mind Access
The door to the subconscious mind opens when waking up and going to bed, due to brainwave shifts from beta to alpha to theta, where the analytical mind is suppressed, making one more receptive to programming.
Analytical Mind
This part of the mind acts as a barrier between the conscious and subconscious, and when it's suppressed (e.g., in alpha or theta brainwave states), the subconscious becomes more accessible and programmable.
State of Being
This is defined by the combination of how a person thinks (language of the brain) and how they feel (language of the body), and it directly influences their personal reality.
Unlearning Process
This involves becoming highly conscious of one's unconscious thoughts, habits, and emotional responses, then actively choosing to prune old synaptic connections and deprogram automatic behaviors before establishing new ones.
Mental Rehearsal
The practice of consciously imagining and preparing for desired behaviors, responses, and feelings, similar to how athletes or actors prepare, to install new neurological hardware and create new patterns in one's life.
Think Box
A preparatory mental space or activity, used before meditation or other intentional practices, to organize thoughts, clarify intentions, decide what to focus on and what to avoid, and assign meaning to the upcoming activity.
Play Box
The phase of execution following the 'think box,' where one acts or meditates without analytical thought, having already pre-planned and clarified intentions.
6 Questions Answered
The first part of the day is critical because the door to the subconscious mind is open, making it an opportune time to program new behaviors and rehearse a different way of being, rather than letting the external environment dictate your thoughts and feelings.
Reaching for your cell phone first thing connects you to known people, places, and problems, triggering past emotions and thoughts, which allows the environment to control your state of being and keeps you thinking and feeling in the past.
Thoughts are the language of the brain and feelings are the language of the body; together, they create our state of being, which in turn creates our personal reality, meaning that if we consistently think and feel in the past, our life will remain the same.
Unlearning involves becoming highly conscious of unconscious thoughts, speech, actions, and feelings, observing them without judgment, and actively stopping the program by staying conscious rather than going unconscious in daily life.
It's crucial to make time for oneself, even if it's a small experiment, to invest in one's future and believe in possibility, as change can occur through joy and inspiration rather than waiting for a crisis.
A pre-meditation ritual, or 'think box,' is used to organize thoughts, clarify intentions, decide what thoughts and emotions to avoid, and assign meaning to the meditation, which helps quiet distracting brain circuits and allows for more conscious and effective practice.
20 Actionable Insights
1. Program New Morning Behaviors
Utilize the unique brain chemistry upon waking to program new behaviors and ways of being, as the door to your subconscious mind is wide open.
2. Delay Early Morning Phone
Avoid reaching for your cell phone immediately upon waking, as it connects you to known problems and triggers past emotions, allowing the environment to control your state.
3. Establish Intentional Morning Routine
Create an intentional morning routine to prime yourself for the day, as it significantly impacts your productivity, interactions, and overall presence.
4. Implement Think Box Protocol
Before meditation, engage in a ’think box’ ritual (e.g., waking early, writing notes) to organize intentions, identify thoughts/emotions to avoid, and assign meaning, preparing for deeper practice.
5. Mentally Rehearse Desired Self
Apply mental rehearsal, like athletes and actors, to your own life by repeatedly practicing and envisioning the person you want to be, thereby installing new neurological hardware.
6. Unlearn Old Self First
Actively engage in an ‘unlearning process’ by becoming conscious of unconscious thoughts, speech, actions, and feelings to break old habits before reinventing a new self.
7. Cultivate Unconscious State Awareness
Continuously observe and become conscious of your unconscious emotional responses and habitual behaviors throughout the day, as this awareness is the first step to stopping unwanted programs.
8. Daily Self-Evolution Practice
Engage daily in conscious self-evolution by asking ‘What am I working on today?’, intentionally responding differently, thinking new thoughts, and practicing desired emotions.
9. Practice New Behaviors in Life
Actively practice new, desired behaviors and emotional responses in everyday situations (e.g., meetings, family interactions, driving) to reinforce intentions and create new experiences.
10. Reflect on Your Day
At the end of each day, reflect on your actions and emotional responses by asking ‘How did I do today?’ and ‘How would I do it differently?’ to learn from mistakes and evolve.
11. Assign Meaning to Practices
Consciously assign meaning to your actions, especially before practices like meditation, as this activates the prefrontal cortex, quiets distracting thoughts, and enhances value.
12. Practice Finding Present Moment
Dedicate energy and awareness to finding the present moment, as this practice helps the body relax and respond to the mind, enabling different responses to life’s circumstances.
13. Reflect and Plan Post-Meditation
After meditation, reflect on what went well to reinforce positive patterns, then identify areas for improvement, clarifying what you will and won’t do in your next session.
14. Replace Limiting Beliefs
Identify self-limiting thoughts like ‘I can’t’ or ‘it’s too hard,’ and consciously replace them with empowering beliefs such as ‘anything is possible’ to cultivate a new internal voice.
15. Prioritize Self-Investment Time
Make time for self-investment, even if brief, by intentionally deciding what thoughts, actions, and feelings you will avoid or cultivate, as this commitment invests in your future.
16. Choose Joy for Change
Recognize that you have a choice to learn and change from a place of joy and inspiration rather than waiting for pain, suffering, or crisis to compel transformation.
17. Use Meditation for Self-Familiarization
Understand meditation as a process of becoming deeply familiar with your current self and then familiarizing yourself with a new, desired self, preventing default to old patterns.
18. Shorten Reaction Time
Acknowledge that defaulting to old reactions is normal, but focus on reducing the duration of these reactions by consciously choosing to return to your desired state as quickly as possible.
19. Believe in Future More
Cultivate a stronger belief in your desired future than in your past, as this conviction provides the motivation to consistently show up and do the work necessary for personal transformation.
20. Avoid Morning Stress Triggers
In the morning, avoid immediately engaging with news, emails, or social media, as these can condition your mind and body with stress and allow the environment to control your thoughts and feelings.
7 Key Quotes
When you're in alpha or our analytical facilities are suppressed, we're in theta, we're in a hypnotic state and the door between the conscious mind and the subconscious mind is wide open.
Dr. Joe Dispenza
If you can't think greater than how you feel and you believe that your thoughts have something to do with your destiny and you understand that feelings and emotions are a record of the past, then you're thinking in the past and your life will stay the same.
Dr. Joe Dispenza
95% of who we are is a set of memorized behaviors, automatic emotional responses, unconscious habits, hardwired attitudes, beliefs, and perceptions that are running pretty much like a computer program.
Dr. Joe Dispenza
How you think, how you act and how you feel is your personality and your personality creates your personal reality.
Dr. Joe Dispenza
The unlearning process is as valuable as the relearning process. The breaking the habit of the old self has to happen before you reinvent a new self.
Dr. Joe Dispenza
When you assign meaning to the act, you turn on your prefrontal cortex and the prefrontal cortex says, quiet, everybody that's not involved in this intention, settle down.
Dr. Joe Dispenza
You can learn and change in a state of pain and suffering, or you can learn and change in a state of joy and inspiration.
Dr. Joe Dispenza
3 Protocols
Dr. Joe Dispenza's Pre-Meditation Ritual
Dr. Joe Dispenza- Wake up early (around 4:30 AM) to avoid distractions.
- Enter a 'think box' phase: organize thoughts, decide what thoughts/circumstances/emotions to stay away from during meditation, and clarify intentions for the meditation.
- Review how to execute the meditation (e.g., how to open the heart, how to do a breath technique, what to create).
- Write down notes if needed to process disturbing thoughts or calendar items, ensuring they are set aside for later.
- Assign meaning to the act of meditation, which engages the prefrontal cortex and quiets other brain circuits.
- Transition to the 'play box' phase for meditation, where execution occurs without analytical thinking.
Post-Meditation Reflection for Evolution
Dr. Joe Dispenza- Reflect on the previous meditation: What did you do well? What felt right? What did you execute successfully?
- Articulate and remind yourself of these successes to reproduce that level of mind and install neurological hardware.
- Identify what you would work on improving in the next meditation.
- Become aware of what you don't want to do that you did in the last meditation (e.g., getting distracted by thoughts of work or an ex).
- Get clear about what you are not going to do and what you would do differently if you had another opportunity.
Daily Self-Observation and Evolution
Dr. Joe Dispenza- Stay conscious of unconscious thoughts that slip by awareness.
- Watch how you speak and observe how you act.
- Pay attention to the way you are feeling throughout the day.
- Become so conscious of unconscious states of mind and body that you don't go unconscious in your waking day.
- At the end of the day, ask: 'How did I do today? Did I fall from grace? When did I lose it, and with whom? If I had another opportunity, how would I do it differently?'
- Use mistakes as learning opportunities to avoid repeating old patterns.
- Rehearse how you want to be in future situations (e.g., a Zoom meeting) to ensure behaviors match intentions.