Why a good state of mind is the foundation for everything – and why it has nothing to do with positive thinking.
A constructive state of mind. A creative state of mind. A relaxed state of mind.
That's the best foundation there is. For every human being. For every family. For every company. For every encounter between human beings.
We live in crazy times
Compared to the last decades and centuries, we humans have built ourselves a world that is totally crazy. Media. Communication. Visuals, video, audio, AI, you name it. So much has happened. And so fast.
And many people feel like they're trapped. Caught in the turmoil.
We can't change that. We can't turn back time, and escaping the modern world is damn hard. Sure, there are ways. But I think most of us don't even want to be escaping all the time.
So the real question is a different one: How can we see our world – our human world, our personal, very own world – more constructively?
This is not positive thinking
I'm not talking about positive thinking. Not about reframing or anything like that.
I'm talking about seeing ourselves as human beings the way we really are. Not the way we thought we were most of the time.
Seeing how brilliantly we are made. It's just that for the longest part of our evolution, we humans didn't understand that – at least the vast majority of us didn't.
And what if many more people could see it? How brilliantly they are made. How perfectly our mental operating system works.
Why does that make a difference?
Because all we are is pure creativity, wisdom, love, and unfathomable intelligence. And with that very creativity, we can create the illusion that we are none of that.
How do I know?
Because I see it every day. And I see it in myself. I see it in the people I coach. I see it in my family. I see it in every human being in action. Not always, but more and more often.
For decades I didn't see it. At least not clearly. I had moments, glimpses of how brilliantly I'm made, of how we humans are built. But I didn't really get it.
The planet you were given
Imagine someone gave you the whole planet Earth.
Everything. The jungles, the highest mountains, the deep sea, the beaches, the forests. Every human, every animal. A gift called Planet Earth.
And you live with your little family in a dry desert. Stone and sand. Your whole life, you search for water, just so you have something to drink.
Until the day you die, you never see the sea. Never a forest. Never a fish. Never a beach. Never snow, never the beauty of the mountains. You think the only thing that exists is stone and sand, with a little water now and then. And most of the time you're afraid – of not finding enough water, of not having enough to eat, because there are hardly any plants and animals out there.
So you live your whole life in fear. Without ever noticing that you could beam yourself to any other place on this planet at any time and live there.
Okay – at this point the story gets a bit weird. Totally fine. It's a metaphor, not a real story. It's a picture I'm painting for you: we humans are so much more than we think. So much more capable of great things than we can imagine.
So picture this: you beam yourself – your family and friends too, but above all yourself, because it's your mind, your system – into the most beautiful paradise. Beach. Fish for infinite lifetimes. Sometimes you beam yourself back to the desert. But most of the time, you now live in paradise. No longer in the hellish heat of stone and sand.
Heaven and hell are inside you
Because the planet I'm talking about isn't just Earth. It's your planet. Your inner world.
And your world isn't only your thinking. There is a world beyond your thinking. There is a world before your thinking.
That's why heaven and hell are states of mind. Levels of consciousness. That's why they are inside you, and you visit both places from time to time. The ratio is what makes the difference: how long do you spend in hell, and how long do you enjoy yourself in heaven?
And one more essential point:
When you see hell for what it is –
namely, thought brought to life as a full-body experience –
it very quickly loses its power!
And you can breathe again.
What you create with this brilliant system is up to you.
You were given the whole planet.
And along with it, this magic paintbrush, the superpower called "Thought", with which you beam yourself from place to place. Without having to mistake the place for reality.
Start looking.
You don't have to create something great.
We are not limited. That's the point of this picture: there is so much more to what you truly are, to the core of your being, than you think.
And no, I'm not saying you have to create something great. If you want to, please do, gladly. Once you realize how your operating system works, it gets so much easier. But you don't have to create anything great to live a beautiful life.
Seeing how you are made is the best foundation for living in a beautiful feeling. And for creating whatever you want.
The feedback is built in
And the beautiful thing is: the system is built so brilliantly that you feel what you think. Always.
Which means you have a built-in feedback mechanism, all the time. If it doesn't feel good, I probably wouldn't keep thinking that way.
Not as a technique. It just happens, more and more, the more I see how it works.
Without even knowing what I was thinking. Sometimes I know, sometimes I don't. That's not the point.
Listen closely, this is really important: I don't have to know what I thought when I have a dark feeling.
(And if you love dark feelings – please, go ahead. Keep thinking that way.)
Why feeling good is the foundation
Most of us want to feel great. Most of the time, at least. We want to be in awe of our lives and really enjoy them.
No matter what we're doing. Working, being with our family, doing things that used to feel hard. Even our taxes.
Feeling good is the foundation, because that's exactly where you're most creative. That's where it really happens, where the rubber meets the road. That's where things get done without you thinking much about them. That's where you live from a different place.
That's where you can lie on your deathbed and say: "I lived a beautiful life, and I don't regret anything."
Don't we all want to get there, when we know it's coming to an end? Don't we all want to live in beautiful feelings, at least most of the time? Maybe there are exceptions. That's okay. Because I'm not talking about what you have to do.
The system before your experience:
I'm talking about how you are made.
About the system behind your experience. Before your experience. The system that lets you experience anything at all in the first place.
It's always there. Whether you believe it or not. Whether you agree with me or not. It doesn't change. It lies beneath all of your reality creation, before all your feelings, before your thinking.
And the beautiful thing is: you don't have to build it. You don't have to fix it. You simply get to see it.
Gabriel Beyer is a transformational coach and the host of the podcast "Perfekt Imperfekt". He works with people and companies on the Inside-Out understanding of how human experience is created.