The Link is What You Think

Written By admin • 3 min read

Indisputable, evidence-based health science makes it clear that health, happiness, wellbeing and fitness start with what we tell ourselves, perceive and think about people, places, things, events and situations. We are in complete control of our minds and our thoughts about outside events, not events. The mind is the root of all healthy healing and illness prevention.

This is a simple yet all-powerful insight I bring to everything I do in my work coaching folks and families “in their living room,” coaching professional athletes and elite amateurs “in their locker room,” and building executive prowess and organizational effectiveness “in the company board room.”

Here it is, so repeat after me:
The link is what you think.  I’ll say it again: the link is what you think.
Write it down in the box below and look at it the next time you are in traffic, have a run-in with your boss, look at your bank account, weigh yourself, wake in the morning and wonder what the heck you did the night before, or are on the way to your nearest gym or outdoor boot camp. The link is what you think, it’s not—NOT—the external event.

This box is the secret sauce to fitness, health and wellbeing, so I suggest you study it carefully.  I’ve boiled 300 years or so of “psychology” down to an easy to understand and apply diagram.
See the numbers? They mean something.

Position # 1 is filled with all of the situations, people, places, and events that actually happen to you in life.

Position # 2 is filled with your thoughts ABOUT those events.

Position # 3 is driven directly from those thoughts which create your feelings (some variant of anger, sadness and/or worry on the negative side of the emotional spectrum).

Position # 4 is filled with your reactions/behaviors to the feelings you created within yourself resulting from what you thought in position # 2—not the event itself, in position # 1.

We never go from an event to an emotion without thinking about the event first.  It’d be like cutting off your head to think an event “made you” or “got you” upset. You never get upset by an event—you create it by what you think about that event.  You are not passive recipients of emotions—you are active creators of emotion. Here’s the important thing:  unless and only until you THINK ABOUT events, you won’t have any feelings or emotions about events.  Do you think if someone shouts, “boo,” while you are in a coma, you’d feel fear? No, you wouldn’t because you wouldn’t be thinking anything about that event.

Have someone shout “boo” while you are home alone having been told there is a prowler in the neighborhood. Your position # 2 may be filled with thoughts that something terrible was about to happen to you.  Position # 3 would be filled with fear. At position # 4 you’d quickly get a baseball bat and call the police.  See?  The link is what you think, not the actual event.  Tell yourself (at position # 2) that you know it’s just your roommate playing games with you and instead of fear.

My point? The next time you “get scared” by a heavy barbell, “feel intimidated” by a group ex fitness class, “feel overwhelmed” by your exercise routine, or “lose confidence” in your ability to continue on your weight loss program, ask yourself this:

 What am I thinking that’s making me feel this way?
Is it true? Is it helpful? Is it inspirational? Is it necessary? Is it kind?

See the THINK inside those questions.

Trust me—you’ll quickly identify your erroneous thought, recognize it’s not actually true, and immediately want to replace it with a more logical, accurate and empowering thought. That’s what the 1-2-3-4 box is all about: growth, expansion, exploration and transformation. It’s the fence at the top of the mountain, not the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff. I encourage you to look at this box and examine your thoughts according to the THINK model frequently and see how quickly you learn that you are in total control of your emotions, you are never, ever, “made to” feel something, and you never “get” angry, upset or worried—you create it all yourself.

 How?

The link is what you think. That’s how. It’s the only way. The link is what you think.