The Secret Sauce Podcast
Helping people build big businesses & live big lives - one ingredient at a time. That's our mission. Welcome to the Secret Sauce Podcast.
The Secret Sauce Podcast
Break Through the BS: Overcoming Limiting Beliefs Holding You Back
We explore how limiting beliefs develop from childhood experiences and why they persist into adulthood despite no longer serving us. Through personal stories, scientific explanations, and practical strategies, we provide a roadmap for breaking free from self-imposed limitations.
• Limiting beliefs typically originate from childhood conditioning, trauma, or failure
• Most people aren't born with limiting beliefs but develop them through life experiences
• The reticular activating system in our brain reinforces these patterns by filtering information
• Identifying your "rope" - understanding where your limiting beliefs come from
• Challenging the narrative by questioning the validity of these self-imposed limitations
• Taking immediate action is more effective than just thinking about change
• Surrounding yourself with positive influences who believe in your potential
• Breaking the cycle by being mindful of how we speak to children
• Reframing limiting beliefs as challenges with "watch me" responses
• The responsibility we have to not plant limiting beliefs in others
If this episode resonated with you, please share it, and we'd love to hear in the comments what limiting belief you're ready to overcome after listening.
If you are listening to this, chances are like us. At times you struggle with limiting beliefs, doubting yourself, little voice in your head telling you you shouldn't try that thing, you shouldn't do it, you're not good enough. If that is you, then this episode is for you this is the Secret Sauce Podcast with Chad Treese and Lacey Moores, where we want to help people build big businesses and live big lives, and we think that there's not a magic bullet for doing that, but there is a secret sauce.
Speaker 1:So a lot of these are going to be just the ingredients that can help you make up a secret sauce to build a big business and live a big life. Let's get into it. Welcome back to the Secret Sauce Podcast. I am Chad Treese here with Lacey Moores. Today we're talking about limiting beliefs, which is something I'm super excited about. I think it, for most people can definitely relate to this one.
Speaker 1:I think, if you're human, you have a little voice inside of your head. We're actually not born that way, but pretty much anybody beyond infanthood does struggle with limiting beliefs, and so I just want to talk about it, get it out in the open. We talk a little bit about why we have limiting beliefs, the science behind it, which is really important, then to understand how to get over it and how to crush those limiting beliefs. When they come up, you want to jump into it.
Speaker 2:Let's do it, I'm excited.
Speaker 1:Let's do it. I want to start with a story. If you would amuse me for a second Sure, but if you would amuse me for a second Sure, but if you've heard the story of the elephant and the rope, it's a parable, not a biblical parable, but a parable nonetheless. Yeah, go, the elephant and the rope. So there's a man walking through the jungle to an elephant camp, going to visit an elephant camp, and the adult elephants are there, completely uncaged, nothing keeping them there, chains, no cages, nothing.
Speaker 1:They could, their freedom is insight they can take off whenever they want, except for a very small rope tied around one leg. You got the picture now. So he asked uh, one of the um, not guides, but one of the elephant trainers asked like why, what in the world keeps them here? There's no, you know, there's no chains, there's there's no cages, what keeps them? And he's like, well, when they're really young, um, we tie that rope to their legs and at very young age, that's enough to keep them right where they are and they, they try to break free from it. They can't, they're not strong enough yet.
Speaker 2:At that time it's tied up to something.
Speaker 1:It's still tied up to something, even and uh, but they could break free and like. These are massive elephants. Right, they could break free at any moment. But because it's tied on at a very young age, they never understand. They never come to understand that they're strong enough to break free from that. It's something that chains them basically for the rest of their life and they don't even try.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 1:And to me that's a limiting. That's where, like, that's a perfect metaphor for limiting beliefs. Yeah, because it does start, and we'll jump right into the science of it, but it does start at a very young age. We're not born that way, we are born believing we can do anything. Right, that's our default setting as humans is that we could do whatever we set our mind to, and then it's trained out of us, which is sad, but it's the human experience, right, there's no avoiding that, so let's just talk about it. But where do limiting beliefs come from?
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:And they typically come from childhood conditioning. Yeah, most of the time it's in childhood, just like the elephant just like right, um, it's.
Speaker 1:somebody said something at one point in time uh, why would you try to do that? Or why would like? That dream's too big. Or you're not good enough to play for this team. You're not tall enough, you're not pretty enough. You're whatever it is, you're not good enough to play for this team. You're not tall enough, you're not pretty enough. Whatever it is, you're not enough. Yep, right. And then that haunts us for the rest of our life. That's that little voice in our head that, as we try to do something, says you're remember, you're not that, you're not enough, so that's the best we're. Limiting beliefs come from. A lot of times it's trauma or failure. So maybe somebody didn't tell you something, but you tried something, you failed, and then for the rest of your life, the rest of your experience is remembering that trauma of losing or failing and you don't try it anymore. You're just like that's okay, I couldn't do that. Now I can't do that.
Speaker 1:And you tell yourself I can't do that anymore because I tried it and I couldn't do it.
Speaker 2:So I'm having some major conviction here, because on another podcast you asked me to sing and I told you I wouldn't sing.
Speaker 1:Are you going to sing for?
Speaker 2:us. I'm not going to sing. But the reason I'm not going to sing is because when I was a young kid I tried out for choir in elementary every year and they posted that little sheet and I never made it and I just, and I'm okay with it. I'm good at other things but to myself I'm not a singer. Like people don't want to hear me sing, Like it's not good, and you're just saying all those things and I'm like man, I, if I really wanted to be a singer, I could have gotten voice lessons, I could have done all these things. But it is definitely caused by that one instance and I can even tell you the teacher's name. And my sister made it every year and I didn't, and like all these things wrapped around me not making choir that's so sad.
Speaker 1:I'm so sorry, I'm okay, you've grown into wonderful, without saying you're still really great. So, um, but no, I I mean it's a great example and um, it's sad when you think about it like it is sad that the you know, everybody has a story like that. Everybody has lots of stories like that. Because it's typically not one thing. Thanks for sharing that, by the way, but these are what make up who we are as people.
Speaker 1:These ingrained patterns in our brain that we learn at a young age, then we experience and then we hold on to them forever and uh. So limiting beliefs are very normal first and foremost, like understand that, like everybody's got them, yep, um, but just accepting that and then not doing anything about it, it would be foolish too, I think. So like yes, let's explore. Here's what they are, here's why we have them this is now, how do we?
Speaker 1:yeah, overcome it, let's go right. Um, we've talked a little bit about the reticular. A reticular activating system system as well the raz system right in your brain. Another reason why we have limiting beliefs right is because our brain feeds on what we feed it like.
Speaker 1:It continues to make it bigger and bigger right, so so that's that same concept and the reticular activating system says because you couldn't do something at one point in time, or somebody told you you couldn't do it, or you had this thought like maybe I can't do that, your brain starts to focus on that and will remind you.
Speaker 1:you said maybe you couldn't do that at one point in time. So the reticular activating system is really great at times it also can hinder us a little bit. So just having that knowledge and knowing okay, that's what that voice is inside my head it doesn't necessarily make it real right. Most of the time it's not Right, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I always call it the little man voice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yep, I'm trying to keep you little.
Speaker 1:There's value in listening to it. You can't push out every single thing. Like you have intuition, yep, there's intuition, and then there's a little man voice and deciphering which one is, which, like I get it like our brains are also hardwired to keep us away from things that could hurt, cause us danger. Yeah, exactly, pain, right. So, um, that's another thing that our brain and our bodies tries to tell us to avoid, because, you know when, when we were cavemen, there's a lot of things that could kill us at any given time, and so that's a natural instinct that we do. We do create those patterns, and so there is some value in listening to some things, but there's a ton of value in knowing what to push out, what is a limiting belief and what is positive intuition, right?
Speaker 1:So let's talk about how, how do we, how do we, how do we, what do we actually do with this information, right, right, um, I think, most importantly, you got to identify what the rope, what your rope is Like if we take it back to the elephant in the rope. What's your rope? Uh, what, what is that thing that's holding you back? What is the limiting belief and where does it come from? You do have to. Um, it can be a painful like I don't know if it was super painful for you to talk about that story about choir, right, but there's gonna be some things that are even bigger than that and it's like man, I didn't, I did not do that thing and that's kind of painful, but, uh, you gotta live in it, you gotta lean into it a little bit to understand where it came from.
Speaker 1:Um, so you can do something about it. And so you don't repeat that because, like we're parents, right, and uh, knowing it and actually understanding it, we can change the cycle too. Um, I think about it with kids all the time. Like, raising my kids is like okay, is the message that I'm giving them, trying to parent them away from something that could hurt them? Is that creating a limiting belief in them that will harm them later on in life? Man, that's kind of heavy, but it's real.
Speaker 2:It is real. You're getting emotional.
Speaker 1:No, you're good, go for it. Let me tell you a little story. I don't mind.
Speaker 2:When I graduated from my coaching program, that morning I got a text message from my dad and it was very heartfelt how proud he is. My dad's always been my number one fan and encourager and always has told me like, you can do what like whatever you think, lacey, you have the skills. He's always been my biggest cheerleader. And so I posted something that morning or that night whenever I after I went to this graduation from this really hard program, and I put a picture of my dad and I shared his message and I said just the impact that he's had on me and so many people ask like, where does your confidence come from? Where does like all of this come from? And I was blessed to have just an amazing father who was so good about all these things. And then somebody posted on there there who I know very well, who's actually related to me, and she said, man, this is incredible. She goes. I just think about what my life would be like if I had your dad and it rocked me.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It rocked me Cause it broke my heart too. You know, like I, I'm so blessed to have him, but so many people don't have him right, and it's such a powerful thing for our kids to hear what you know, not inflict all of these limiting beliefs on them when they're young. We have to protect them and keep them from harm, but we don't have to do all of that, and sometimes it's natural because it's what's ever been done to us.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, so good it's. Uh, I think it's still it's definitely worth discussing, Like it can be a little heavy at times, but still like you have time to disrupt that pattern right.
Speaker 1:Like, yeah, I probably have. My kids are eight and 10, about to turn nine and 11. And I know there's times in my life where I've tried to protect them from something that probably created this little inkling of a thought that would later on maybe in life, become a limiting belief. That's life, that is, it's going to happen, right. We just want to have less of that then have that be something that is like haunting them later on in life and we have a chance, like if we explore it, we actually have a chance to undo it, yeah, to do better, right. So, um, I didn't bring it up to like bring down the mood.
Speaker 1:I actually brought it up because amazing um, like it is worth exploring and doing better when we can and like, even in that experience, like whoever said that to you, right, just understanding that that existed, like she can start to break free from that If she did have limiting beliefs. That also your dad doing that for you probably did that realization of, oh yes, would my life have maybe been different if I had somebody like that? Yes, but now you saying it, maybe she raises kids, maybe she has grandkids, they have kids, whatever. There's so many ripple effects of it that it's so good to bring it to the forefront and it's not like, oh, I had this, you didn't type thing Right. So I think identifying the rope, identifying what the limiting belief, is super, super important.
Speaker 2:What's your when it?
Speaker 1:happens whenever you're in, like okay, questioning, can I do this thing? Are you cut out for this? Are you good enough for that thing? You have to acknowledge it, like if you just say, yeah, you're right, I can't. But so you got to start looking for it, like, okay, what is it and where is it coming from? Like, what experience is, where's that voice coming from and why is it doing it? Right, um, and then you have to challenge that narrative, challenge the story, uh, is.
Speaker 1:The next step of that is you are responding. You are in charge of your life, not this little voice, not somebody who a long time ago, told you that maybe you couldn't do this thing. So now that you've recognized it and you understand, maybe, why you have that limiting belief, now you've got to challenge it. It's like, no, I can do this thing. I am in charge of my future. Nobody's going to tell me I can't do this thing. Like, use it as a challenge, right, so it's every time that comes up, okay, how can I flip that script fast? Because it's very easy to get in that mode of you're right, I shouldn't try it. I'm going to go back to safety mode.
Speaker 2:You know. So it's so good because you said earlier, you can't make that voice go away. It will never go away. No matter how much you practice all this stuff, you're never going to make it go away. But what you can learn to do is not listen to it. So be quickly to identify that's a little voice. I'm not paying attention to you today. I'm not going to listen to you today because it's always going to be there. But it's whether or not you decide if I want to listen to you, if I'm going to give you any space in my mind.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you can turn it into. I think you can turn it into a positive. It's like when somebody tells me I can't do a thing now as an adult, right, when somebody else tells me, now if I tell myself I can't do a thing, that's bad, somebody else tells me I can't do a thing, then I'm like fuck you, yes, I can. And now I cussed again explicit. We got to mark it explicit, carson. Uh, but that's my mindset on that Right.
Speaker 1:If, like when somebody else tells me you're not good enough for that or I I I doubt you could do that, then I'm like watch me watch me right. The same thing If that little voice in your head when you have to challenge it.
Speaker 1:the same way if you're that little voice inside your head says you're not good enough for that thing. Say, if you watch me, I'll show you Right, so that's good. Stand up to the challenge, right, use it as inspiration, motivation. And then you got to take action, like quick action on it. Because if you sit there in thought, wondering, sooner or later you'll convince yourself that that thought is true. Right, so immediately recognize it, say, screw that. And then go take an action towards it.
Speaker 1:Doesn't mean like, oh, I, you know, I'm going to in your example, like I'm going to become a great singer. Taking action doesn't mean like you're like right now, if you start singing you're not gonna be great. But if you immediately say, okay, I'm going to work on that, I'm going to go hire a voice coach, I'm going to do these things like take action on that thing immediately, okay, because that starts to rewire your brain a different way. When you start to take action against these thoughts that you have, you're rewiring your brain that you can do this thing Right, and then the voice does start to change a little bit. So the thoughts that you put into your head definitely start to rewire your brain for the positive, not the negative.
Speaker 2:Right, that's really good too, because I think some people think that you can't rewire you can absolutely rewire your brain.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, it's the whole reason why you have these thoughts in the first place. You're born without it, right? And then you're creating this pattern that starts to lay down layers in your brain. But neuroscience tells us you can absolutely rewire your brain. But it does take effort. It does take acknowledging what's going on. Sure, so it's. It's. It's super exciting. To me. It's like studying the way that the mind works and everything. Um, I I used to not care about this stuff at all, and now I probably dive into it too much, but the more that you learn about them or you understand, it's like oh yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:You can lay down all new patterns. You could rewire the way that you're. You talk to yourself.
Speaker 2:So just basically, like back to my very plain um thing I said in the beginning about not being able to sing. Well, I could go out and get voice lessons, I could teach, like go through learning how to sing, which would then maybe help me sing better, and then if I ever went down that path of trying to sing for true, you know, whatever it is it is I could completely rewire my brain for my brain to think that I'm actually a good singer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, cause you're right that right now.
Speaker 2:But I'm just saying you're, you're saying we could, we could.
Speaker 1:Yeah, your brain doesn't live in a world where things are true or not true. Your brain lives in a world where it understands, uh, what you feed it. Does that make sense, Yep? So you, you definitely have to feed it the right things. If you lean into the things that's feeding that limiting belief, it's going to get bigger and bigger and bigger. You're going to get crippled by it and you're going to have more limiting beliefs, Like you're literally just like feeding the gremlin after midnight and it's just getting bigger.
Speaker 2:There's more of them right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the fact of the matter is, science says that action rewires the brain faster than thoughts.
Speaker 2:So taking action on it right away.
Speaker 1:That's good. So it reminds me of a story and it's a little sad, but I don't want to bring it down. But I do think stories are important. And so I've talked about my son before Cohen. He is 10. When he was 8. I think 8. He got 10.
Speaker 1:When he was eight I think eight, he got cut from a baseball team. I'm going to get emotional for a second, I'm sorry. Like that's not the sad part. The sad part is what it did to him. Yeah, because he's on a school team with his buddies, right, right, and he had a coach tell him you're not good enough. Yep, and I was preparing for this episode, wanting to tell this example, and it occurred to me that, like, what a failure on that adult's part. Right, to allow that, to care more about winning a couple games at eight, nine years old, when a school team, right, with their buddies, chances are a lot of these guys may, may or not go pro. I'm not trying to tell them you're not. I'm trying to. Not trying to plant that limiting belief, right, right, but to plant that limiting belief in a kid at eight or nine, yeah, that could later on affect everything. Right, it tears down the confidence, yeah, right and now he starts he'll question himself on stuff.
Speaker 1:I see his lack, lack of confidence and it comes from other people telling them you can't do that or you shouldn't try that or you're not good enough, and uh, it's a really good reminder for me because I coached his basketball team too, and I now coach his new baseball team and sometimes I'm too hard. Sometimes, like I, I don't look at that as an opportunity to teach the lesson that, like you, can absolutely do this and the responsibility that we have as adults yeah to not implant limiting beliefs in kids to not like plant that tiny little seed that could grow into something huge later on right so sorry, I got it's good, it's real but that's, yeah, a good reminder, hopefully out there to everybody.
Speaker 1:Listening is like you have an opportunity to flip the script you have an opportunity, even if you are riddled with limiting belief in yourself.
Speaker 1:Yes, let's work on fixing that right right uh, but also we have a responsibility to the younger. Yeah, to not plant those seats, right, right, uh, so that was a big one. Um, and I think I think about different limiting beliefs, like in our industries, right, I think there's a lot of people that say I can't. I can't do like robin, like I can't be like rob Robin, who does it all our national EVP of sales, I can't be a great mom and I can't crush it in this business. I can't do it all, I can't have work-life balance, I can't be great at everything, and I think that is a huge limiting belief that people just buy into. But the fact of the matter is you definitely can, right, if you want it bad enough, you definitely can.
Speaker 2:But we're told at an early age, like you have to have work-life balance, or you're not willing to You're not a good mom if you're working, like all of the things. That Robin for me was huge because she told me I can, and in a world of all of those things, and I was trying to be very careful to make sure that I was a good mom and I was a good spouse and and a good mortgage, you know, and all those things and and finally, you know being around somebody who says you can right.
Speaker 2:You can do it.
Speaker 1:You can definitely do it so. So I think the message there is surround yourself with people that are giving you, like feeding, the right information and right Um, no matter where you are in life.
Speaker 1:A kid, if you're raising kids. Wherever you are in life, surround yourself with people that are going to put the good in. They're going to tell you that you're capable of anything that don't feed into those limiting beliefs. And if you've got somebody in your life that they're a constant reminder of the things that you shouldn't try or maybe can't do, it might be time to cut them out. Right, or you either got to change them or you got to cut them out because it's not serving you at all. I think about with overcoming limited beliefs. One thing I wanted to like just leave probably leave the conversation with is one big thing for me is when I'm not taking the risks that I think I should be taking or I'm not doing the thing, I'm letting the limiting beliefs win, which happens a decent amount.
Speaker 1:I'm just being honest, um, I I have to remind myself if there was, if this was, a autobiography movie of my life and it's played for my kids later on what would they think of that?
Speaker 1:Would they look at that and be really jazzed up? Would they be excited about looking at their dad? And is this story a powerful one that they could look at and say look at my dad overcoming this thing or look at him succumbing to this thing. Is it something that lifts them up? Or is it something that, like later on in life, I'm I'm setting that pattern for them to be able to do it like? Show the show that generation, show the kids that are starting to get their own limiting beliefs that you can break through. That, um, is such a great lesson, and and so I think that's the easiest way for me is to think about like my life as either a story, a book or a movie, and is it something that I'll be proud of? Is it something that, when they're watching it, that I'm like, super proud that they get to see that in me More times than not?
Speaker 2:right. You're not gonna be perfect every day, but just to live with that intention, right? Well, I think it. I mean, that's just a testament, though, to you, chad, that you, you're always wanting to be better. I mean this is a testament, though, to you, chad, that you're always wanting to be better, you're always wanting to grow and you're always wanting to look into areas that need it.
Speaker 1:But I wasn't always that way right. This has actually been a change for me in the last few years. So I think there's a lot of people who have a limiting belief like I don't, like that's not me, right, it was me for a long time. I had this limiting belief that, like I don't believe in uh, human, like human development and growth, like it's kind of hokey to me and like I had that limiting belief Like I didn't want to lean into that, um and so I think, like that has not always been me, but it is super powerful. When you do and you lean into that, uh, the sky is the limit. The ripple effects are huge. Be that person, be that example for your kids, for the people around you. That's when life, that's where the magic starts.
Speaker 2:And it's where the color is. It's where the color is.
Speaker 1:Exactly, there's a whole lot of color there.
Speaker 2:A lot of color.
Speaker 1:That's where probably I would leave it.
Speaker 2:I don't know if I brought it to a great conclusion there. That was amazing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, limiting beliefs, yeah, limiting beliefs. Do not listen to them, do not, do not, do not push through. Break through. There's a whole lot more on the other side and don't push them on to other people either and don't be that person that pushes them to other people.
Speaker 2:Thank you yeah, amen, awesome guys. Thanks for listening.
Speaker 1:Uh, thanks for listening to me cry for a little bit, but uh, I appreciate you being here absolutely uh and I sure hope that we'll see you in a few weeks.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and if this was impactful to you, please share it. Please share this story because, man, you know we all have those stories and sometimes it's just good to hear somebody else's and then really internalize on that. So we would love for people to share this if this was something that was impactful for you.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Or a challenge Share in the comments somewhere what limiting belief, like now that you're exploring it, what is like your choir, like you kind of came to that revelation right then. Right, like if you had a revelation from this, like what was that moment? Uh, I'd love it to share it. Or a moment where you can see your kids, or whatever it is like do it, let's share it um and let's break through it my other one was roller skating.
Speaker 2:I've never been good at roller skating, and now I'm going to pick one. But I'm either going to come out of this conversation Chad, I'm going to learn to be a good singer or a good roller skater.
Speaker 1:I can't wait to hear which one you choose.
Speaker 2:That one might not be very safe in my age, um, but one of them, and I'm going to get over all those limiting beliefs and I'm going to go for it and learn something new.
Speaker 1:Awesome. I love it. Thank you so much. We'll see you next time, guys.
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