You know those moments where you wake up in the middle of the night and your mind is racing with thoughts and ideas or even right before you go to bed you have a hard time falling asleep because you can’t shut your brain off? Welcome to your subconscious mind.
This morning I woke up at 5:30am (which may be normal for you, but 6:30am is normal for me), but I woke up wide awake while it’s still pitch black in my room with dozens of thoughts and ideas running through my mind about ways to provide more value to women who want body image coaching, how to improve the ABS Protein Pancakes formula and create a new flavor, how to continue to reach thousands upon thousands of women all over the world who would benefit from strength coaching both physically and mentally, etc. I laid in bed for a second and just let the ideas and images run through my mind until I got a clear picture then I immediately got up, poured a cup of coffee and sat down with a pen and paper to write it all out to make sure I didn’t forget.
Here’s the thing, most people when they experience the above scenario I mentioned at the beginning of this will probably get frustrated and do everything they can to just shut their mind off. However, once you are done reading this article and understand how your subconscious mind works you will stop treating it like a pesky friend that won’t leave you alone and more like your best friend who has all the answers you need and have been searching for in life.
So let’s dive into the basics to help you understand the way your mind works.
The Conscious and Subconscious Mind
You have your conscious mind and your subconscious mind. Your conscious mind is the mind that takes you through each waking hour of the day, reminds you of your errands, autopilots you when you’re driving, gets you through work, knows how to pay bills, etc. basically your routine daily things. It takes things that you have habitually taught it and then puts them into action on a day to day basis with little to no thought. This is why you can zone out when driving and still some how make it to your destination and wonder “wait, how did I even get here I wasn’t even paying attention because I was thinking about…” You can thank your conscious mind for doing that. So how did your conscious mind get trained to do all of these things without thinking so that you literally don’t have to be present at all and still make it through the day safe and sound? Your subconscious mind aka the mother ship.
Your subconscious mind is the deepest part of your mental processing that creates lasting memories (both happy and painful), that creates patterns in your life, that comes up with that million-dollar idea, that creates “synchronicities” and serendipitous moments that create those conversations of “you can’t make this up! What are the odds of that happening!”. Your subconscious is also the part of your mental energy field that is directly connected to Source, God, The Universe, (whatever you feel comfortable calling it) but basically like the genie of the universe that sees and knows all which is why so many high performers in life all have a meditation or spiritual practice because this is the best way to consciously connect with your subconscious for answers and direction because it requires your full present moment awareness. The amazing thing is that your subconscious acts almost as a sponge and absorbs the information and thoughts you impress upon it and take in throughout the day. The thoughts that you repeatedly think or the thoughts that have the biggest emotional impact on you, your subconscious kind of “pings” them as important and plans them deeply into your energy field. This is why when you are “in love” you literally can’t stop thinking about that person because there are so many emotions that are involved in every little thing you do directed towards that person that your subconscious starts going crazy with “pings” every time there is a strong emotional reaction to make a deposit in your mental energy bank to “remember this! This is important!”. However, the same is true also with painful and hurtful experiences.
The good news is that your subconscious mind does not know the difference between what’s real and what is in your imagination. The bad news is that if you don’t know how to work with your subconscious mind instead of against it then this also is true for the negative experiences you have in your life or you have created in your mind with thought pterns. For example, if you start paying attention to things you say habitually throughout your day you will start to see patterns. This happens a lot with people getting sick, losing weight, and getting injured. If you walk around saying and thinking things like “Oh that’s just my luck I would get stuck in traffic…..I gain 5lbs even just looking at a bowl of ice cream….every time before I start a new workout regimen I always get sick…”etc then don’t be surprised when that’s exactly what happens because your subconscious hears this and goes “Ok so every time they eat ice cream make their body hold onto it instead of metabolize it. Got it…..Every time life starts looking good, create a dramatic problem to ruin everything because it’s too good to be true….got it. Ok they say all the good ones are taken so therefore we will only bring her/him taken individuals...got it”.
Your subconscious takes everything you think and say as an absolute. This is why it’s so important to choose your thoughts and the things you repeatedly say carefully or else you will continue to create frustrating patterns in your life.
This is also the biggest component I use with the ABS Fit Life is we do our gym strength training to strengthen our bodies but just like creating habits in the gym we also have to strengthen our minds so that you stop identifying yourself as an overweight, out of shape, fat person and you start seeing yourself first in the mind the way you want to see physically. You can apply this to any area of your life: stop seeing yourself as a broke person living paycheck to paycheck and start mentally seeing yourself living with plenty of money and always being able to do what you want financially. It has to first happen in your mind. There’s the saying of “You have to see it to believe it”, but this is actually backwards and should say “You have to believe it first in order to see it”.
A great book that I recommend to everyone as a staple for understanding your subconscious is The Power of Your Subconscious Mind by Joseph Murphy.
Now that you have an understanding of how the subconscious mind works, let’s go back to the beginning of waking up in the middle of the night, can’t sleep, or early morning wake ups with racing thoughts. The time that your subconscious mind is most primed for suggestive ideas (for re-programming) is right before bed and first thing in the morning. This is because with our daily lives this tends to be the time we actually slow down and are the most present so we are able to connect with the subconscious mind without distractions. This is also why meditation is so important because it is slowing down and connecting with the present moment enough so you can hear your subconscious and quiet that thinking mind.
I woke up at 5:30am this morning with tons of ideas and answers because right before I went to bed last night (I’m talking within 10 minutes of falling asleep), I laid in bed and I have my goals/vision board on my wall next to my bed and I kind of just enjoyed the silence and looked at these goals and vision boards letting my mind dream up all kinds of things (aka I was planting these “things” in my subconscious) and I then went to sleep. That’s it. My subconscious got the memo of everything I gave it and provided me with ideas and answers for how to manifest those things into my reality.
I have a rule that I don’t check any emails or social media until after a certain time in the morning because I know how valuable that time is when I first wake up. It sounds crazy, but it literally could be the difference of moving forward in my life or staying exactly where I am at because the source that has all those answers needs my attention. Once you start to see how this works in your life, I guarantee you will start looking at how you spend those last few hours and start your day a little differently.
I know this is a lot and if this is all new to you then this information can be overwhelming especially if this is the first time you have ever been aware of your thoughts or conversation playing a part in why your life is the way it is. When I was first introduced to this about 10 years ago, it was a game changer for my life but it was also incredibly frustrating realizing that NONE of my thoughts or habits were in line with what I wanted and I had a lot of mental/spiritual work to do to get my mindset right.
If this is where you are then I suggest starting out slowly with the exercise I mentioned above before bed, but also just starting with a journal before bed and first thing in the morning of writing out what’s going on in your mind and don’t change anything just yet just become aware of what is going on so you can identify where the changes need to happen.
The book I mentioned above will also be an amazing resource in understanding and reprogramming your subconscious mind, but as always I am here to help you in any way possible to create a life and body you love whether through being your private coach or as just a resource of knowledge so stay connected.
Believe in yourself. Trust yourself. Love your life. You are much stronger and much more capable than you think...or exactly as you think I should say you just have to raise the bar inside to see it show up outside yourself.
Ashley Drummonds
