It’s been said that you are what you believe. What does that mean exactly? The difference between success and failure in life can very often be traced to what we call beliefs, and the appeal beliefs have on our lives. 

By success or failure, I am talking about living the life you desire, not the one you may have defaulted to as a way to survive. There are plenty of successful people (financially speaking), in jobs they despise that simply defaulted there out of need. Success means living life on your terms. Living your ideal life.

“In order to achieve success, one must have a sound set of beliefs which to live by and a faithful adherence to those beliefs.” 

Our actions will always follow our beliefs. Most people aren’t even aware of their beliefs, but you can see what they are by the way they live.

For example, my recent life coaching guest on the Rant & Grow podcast, Michelle Allaire, is a mother of three, a business owner, and at the core of who she is, an artist. As an artist her belief has been the narrative we often hear about artists — she believes to be a “starving artist.”

For some reason many artists carry this badge as if it’s cool, even a necessary part of being an artist. The sad truth is that this is an erroneous belief that doesn’t serve anyone. Why?

If you are starving you can’t produce good work, because you are spending most of your time figuring out how to survive, and you are also robbing the world of your gifts. No one benefits from that narrative. No one.

Our Actions Follow Our Beliefs

Actions in accordance with our beliefs should always be altered if they are seen to violate fundamental Universal morals. In most cases, a belief can be boiled down to a piercing simplicity that provides substantial guidance.

“When it comes to living our ideal life, it is the self-realization of the fundamental beliefs and reasons one exists.”

Our life’s purpose answers the questions: Why am I here? Why do I exist? It is entirely possible that two people share a common or very similar ideal life and purpose, just as it is entirely possible that two people can both share a rock-solid belief in the value “integrity”.

When you look into the stories of entrepreneurs like Walt Disney, BF Goodridge and others, some of these spent years in jail, had many bankruptcies, and had many challenges pursuing their dreams.

Disney believed that he could create a vehicle for people to feel happy. Who doesn’t want to be happy? Yet it took several bankruptcies and difficulties to create that value for others.

Just because you believe in something, it does not mean it won’t come with challenges. Living your ideal life means being willing to overcome any and all challenges, no matter what. It’s about being a leader.

Leaders don’t give up, they just keep pushing forward, their beliefs and commitment to improve the life of others, drives them to push through all kinds of adversity.

The benefit of overcoming adversity is personal growth, increased self-esteem, and happiness. Your commitment to overcome challenges is rooted in what you believe about yourself, about life, about the world.

“Beliefs determine our attitudes, the actions we take in life, and what we commit to.” 

As a coach I’ve helped 100s of men and women in the past decade as a volunteer. I didn’t become a certified life coach to pursue making a living from it, I did so I could learn additional tools to apply in my leadership practice focused on helping people become empowered.

My purpose in life is to empower people to grow. My mission is to set people free from a worldwide epidemic of low self-worth. My leadership style is rooted in the power of vulnerability, gratitude, self-awareness and authenticity.

Vulnerability, gratitude, and authenticity are my core beliefs leading my life, and none of that would be possible without keen self-awareness. These were not always my beliefs, I designed them purposefully using neuroscience techniques.

Whenever I see patterns repeating themselves, I ask my coaches and mentors for reflection. What I am looking for isn’t help with how to do stuff, I am looking to understand the limiting belief that is not allowing me to put into action the things that align with the ideal life I want to lead.

Getting back to Michelle, she isn’t starving. She is a successful business owner. She is a very organized leader who believes in the power of setting goals, and accountability. However, her passion is art. She has not been able to devote more time to pursuing her art, out of fear that she would starve. Why? That’s her belief as an artist. Artists starve!

All I did as her life coach is help her see that her business can be a source of income supporting her dream to do more of her art. We came up with a good schedule to allow herself the pursuit of what really makes her happy.

A plan for Michelle wasn’t enough. You can have all the plans, actions steps, goals in place, but the execution will always fall short if your beliefs aren’t aligned.

I worked with Michelle to develop a mantra to override her “starving artist” mindset, and she is committed to practicing it for 90 days. According to neuroscience that is how long it takes for a mantra to become a hard-coded new belief in the brain.

Check out the Rant & Grow podcast life coaching session with Michelle and see what commitments she makes to lead her ideal life and break free of the starving artist mindset. Maybe you’ll discover some wisdom for your own life. You can listen to the podcast right here.