My friend’s daughter broke her wrist. I looked at her picture and immediately felt her pain and joined the chorus of others –
“Ouch and poor baby!”
But then I looked closely at the cast. Scrawled in red were the words: I HEAL FAST. What a concept. Broadcast “I heal quickly” to the world, to your arm, to your own inner psyche. What if we gave that thought to other forms of healing?
A broken heart? A failed relationship? A job loss? Or any other area in our life where we felt broken. But what is “quickly” ?
The thought, “I heal quickly” doesn’t actually designate a time as much as an intention. And it doesn’t dismiss the reality of feeling your feelings. But the truth is we tend to think our feelings instead of feeling them. When we say things like, I feel like he’s taking advantage of me—that is actually a thought. The feeling might be humiliation, shame, anger or fear.
A feeling is a vibration.
When we indulge our thoughts we get more of them~ for better or worse. More pain, More loss. More joy. More resilience. We say, “Time heals all wounds”. What if we said: “Thoughts heal all wounds?” Most would agree, it’s preferable to heal faster than slower – unless there’s more benefit to staying wounded
What might some of the benefits be of staying wounded? We get attention, love, connection, (any attention may be better than no attention). We get to be right (certainty) about whatever our grievance is. We gain significance because we have the biggest problem. While not the most empowering reasons, they do serve our basic needs.
But so does the belief, “I heal quickly”.
Tony Robbins, a recognized authority on leadership psychology and peak performance, a life coach and an advisor to presidents and prime ministers, says “All human beings have six human needs regardless of ethnicity, age or socioeconomic backgrounds, and all behavior is simply an attempt to meet those needs.
How does this thought,” I heal quickly” serve four of the six primary needs of all human beings?
The Six Human Needs are:
Certainty: assurance you can avoid pain and gain pleasure.
Uncertainty/Variety: the need for the unknown, change, new stimuli.
Significance: feeling unique, important, special or needed.
Connection/Love: a strong feeling of closeness or union with someone or something.
Growth: an expansion of capacity, capability or understanding.
Contribution: a sense of service and focus on helping, giving to and supporting others.
The “I heal quickly” thought provides:
Certainty: a strong belief that moves us toward pleasure — we know wellbeing is in sight.
Uncertainty: There is unexpected novel discovery in the journey of finding meaning in adversity.
Significance: You rise to the level of superhero status with the belief, I heal quickly.
Connection: It broadcasts you’re a winner. People want to connect with winners. (Not to mention wearing a cast is a great conversation starter). Strong and vulnerable – a winning combination for connection!
When we practice a thought long enough it becomes a belief. What will you practice? What will you believe?
