Indeed. What do you mean by limiting beliefs?
My definition of a limiting belief: a thought or belief that was created during a previous experience (usually in your childhood), that doesn’t serve you anymore. It might even block your personal growth, and acts like a roadblock on your path to happiness and success.
Now, I would like to take you back in 2008, when I discovered one of the limiting beliefs that affected my life previously.
I was sitting on a patio, close to a Starbucks, in San Diego. I had one more hour to spend before the cab would take me to the airport. So I decided to grab a tea and a plate with snacks from Starbucks, and sit there… watching the people passing by.
“I WANT THIS!” – I heard all of a sudden close to me. I looked on my right side: there was a little girl, pointing her finger toward the grapes on my plate. Amused, I gave her the grapes…noticing her mother was fast approaching us. “I’m sooo sooorry”, she told me embarrassed, and grabbed nervously her daughter by hand, saying to her: “You shouldn’t do this!”
While watching them leaving, I had a flash back from my childhood… as a little girl, walking with my mom along the street. It was June – the cherries season in that little town 
from Romania. Suddenly, I saw a woman carrying cherries in a transparent bag. I let go of my mom’s hand, and head straight toward that woman! I stopped in front of her, looked in her eyes, and bagged with my little hand cupped, ready to receive: “Please give me some cherries!” I asked.
I must have looked funny! The lady start smiling, but she didn’t have the chance to give me some cherries, because my mom grabbed my hand quickly and said: “You don’t need to give her cherries, we’re gonna buy some too.” She pulled me forward, and we continued our walk.
Sitting on that patio, I realized that that brief experience instigated a limiting belief that hunted me since. That belief was: “It’s not good to ask for what you want!”.
Can you imagine a life when you’re bound to your own emotions, and you don’t express them at all? A life where you do not ask for help or support? That was my life until three years ago, when I identified that limiting belief and start working on it, replacing it with a more empowered one: “It’s very good to ask, as it allows others to share and help… and you might even get what you want!”
All those years I closed myself off from life that I became a very serious person, that didn’t socialize much. I didn’t ask for help, not even when it was much easier to get to whatever I wanted! While becoming more independent is good, I cannot even imagine what my life could be now, without that limiting belief from an early age! Life is about being open to people, asking for help, and allowing others to give this way… being in the flow of life!
In another blog post I will give you some tips on how to change the limiting beliefs into more empowering ones. But until then, I invite you to pay more attention and identify your own limiting beliefs. This way, you’ll have something to work on when I’ll give you those tips! 🙂
Gabriela
