5 Key Sources for Creating Your Belief System

It can be very helpful and enlightening to see why you believe the things that you do. You might be surprised to realize that your grounds for believing are often shaky.

The blatant fact is that the majority of the core components for the building of a belief system are based on irrational input! That’s right! Only 1 out of the 5 means of building beliefs is based on logic.

The 5 core information sources feeding your beliefs are:

1. Evidence
2. Tradition
3. Authority
4. Association
5. Revelation

1. Evidence

   Evidence shows that one thing causes another. The ‘cut and dried’ quality of evidence appeals to the methodical and diagnostic part of your mind. Developing your belief system through this mode is very rationale and calls upon the use of logical thinking.

   Two ways we gather evidence:

   1. Scientific investigation supplies results from critically tested hypotheses to build evidence based beliefs.
   2. Your individual experience of cause and affect. You might often witness a constant outcome from your actions. For example:
      • If you eat properly, you feel energized and healthy.
      • Giving yourself 10 extra minutes travel time helps you relax.
2. Tradition
   The traditions endorsed through generations and societies are a primary factor in building your belief system. Children are often overwhelmed with traditional activities day in and day out when growing up. Hence traditions can be relatively easy to take on board, without even questioning. It’s great to realize that traditions have served some cultures well. However it does not mean they are automatically based in truth, nor necessarily have continued usefulness for your life.

   Many people adopt their basic ‘global beliefs’ and some ‘topic specific beliefs’ through family and cultural tradition. Family biases, social culture, and societal judgements are all strong influences on the formation of personal ideas about:

   • God and what spiritual understanding is correct
   • political theory and which party to vote for
   • ones own personal value
   • which sporting team to cheer for

   Ask yourself ‘what role has tradition played in developing your belief system?’.

3. Authority
   Numerous beliefs are taken from individuals that represent authority to us.

   It’s possible that these figures of power also appear in the category of tradition, as I’m sure you can picture. For example, parents usually assume a significant role of authority while growing up and they are daily passing traditions down to you.

   Many times those in positions of authority do not represent tradition. Examples of some of these people who may sway, could be:

   • a spiritual guide that declares having a unique  direct line to ‘God’
   • a medical professional who insists that they absolutely sure that any ideas on health that conflicting with theirs, are rubbish
   • a university professor who you have looked up to
4. Association
   Who do you consider your crowd?
   Whether you can be found with the ‘in crowd’ or hidden away with the ‘nerds’, you will be strengthening common beliefs that you share with the group. Think of the saying ‘you rub off on one another’.

   As you are repeatedly faced with unique ways of thinking common to your group, you learn to ‘go with the flow’ and support the shared beliefs.

5. Revelation
   Here, the definition of revelation referred to is “the disclosure of information to man by a divine or supernatural agency”. The experience might be described as:an intuition or premonition about something… or seeing something in your minds eye.

   Two primary understandings offer insight on how this unseen delivery of knowledge occurs:

   1. Some say that the information had filtered into your subconscious before this time through external stimuli. It was just rumbling below the surface. When the correct trigger occurred, (likely some
      vague occassion), the info was brought to your conscious mind.
   2. The more inquisitive entertain the idea that perhaps it is due to a sixth sense of perception that we have. This extra sense is full of power to perceive different aspects of life, that are often overlooked in more accepted and understood modes of perception.

   Revelation land upon you at any time. You might be; busy in the office, in the shower, meditating on breaking waves. Where ever it may light upon you, might be interesting to ponder. But, I think what you may want to ask, can you use this information?

   There was positively one remarkable man who highly valued the wild ideas his imagination threw upon him.

   Albert Einstein! He intimately knew the power of imagination, and how it is interwoven with the magic of believing. A few of his words of wisdom on the subject:

   “The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination.”

   “Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand.”

Look at the origins of your beliefs, and see what you might learn.

1. Bravely ask, “do they have a solid basis and do they serve you well?”
2. Recognizing that many or your beliefs are ‘adopted beliefs’, have another look at them in a new light. See if you can find holes in them. As you learn and grow, it is reasonable to think that you will change some of your beliefs as you progress with your personal development. Enjoy the process!

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