Most people think their lives are shaped by circumstance. I don't buy it. Your life is shaped by your mindset, your focus, and the way your brain constantly rewires itself to match the signals you give it — whether you give them consciously or by default.
Photo by Milad Fakurian on Unsplash
Dr David Hamilton has been shouting this from the rooftops for years, and he's right: your brain is not a static lump of grey mush. It's a living, pulsing, rewiring engine. It's elastic. And elastic things can stretch.
The question is: Which direction are you stretching yours?
Your Brain Is Running the Show — Not Your Body
Here's the truth most people don't like to hear: your body doesn't decide how you feel, how strong you are, or how capable you become. Your brain does. It sends the instructions, the chemical messengers, the electrical impulses. Hormones, immune responses, healing rates, energy levels — all of it bends to the influence of the brain.
And the brain, in turn, bends to the influence of your beliefs, your focus, and your internal dialogue.
Think about that for a moment.
You're walking around in a body that is literally obeying the stories you tell yourself.
Tell yourself you're tired? Your body obliges.
Tell yourself you're broken? Your body adapts to the script.
Tell yourself you're resilient, resourceful, unstoppable? Your brain starts building neural circuits to match that identity.
This is neuroplasticity — the science of "you become what you repeatedly think and do."
Hamilton puts it beautifully: the brain is a "chemist" responding to your thoughts. Change the thoughts, change the chemistry. Change the chemistry, change your life.
Photo by Anna Tarazevich
Directed Awareness: The Steering Wheel of Neuroplasticity
If neuroplasticity is the engine, directed awareness is the steering wheel.
Directed awareness is the discipline — and it is a discipline — of choosing where your attention goes. Because where your attention goes, your neural wiring follows. Your brain strengthens whatever you practice mentally, just as your muscles strengthen whatever you practice physically.
If you consistently focus on fear, your brain becomes excellent at fear.
If you consistently focus on possibilities, it builds pathways for creativity and courage.
Directed awareness is not about positive thinking. It's about deliberate thinking.
It's mental training. Mental reps. Conscious reps.
The extraordinary part?
Your brain doesn't differentiate much between imagination and reality. Visualise lifting a weight and similar neural pathways fire as when you physically lift it. Dr Hamilton has written extensively about this. Olympians use it. High performers use it. And it works because the brain takes your focus seriously.
Tell your brain where you're going, and your brain starts paving the road.
Photo by Andras Stefuca
The Body Follows the Mind — Always
I've spent decades watching ordinary people do extraordinary things — including walking barefoot across burning coals. When someone steps up to the fire, I don't look at their feet. I look at their mind. The moment they shift from fear to intentional focus, the physiology follows.
You can see it:
Breathing changes.
Posture rises.
Biochemistry shifts.
And suddenly, the impossible becomes possible.
This isn't magic. It's biology responding to belief.
Dr Hamilton's research shows that belief can affect immune function, healing, strength, blood pressure, and even gene expression. So if a thought can change the body, imagine what a consistent practice of directed awareness can change.
Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya
Your Brain Is Elastic — But It Needs Instructions
Elasticity without direction leads nowhere. Stretching a brain without choosing the right ideas is just mental gymnastics. The real transformation comes when you use neuroplasticity intentionally.
Here's the formula:
- Decide what you want.
Clarity activates the brain's reticular activating system — your internal GPS. - Direct your awareness there daily.
Thoughts become networks. Networks become habits. Habits become identity. - Act in alignment.
Behaviour reinforces belief; belief reinforces behaviour.
This is how goals become achievements and intentions become outcomes.
The Firewalk of the Mind
You don't need to walk across fire to transform — but firewalking is a perfect metaphor for how rapidly your brain can shift when you give it a new instruction.
One moment, the brain screams danger.
The next, it obeys a new command: focus, breathe, move.
The body follows.
Every. Single. Time.
Photo by Almos Bechtold on Unsplash
Neuroplasticity isn't a theory for classrooms; it's a tool for living. Your brain is elastic. Your awareness is a lever. Your thoughts are instructions.
So the final question is simple:
What future are you programming your brain to build?
About the Author: Steve Consalvez
