We trust our minds to give us the answer to life’s unknowns. We do this because it’s really the only tool we have. And yet, we rarely question the mind’s accuracy. We listen to our thoughts, allowing them to dictate what we can and cannot do. We allow our thoughts to create a reality that often limits us from reaching our full potential in school, in relationships, in personal goals, in everything. In doing this, we allow our thoughts, to dictate our beliefs, which then dictate our behaviors (thoughts->beliefs->behaviors, this is Cognitive behavioral therapy 101). We all do it.

Below are two engaging articles which discuss examples of the brain being wrong. In the case of world class cyclists, scientists misled riders during a “personal best” physical assessment into believing they were competing against their previously set personal best time (in actuality, the on screen avatar they were competing against was a few seconds faster than their personal best).
The second article discusses an example of the “4 minute mile” and how physiologists said it could never be broken… until it was. This article provides some positive psychology advice and insights, along with some cognitive behavioral techniques.

Cyclist beating their “best” times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/20/health/nutrition/20best.html?_r=0&pagewanted=print

The impossible “4 Minute Mile”:

http://zenhabits.net/heal/