BWW Blog: “Something to Believe In” - Mindfulness with Dan DeLuca

I first met Dan DeLuca in a virtual masterclass he gave at my school about the importance of mindfulness. I was so intrigued with the subject that I reached out to him to learn more.

"To me, mindset is everything. It is what drives us every day. It's so easy to feel victimized by the mindset we grew up with or took from our environment," DeLuca tells me in our recent interview, "but once we take the reins back and gain control of our minds, everything changes."

DeLuca tells me that he is interested in what's at the core of our being and the idea of how we bring our soul back to its purest state. "It's a matter of becoming conscious," DeLuca says. "We can redirect our negative thoughts and change our outlook."

At a young age, we "download" how to be human, and it's only natural that the blueprints from our environment are flawed. Science tells us that our thoughts will continue on autopilot if we don't interrupt and replace our bad habits, mental and physical. Humans are creatures of habit, and our thoughts are not exempt from this vicious cycle.

"It's easier to not think for ourselves and let our thoughts go on autopilot. 'You're not good enough. You're not worthy enough.' It's so easy to fall victim to these thoughts, but they aren't even ours! We downloaded them from somewhere else. We don't have to take what's not ours."

When steering the self, it's important to take responsibility for your thoughts and actions to avoid the negative consequence of "autopilot": self-sabotage.

And, how do you take responsibility for your thoughts? Simply by keeping track of them and taking stock of where they come from. The thought "You're not good enough" may come from a place of fear. But, when you realize the thought is not yours to hold on to, you can let it go and change your perspective.

"It's almost like a superpower," DeLuca delineates, "we have the power to de-escalate any heated argument when we don't take anything personally."

When we consider our actions, DeLuca says that it's vital to ask one simple question: "Where are we coming from?"

"If we want something from an out of alignment state, whether that be conscious or unconscious, we might get it, but chances are, that "thing" we got will not fill us up the way we intended it to. The question I work on myself consistently is, 'Am I coming from a place of pure love and service to others or a place of insecurity and fear?'"

DeLuca highly recommends the teachings of Dr. Joe Dispenza for those interested in learning more about mindfulness. Keep up with Dan at his Instagram here and his website mindfulnessinthearts.com. Mindfulness gives us "Something to Believe In" - because what we believe is who we are.

"What you think is who you are. If you embody what you want to be, that is what you will become." - Dan DeLuca