They reference the ego rather than the Self as the locus of our identity. When we move with the deeper currents of the Self, we surrender control to the flow rather than seize it and discover our real Selves in the process. Beliefs define parameters of possibility and when we break through limiting beliefs, we see options we never knew we had. It really can feel miraculous when that happens. The distance to the horizon is not exactly limitless, but compared to how it had looked, it can seem like it.
Obstacles seem to vanish.
How we imagine ourselves living is the outer limit of how we can live. When the questions we are capable of asking are pre-determined by our beliefs, the answers are already part of the script. Computer programmers who work in only one language, like people who speak only one language, really speak no language, as Goethe said. A language shapes our framework of perception in ways we can't see. Inside the skin of a single language or culture, we're like people wearing glasses who are running around looking for their glasses.