For a moment, I invite you to discover your truth. It begins with a decision. Can you tell yourself to, ‘Stop?’ Stop thinking. Stop analysing. Stop allowing the whirlwind of negative thoughts to pollute your mind, because this is not making you feel good, it does not generate happiness, it does not inspire, empower, motivate or uplift you. So just ‘stop’. When you stop, you can then enter the silence. In this place, if you can sustain it, the clouds will begin to part, and the swirling currents will uncurl and flow with serenity into a gentle river, carrying a stream of thoughts that simply pass on by, without any friction. Watch them, observe them pass by, and allow the silence to continue. With silence, the stillness in your being descends, peacefully. Surrender to this, surrender to every thought and every reaction; let go of the habits, to make way for your truth. In this sacred space, give up what you have known, your habits and conditioning, to make way for the truth that is, to connect with your wisdom, and find the answers you seek to your life’s’ challenges. All you have to do, is to be silent and still, watch your thoughts pass by, and allow your wise truth to arise, like vapours from a river, metamorphosising into images, words or sensations in your being, that guide and inspire your life. Allow anything to arise. Have no expectations. Surrender each time you notice thoughts creating boxes in your mind, and once again allow your mind to expand.
Sometimes people ask me, ‘how will I know when I am hearing the voice of my truth’. The answer I give is, ‘You just know’ and that for me, I know when my heart expands, and is filled with the sensation of true beauty.
When you learn to embrace your truth, you can choose to decide which thoughts to hold and how to feel. You can generate inner calm and happiness, or feed stress, anxiety and negativity. You can react to what people do and say, or choose to create thoughts that prevent people from affecting how you feel. Here is a more practical view on how the mind works and how you can manage your thoughts.
Our mind operates at the level of conscious awareness, the subconscious, and the unconscious.
- The Conscious Mind – that which we are aware of. For example, the thoughts we can perceive.
- The Subconscious Mind – information just outside of our conscious awareness, such as the thoughts, memories and information we know, but do not currently need to be aware of in this moment.
- The Unconscious Mind – biological instincts, processes and deeply hidden memories, programmed beliefs and those thoughts we choose not to see.
It is the unconscious thoughts that triggers feelings, that then lead us to react with more unconscious and conscious thoughts, that can send us into downward spirals of negativity. This happens when we unknowingly react to an event, situation, sensation, or feeling. The response happens so fast that we do not notice it, and find ourselves feeling bad, but not knowing why. The bad feeling then generates more negative thoughts, and the dark cycle is created, sending us spiralling down.
These negative thoughts are conditioned from childhood, when we were told ‘you can’t, ‘you should’, ‘you need to…’,’you must’, ‘you will fail’, ‘you have to’, ‘you are not good enough’, ‘you are shy’, ‘You are the weak one’ etc. These statements, often put on us, or taken as our interpretation of a situation, would have been taken on unchallenged, and if repeated often enough, formed as our belief system about who we are. But this was never our truth, just a collective of thoughts put on us, taken on by us, because we did not know any better.
Today, these thoughts continue to play out silently, in the background, triggering emotional reactions, while we wonder why we feel the way we feel, and think the thoughts we think, when really life could appear so much better.
How do we change our thoughts?
- Understand the origin of your thoughts – when you can see where they come from, you can decide if they are true, out dated, or unwanted, and let them go.
- Stop listening to them. Our thoughts are not the truth, they are our conditioned programming.
- Don’t predict the future. If your thoughts attempt to tell you what will be, ‘stop’, and ask yourself, how can you possibly know. Surely there is an equal chance of positivity and success as there is to any failure?
- Don’t make emotional decisions – your feelings may be a result of unconscious programming and conditioned thoughts.
- Allow thoughts – Do not try to push them away, let them flow by in the river.
- Be aware of negative statements – ‘should’, ‘must’,’can’t’, ‘ought’. And replace with with, ‘I choose to do or be…’
- Be loving – habits cannot hold up to the power of being present and making positive loving choices and intentions. These override the unconscious mind.
- Discover who you are now and who you have becom – You are not your thoughts. You are not the person you used to be. Which thoughts truly belong to you today?
- Go into the silence, let your inner wisdom come to light and shine brighter than negative beliefs.
This topic will be discussed in Marbella on Tuesday March 19th at ‘Coffee break solutions’, wednesday in Gibrlatar and Thursday in Sotogrande. Full details at: http://www.antoniabehan.com/coffee-break-solutions.html