Lesson 1 // Thinking
RE LEARN
Before you begin: let’s take a few deep, grounding breaths. Place one hand on your heart and the other on your stomach, close your eyes, breathe in deep, hold, direct your awareness to your heart, and release. Repeat until you feel centered and relaxed.
Our conscious and subconscious thoughts are powerful entities. They shape our perception and interpretation of reality that then impact our actions. We are not our thoughts and yet, we so easily get wrapped up in each thought that floats by our awareness (which we’ll dive deeper into in the next lesson), as though the thought is an extension of us. We are the thinker and the observer, aware of the thoughts. So often we identify with the thinker and forget the power of observation, of identifying with our awareness.
The brain develops patterns of thinking based on repetition. These patterns affect our communication, actions, habits, behavior, beliefs, perceptions, attitudes, and emotions. This repetition programs these thought patterns, perceptions, and interpretations that, over time, become a part of our subconscious, that we then act from. As psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Carl Jung once said, "Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.” When we consider this, it becomes very clear how important our thoughts are.
As we learned in Your Mind, It is estimated that 95% of brain activity is unconscious. This can result in, for example, unconsciously acting from patterns of thought developed since childhood that do not serve us. Along our journey to who we are today, we've picked up ideas, beliefs, behaviors, habits, perceptions, and attitudes that are in our subconscious. We act from them out of default, even if they cause us to suffer or remain stuck. If old subconscious patterns, beliefs, and negative or unproductive thoughts are fired and wired over and over again, then we can easily feel stuck, as if we're going in circles. But the subconscious isn’t all bad. In fact, in many ways, it is our friend. Imagine having to consciously remember to breathe all day long. Consider how much that would detract from the plethora of other ways we could use our brain and energy. Empowered by new knowledge, we can actually use our conscious awareness to “rewire” that which is unhelpful in our subconscious. When we bring our awareness to what we think and consume - and in turn, process subconsciously - we can actively feed and cultivate a mindset that works for us, rather than against us.
Imagine the brain is a field of grass. Our thought patterns are paths in the grass. The more a path is walked, the more worn it becomes, and the easier it is to follow the path. If, for example, I’ve noticed that the peacefulness I’m trying to cultivate is easily thrown off while I’m driving, I can use my awareness to objectively observe what thought patterns occur while this peace is disrupted. From my observations, I can choose to feed peace with my thoughts because my objective observations help me see it is more important to me to be at peace than to continue to feed old thought patterns or beliefs. Once I notice that whenever someone cuts me off, stops short, is driving too slowly in front of me, or tailing me, I think very aggressively or defensively, I can choose to not react from that worn pattern of thinking and instead open up to consciously perceive the situation from a heart-centered, understanding approach. I respond rather than react, and think instead, “Perhaps that person is having a bad day and is late, I feel for them. I’ll arrive at my destination when I get there; there is no rush. My focus and attention is here in this car and I choose to enjoy my drive and feed peace.”
Curiosity allows us to deviate from the worn path. When we use our awareness to notice, and then we get curious about whatever it is, beyond our immediate perception or interpretation, we open ourselves up to the entire endless field of grass rather than the narrow limits of a few worn down paths. Our brains are incredibly adaptive; we can mold and shape our mindset into whatever we wish. This is called neuroplasticity. The brain benefits from learning; it creates new connections and develops new pathways (literally called neuropathways, just like the path of grass)! We can always form a new path, starting with this very moment. Cultivating a new mindset is the result of consistently deciding to walk the new paths time and time again.
Thoughts, from our conscious or subconscious mind, are connected to feelings. How we think affects how we feel and how we feel affects how we think. By bringing awareness to how we think, we bring awareness to how our thoughts connect with how we feel. By actively cultivating a mindset of our choosing, our feelings follow in accordance with that mindset. We can use our awareness of our feelings to determine what thoughts we are having that contribute to those feelings. Conversely, we can notice what feelings are cultivated through positive thought patterns. For example, if I want to feel peaceful, I can use my awareness to notice what does and does not cultivate feelings of peace both in my thoughts and perceptions of my experiences.
It's not always easy. There are experiences that trigger us to act from a pattern of behavior that we may no longer wish to perpetuate. That is where awareness and consistency come in. We can bring awareness to a situation, even if, at first, it is after the fact, through compassionate, non-judgmental reflection. We can recognize the trigger and decide how to show up differently next time. We try again to walk our new path. We continue our practice. We are compassionate, honest, consistent and patient with ourselves. Over time, we will see our awareness permeate into those difficult moments and be able to respond and take the new path in the moment, instead of reacting from an old one.
Playing an active role in shaping our minds is essential. Our active role is what allows us to choose our perception and interpretation of our personal reality. This can make a HUGE difference. Just as we said before, when we shift our mindset, we open ourselves up to the entire endless field of possibilities that permeates throughout every experience and our lives. It starts with our active awareness (as opposed to passiveness) of what we consume, learn, and the paths we feed through thoughts, words, and actions. From our awareness and active role, we choose the paths we cultivate. It is the difference between continually shaping and programming our minds for ourselves in the present moment or having our mind programmed by someone else and past experiences. With our constant and consistent effort, we break free of old patterns and cultivate the mindset of our choosing. As Erica Spiegelman reminds us in The Rewired Life, “by mastering your mind, you master your life.”
REFLECT
Answer the following questions in your notebook, a piece of paper, or record yourself talking through your answers on your phone and read over or listen to your answers when you’re done.
Dig Deep. Be honest. Be compassionate. Be objective. Take responsibility and accountability. It is of no help for us to be judgmental of ourselves or direct blame elsewhere. You got this!
1. What is my current state of mind, my emotional and mental state at this particular time? What is my current mindset - the established set of attitudes I hold? When does my mindset create peace, hope, love, understanding, openness, and kindness; when does my mindset limit me by creating unbalance, fear, hatred, judgment, chaos, and closed-ness?
2. What are some old patterns of behavior, beliefs, ideas, attitudes, and perspectives I can identify that are keeping me stuck?
3. What might I be consuming, feeding, entertaining, or perpetuating that keeps me stuck in old patterns?
4. What ideas, beliefs, thoughts, and behaviors are perpetuated in my mind that are, in fact, not even my own? (For example, if you experience self-doubt, is this doubt coming from you, or from people in the past who doubted you? a.k.a. is this a learned behavior or beliefs?)
5. What is my current level of awareness when it comes to how I am thinking and my mindset? Do I bring my awareness to the present moment to recognize when I am acting or reacting from a subconscious pattern? Do I reflect and recognize the trigger and my reaction? Do I compassionately determine another approach for next time? What might need to change in this regard?
6. How do I want to feel? What do these feelings tell me about the mindset I am going to cultivate and the thought patterns that will contribute to these feelings?
7. Why is it important to me that I bring awareness to, observe, and cultivate my mindset? What is my purpose in doing so? Why am I cultivating my mindset?
8. How can I embrace curiosity more? What am I currently curious about? What can I do to feed those curiosities? How can taking action on my curiosities contribute to my mindset?
9. What role does consistency play for me in this process? What are typical ways I struggle with consistency? What will I do to prevent and recover from those?
RE DO
1. Set a timer for three minutes or play this three minute sound bath when you are ready:
2. Sit quietly in a comfortable position, close your eyes, and draw your focus to your breath. If you are familiar with meditation and breath-work, try focusing on your exhale while allowing your inhale to simply just be. With every breath, try to touch it, be aware of it, follow it in through your nose, down your throat, into your lungs. Feel the space within you expand. Hold. And slowly release and follow the air out of your body, through your throat to your nose.
As you breathe, thoughts will float into your awareness. When they come in, be aware of them, recognize them, and in a compassionate, understanding, friendly, and non-judgmental tone, remind yourself: "thinking." And return your focus to your breath.
Each time a new thought arises say to yourself "thinking," and return your awareness to your breathing. It’s okay if you get lost in thought, when you realize this happened, remind yourself “thinking” and return your awareness once more to your breath.
3. When the three minutes are over, reflect on what you noticed during and after the practice and how you feel. How can you take what you learned in this exercise into your practice of cultivating your mindset?
No need to feel discouraged if this practice was difficult - allow yourself to get the hang of it by trying it a couple of times. As you get acquainted with the practice, feel free to increase the length of your practice. Like weight and repetitions at the gym, we increase our strength and ability by increasing the challenge.
This exercise is a way for us to practice, out of context, what we are doing as we cultivate our mindset. It is a wonderful exercise to do any time you wish to practice and strengthen these abilities and/or you find yourself overwhelmed, out of touch, and stressed.
This practice is adapted from Shamatha-Vipashyana meditation in Pema Chödrön’s The Wisdom of No Escape.
In Your Day-to-Day
Your thoughts are incredibly powerful entities of which you are the observer and master (not the thoughts)
Observe your thoughts to notice the patterns, beliefs, and perceptions that no longer serve you
Be curious and open to expand beyond limiting thinking, judgments, perceptions, and beliefs
Actively choose to feed and cultivate your thoughts, which will positively affect the loop between your thoughts and your feelings
Use the breathing practice from RE/DO to realign, recenter, and empower yourself as the observer first thing in the morning, when you have a few moments during the day, want to recenter, and are feeling overwhelmed by emotions or stress
