Are You Tired Of Overpowering Thoughts?

Our mind operates like a bell, it keeps ringing unless we do something to stop it. I have struggled with it for a long time and only recently learnt how to switch it on and off at my discretion. Thoughts have almost gravitational like power, they keep attracting, supporting, fuelling each other. It is hard to live with a mind like this, and now I know many people suffer because of it, as I was one of them. Here is my take on how to achieve freedom from your mind and live fully.

Spend some time alone with your mind

I know it sounds like a terrible idea for most people, initially it sounded the same for me too. I am suggesting it for the purpose and that is to understand our thoughts and making ourselves familiar with its patterns. Find some quiet time and space where you won’t be disturbed for 20 minutes. And pay attention inward, do the following observations.

1. Most people believe that they are their thoughts, and that is a myth. As you practice observing your mind you will start to notice that thoughts are like clouds, just passing by. You are not your thoughts as long as you stay neutral and do not interact with them. If you find yourself being caught by them, gently (very) bring your attention back to present moment and watch your thoughts passing by like clouds.
2. You can’t stop thoughts if you tried. Yes, it sounds paradoxical at first but that’s how our mind operates. Like a bell, if we try to stop it by hitting it, it will ring even louder. Same thing with the mind, do not force it to stop thinking. I would go lengths to emphasize on not having any agenda of whatsoever when doing this exercise, including the agenda of switching your thoughts off! If you have agenda, you will be caught up with thoughts relating with the agenda and you won’t be able to watch your thoughts anymore.
3. Pay equal attention to your body (different body parts, any sensations in the body part). That way you are reminding your mind that its not the only point of focus in your life. And our mind is quick (est ever!) learner. Remember to be neutral with this new area of focus. After all you want to be fair with your mind!
4. Pay attention to your feelings/emotions, this is tricky one. Some times its hard for people to differentiate thoughts from emotions, let me say that your emotions reside in your heart, by simply diverting your point of focus in the middle of chest, it will be much easier to spot them. Now emotions are different to thoughts, they are very subtle to notice (sometimes!) but more practice will help you understand them better.
5. Pay attention to your surrounding — any noise, light, temperature coming your way, pay full attention to them. Initially there will be thoughts rising from this observation and no matter how tempting they are do not interact with them. If you find caught with thoughts again, gently bring it back to present moment and carry on with the exercise.

You might not see big difference initially but as you strengthen your relationship with mind, body, emotion and your surrounding, you will start to see the magic of it. And these exercise is not just a trick, it is how life is meant to be lived. This has been the story through out our evolution, this was not an exercise then. This was living for our ancestors for millions of years. I have read many books, attended many workshop, done all sorts and long hours of meditation for months and above exercise is my extraction from all my learnings. I call it ‘Awareness Exercise’.

Cause of overpowering mind

It’s modern social norms that keeps pushing us to our limits 24/7, and that is also fine as long as we give enough time for ourselves to reconnect with present moment, our inner self and surrounding - with no agenda, just being alive. This time brought us million possibilities to fill our life with thrill, excitement, enjoyment and the rest of it. And we all want to make most of it before we die. For that we think too much, we multi-task, take up role of different persons too often, too quickly. This lifestyle leads to an inner imbalance and our mind overpowers our being — being is our mind, body and emotions combined. Once our mind takes us over, all our experience gets limited to what our mind has in it (mostly memory, thoughts, determinations, words and their meanings, resolutions etc..) but no real life, real life is outside the mind and we can only experience it with our being. Most of the people don’t even realise that they are living inside their mind, because it’s lot smarter than we think. It keeps giving us an illusion that we are living fully in fact we are imprisoned.

Reality check

Answer this simple question to find out if you are living inside your mind or not. Does your mind talk to you when you have absolutely nothing to do? If the answer is yes, you know that you are not in charge of your life. But don’t stress out, once you know the reality — you can’t help but start reclaiming your life back from your mind. Remember to not stress out, if you do, that means your mind is trying to get control over you. You are your mind when you stress out — you are you when you are fully present into inner being and your surrounding.

Life of your choice

This exercise in long run, will help you to master a fair, stable, non judgemental, natural, healthy relationship with your inner self. Give yourself some time to strengthen this new found relationship, I recommend at least 40 days, twice a day. You will not only have razor sharp insights into your life/problems but you will be on the journey to live a life full of clarity, happiness, fulfilment, success, harmony with your surrounding and many other things that this awesome life can be.

Look forward to sharing more contents re. well being, mental health, breaking barriers, meaning, purpose of life, fulfilment, success, anxiety, worries and more.