To think or not to think

[Sabou]

Something that has always seemed to be just outside of my grasp is the concept of dealing with repeating thought patterns that are deemed unsatisfactory. I tend to be in my head a lot and my usual modus operandi is to become aware of the thought, and if possible to try to change the thought into a more positive orientation, by means of trying to think about it differently until I can feel some level of varying peace.

This often works, but it is temporary, the negative thought pattern will tend to find its way back and then I continue to repeat this pattern incessantly. Sometimes I am able to alter my thought to a great degree and find peace within that thought about a situation for quite some time, but all it takes is a certain trigger to crash it all down.

So this has showed me that the mind/thought is not stable. Now, from what I have gathered the alternative is to be aware of the thought, while trying not to identify with it, or label it, catching the monkey mind and returning to a state of no thought. One of main concerns about this (aside from the level of awareness and dedication it takes to actual skillfully practice this) is that I feel like by not trying to think my way out of a thought pattern I am somehow avoiding it and suppressing issues and not dealing with them. I feel like this may be another method of the ego trying to grasp on to overthinking and identifying with thoughts.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts.

[Night Owl]

Are you able to detect the nature of these negative thoughts? And maybe even identify wich ray they are dealing with? Perhaps if you share some of these we might be able to help you balance this particular ray?

[AnthroHeart]

The mind is probably stable. But thoughts are energy, and they stick around. Thought is like a cloud. It sticks around.
Most of your negative thoughts are picked up from other people, or programmed into you from the negative elite using towers.

I've even heard a theory that negativity is beamed from the moon.

I've wondered where the heck my negative thinking comes from. But we live in a world that is saturated with negative vibes.
And as you walk around you walk into areas that have different negative thoughts floating around.

[anagogy]

Something that has always seemed to be just outside of my grasp is the concept of dealing with repeating thought patterns that are deemed unsatisfactory. I tend to be in my head a lot and my usual modus operandi is to become aware of the thought, and if possible to try to change the thought into a more positive orientation, by means of trying to think about it differently until I can feel some level of varying peace.

This often works, but it is temporary, the negative thought pattern will tend to find its way back and then I continue to repeat this pattern incessantly. Sometimes I am able to alter my thought to a great degree and find peace within that thought about a situation for quite some time, but all it takes is a certain trigger to crash it all down.

So this has showed me that the mind/thought is not stable. Now, from what I have gathered the alternative is to be aware of the thought, while trying not to identify with it, or label it, catching the monkey mind and returning to a state of no thought. One of main concerns about this (aside from the level of awareness and dedication it takes to actual skillfully practice this) is that I feel like by not trying to think my way out of a thought pattern I am somehow avoiding it and suppressing issues and not dealing with them. I feel like this may be another method of the ego trying to grasp on to overthinking and identifying with thoughts.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts.

It depends on the nature of the thoughts. Some thoughts are just habits, without deep roots, and can be changed by practicing a new pattern for a period of time. Some other thoughts arise due to deep desires, and the root of the desire will normally have to be uncovered for those thoughts to be transcended.

It is sort of like weeding a garden and you only pull off the top of the plant, and don't get the root. It just grows back in time. You have to get to the root of it. Some people get really good at weeding the surface of their gardens and they do it so frequently that they think all the weeds are gone, but in reality, all the weeds are still there. They are just below the ground, waiting to spring up again in the future. This is what I believe Ra meant when they said ignoring desires is a shortcut that ultimately creates an imbalance in time/space because ultimately the desires have to be dealt with again somewhere down the line in possibly another incarnational experience.

[Cyanatta]

"So this has showed me that the mind/thought is not stable. Now, from what I have gathered the alternative is to be aware of the thought, while trying not to identify with it, or label it, catching the monkey mind and returning to a state of no thought. One of main concerns about this (aside from the level of awareness and dedication it takes to actual skillfully practice this) is that I feel like by not trying to think my way out of a thought pattern I am somehow avoiding it and suppressing issues and not dealing with them. I feel like this may be another method of the ego trying to grasp on to overthinking and identifying with thoughts."


I have trouble with racing thoughts and overthinking as well and for the past year or so now I've been trying exercises in mindfulness whenever I feel like I'm over-analyzing reoccurring thoughts or get overanxious and dwell on them too much. I know a lot of mindfulness techniques have you think of your stream of thoughts like an actual flowing stream or river, and to envision/observe your thoughts like objects floating by (or like clouds floating by in the sky) - either way, the idea is that your brain is always active and generating thoughts, and instead of trying to "dam up the river" just to gather one thought, you acknowledge the continuous flowing river for what it is and observe/integrate thoughts as they come to you. Some thoughts/feelings can obviously have more weight than others and may be too difficult to fully acknowledge in one sitting, but you can always just come back to them later whenever you wish and chew through them at your own pace.

Doing mindfulness helps me if I practice it enough regularly, but I'm still right there with you as far as overthinking and over-analyzing goes. I've been told on multiple occasions by counselors/therapists that my go-to method for overthinking was exactly the same thing you described - I would cling tightly to a thought(s) and wouldn't stop thinking about it, racing it through my head repeatedly again and again in order not to forget or avoid it, and what was brought to my attention was how I was placing an excessive amount of focus on thoughts of the future/past and not being "mindful" (present awareness) of the feeling attached to the thought. Basically, for me it was too much processing going on upstairs (the brain) and not enough below (the heart). I was trying to "think away the thinking" and would get stuck in endless loops, when really I was just avoiding my emotions/feelings. Someone once told me to think of working through racing thoughts like solving a Chinese finger trap - you can take the instinctive/quick approach and keep pulling your fingers (thoughts) harder and harder to get them "out" and trap yourself by repeating the same action, or you can also take a moment, relax, and mindfully approach the situation by changing your direction/focus and move "inward" to find the release.

[third-density-being]

Hello Dear Sabou,

An amazing tool allowing One to become more conscious regarding His/Her own thoughts is contemplation. To observe flow of the thoughts and to identify it’s source. The “triggers” You’ve mentioned usually only possess some resemblance/common elements with true cause of experienced thought/state. Therefore in such task it is good to understand each trigger and find their commonalities which in turn are features of true thought-source.

Since I do not know what are your thought-patterns and what are their content, I can only operate with generalities. Nevertheless, I think it is utmost important to examine your beliefs which themselves are a groupings of thought-patterns and emotion-patterns that merged together, creating very effective filters through which all of your thoughts journey and are properly (for given belief) charged and modified into belief-compatible patterns. Usually there are couple/many beliefs, each connected (one may even lead to the another, creating “chain of thought roads” – belief build upon a belief).

For example, hating others may in fact be form of projecting Self-hatred onto Other-Selves, as Self-protecting mechanism (to realize Self-hatred is to suffer, to lost joy/sense of life).
I’ve found that very effective way of working with thoughts is to write them, as they appear. Write what You feel, what You think, what You’re experiencing and everything that accompanies it. Write as long, as You are experiencing those (unwanted) thought-patterns and later (i.e. next day) read it and think it over. Contemplate on each experience and try to see your own thoughts and feelings “from a distance” (next day, while You will still feel their effects, You will not be so overwhelmed by them – this is an optimal state to work with them).

When You begin to see/understand source/reason for experienced thoughts, their influence/intensity will lessen. Than, while still experiencing them, make an effort to detonate/balance them by evoking it’s opposites.
When You start to feel/think in terms of hate/fear, bring within your Mind opposite thoughts of love/courage. When You feel bad/small/worthless, imagine that You are good/big/precious Being. It is very important that such thoughts will be placed within the same context as their negatives (rewrite your experience with opposite reactions to each event within your Mind). In states of strong/deep feelings such action may seem trivial, but it will grant You some distance to what You’re experiencing – your inner state become less/none-absolute).  

It is hard for me to give You any example, as I do not know what kind of thought-patterns You’re experiencing. Regarding Self? Self in relation to Other-Selves/an object/event/state (of things/human relations/abilities/capabilities/available possibilities/etc.)?
Whatever the case might be, every time ask Self why? are You thinking/feeling in such way? Try to bring within Self doubt in what You are experiencing, as if an entire experience was bogus/an attempt to trick You in some way. By such approach You will automatically gain distance to the entire inner-event and will have more freedom in observing/analyzing/tracking Self-content.

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Important note: All above is something I am working with. I have my successes and failures. Guarding One’s Mind is an ongoing task for life. All We can hope for, is to become more proficient/effective/experienced init.

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All I have Best in me for You

[Plenum]

Something that has always seemed to be just outside of my grasp is the concept of dealing with repeating thought patterns that are deemed unsatisfactory. I tend to be in my head a lot and my usual modus operandi is to become aware of the thought, and if possible to try to change the thought into a more positive orientation, by means of trying to think about it differently until I can feel some level of varying peace.

The Thoughts that arise naturally in consciousness come from somewhere.  They have a reason for beingness.  They aren't any different to pleasure or pain signals we might receive from our nerves (feedback from the body).

The question is - from where?

My understanding is that Thoughts - especially ones built on repetition - have emotional roots.  So one can't change the surface expression of those Thoughts just by dealing with them on the surface level.  The emotions/feelings themselves have to be experienced more fully, to comprehend their feedback.

Positive Visualisation can work.  If it's applied at the right level.  Applying it to the surface level doens't do anything about the deeper roots that generated it in the first place.

With long-standing patterns, this is unlikely to be overturned quickly.  As Agua mentioned in a thread a little while ago, it tends to be a progression of getting to the core issues.

[Billy]

How do you get to the roots and discover exactly what emotional pattern keeps repeating itself and why?  Is it simply a matter of continuously asking yourself why do I feel this, why do I feel that, until there is some sort of breakthrough?

[Plenum]

How do you get to the roots and discover exactly what emotional pattern keeps repeating itself and why?  Is it simply a matter of continuously asking yourself why do I feel this, why do I feel that, until there is some sort of breakthrough?

there's usually a heavy amount of symbolism to it.  So learning to work with one's dreams is a great tool for working with one's waking consciousness.

one of the best ways to penetrate fear is to keep drilling down into negative scenarios.

Let's say it's a social fear, of going up to someone you don't know that well, and asking some question, favor, or to hang out.

The fear of rejection is a big one here, for most sensitive folks, male or female.

So ask the question: what is the worse that could happen in this situation?

First answer: other person laughs at me.

Ask the question again: what is the worse that can happen if the person laughs at me?

Second answer: I feel humiliated and stupid

Ask the question again: what is the worse that could happen if I feel humiliated and stupid?

Third Answer: My parents will be angry because they expect me to do well in school (classic asian answer).

Ask the question again:

Fourth Answer: I won't have my parents support

Ask the question again: what is the worse that could happen if I don't have my parent's support?

Fifth Answer: I will go hungry, because that is how they punished me once before

And that may be the deepest level of fear.  That one will literally have no sustenance for the physical body (food) because of a particular line of action that started at the surface level.

That emotional trauma (lack of love) is the thing that needs to be dealt with at core.

One can be truly surprised at where this simple line of Questioning can go.  So long as you try to answer as honestly as you can (it's a process that happens within the self).  And one can get to places where one starts shaking and crying, and you still know there are deeper levels to go down before you hit 'rock bottom'.

So that's why patience and care is needed.  Sometimes you will get to places where you aren't able to go deeper in the current state.  You just aren't ready to see more clearly yet.

so that's just one technique.  It's take a brutal amount of self-honesty for it to yield results.  You can see some things that make you realise many of one's personality behaviours are just maladaptive behaviours.  

[Agua del Cielo]

My perspective on this would be:

There is most likely a deeper root to re-occuring thoughts.
In this regard it would consider it almost fruitless to exchange negative thoughts by positive thoughts without adressing that root.
I'll give an example:
Lets say you have been treated horribly by humans in your past.
That experience in this example would not habe been "processed" by your past self, most probably because it was impossible at that time.
So you supress the emotions, the horror, the very incident and completely forget about it. It simply doesnt exist anymore in your current awareness.
You would then develop the belief that humans are cold, cruel and so on by there very nature.
This would be an absolute truth for you, because that part that holds it true in a way is STILL in this experience.

You can convince yourself, your current self, that this is not the truth. But you cannot convince your "old self" ( or better your younger self), simply because it doesnt exist for you anymore.
This would be like telling someone who is being tortured "humans are not cruel" and completely ignoring that they are being tortured.

Now as an adult you will most likely interpret all things in this light. Everything will "prove" your belief.
Lets say this issue is very active at the moment in you, waiting to be healed, you will attract experiences that will trigger this old issue.
In the dissociation process you supressed the emotions and installed defensive mechanisms. One of them would be the so-called "ego". It prevents you from re-experiencing this horror by seperating from yourself and your emotions.
One of the most effective means of seperation is "thinking".
By engaging heavily in thoughts you seperate from your emotions and enter a more abstract world.
(You can try to observe in yourself if this is true).

But still, the thoughts originate from somewhere inside of you.
So they dont arise "out of thin air".
You could try to focus on the emotion that is present "behind" the thought or the re-occuring thoughts.
In some cases this might be easy to feel, in other cases it might take extended periods of focus to discover an emotion.
Once you can feel it, you can try to stay as present as possible with it. Without engaging too much in thought.

The more you are able to stay present with (unpleasant) emostions (since they are harder to bear than the nice ones), the more the compulsive thinking will subside and it will reveal more and more of the core issue.
The unpleasant emotions that are triggered in us by outer catalyst are (in my experience) echoes of very old and severe experiences. The are much much "weaker" or unpleasant than the "original" emotion. Nevertheless they are opportunities to heal, to accept and you will reduce the emotional charge each time you are being present with it.
Once you have "dis-charged" the original emotion, there will be no more need and compulsion for that reoccurring thought.

Usually the whole "thought mess" stops long before you discovered the root of it, i found that the willingness to really feel ones emotions and bringing awareness to them is all it takes to stop the compulsive thinking.

A further note on the "exchanging negative thoughts by positive ones and/ or changing one's believes":
I found that you have to be in the position to change this.
In the above example this would mean, once you face that horror, once you experience this (or rather re-experience that state) are you in the position to change that belief and not a second earlier.
Simply because otherwise there will always be a part in you which has a different "truth".

I also found however, once there is an awareness, that the current emotions and thoughts are maybe NOT the truth but stem from an old experience, one is usually at least capable of stopping to feed this (in this case) belief even more with negative energy and thus making it no bigger than it already is.

(I refer to anagogy's post here, in different words)

@plenum that "agua" you mentioned must feel very honored by being referenced by you

@Billy
hmm, my experience is that intellectual analysis will usually distract you from the core issue, since usually the outer appeareance rarely indicates a connection. There would usually be one aspect in common, but it would most probably be overlooked and one would be lost in intellectual abstractions.

Focussing (consciously, not getting lost in it) on the emotion will most probably bring better results, since the emotion will be the same basically, just not as strong.
However, asking for the "truth" to be revealed and confessing the willingness to deal with it ( if that is what you meant), proved to be a mighty tool for me.
I guess this is because it acknowledges that one does not see the true meaning at the moment, honors the fact that one has blocked the deeper truth for unknown reasons and reduces the need for the control mechanism by confessing that one now is willing to deal with whatever arises.
This is a powerful intention which will be noticed by your subconscious control and your guidance.
Apart from that i found deep and maybe sped-up breathing will always help to bring emotions into awareness.
Any type of breathwork would be my favourite recommendation!