On a typical day a person thinks anywhere between 6,000 to 70,000 thoughts. There is a viewpoint that 70 - 80% of these thoughts are negative. Our experience does tell us that anything negative appears to trigger the flight or fight response of the body mind structure and hence the human mind is more conditioned to take notice of negative thoughts. Hence the fear that something might be more relevant to our survival and may require a emergency response automatically prioritises negative over positive.
Another commonly held
viewpoint is that thoughts expend energy, the more you think, the more tired
you get, which is no surprise that when you are in deep sleep your day to day
thoughts are absent and you expend the least amount of energy. It can also be
observed from direct experience that absence of thoughts in deep sleep also
refreshes the mind and the body.
Thoughts can be about
anything, but intention creates focussed thoughts, which in turn leads to
actions and feelings, repetitive actions become a habit and a habit becomes a set of values which in turn becomes your destiny.
Thoughts do one other
thing within us. They impact our physiology by impacting the hormonal balance
in our body. This in turn creates emotions and feelings and these impact the
way we behave. For example a sudden release of endorphins makes you happy
compared to a release of adrenaline and noradrenaline when you are angry. These
hormones then affect the way your various body organs react. For instance when
you are angry your heart starts beating faster, your blood pressure changes,
your breath becomes shorter, etc. One single thought can have a massive impact
on the physiology of your body. Sustained thinking can permanently impact your
physiology to a point you may develop chronic pain in parts of your body.
Excessive thinking of the past (which can not be changed) is a major contributor of depression and excessive thinking of the future is a major contributor of anxiety.
If your thoughts can
have such a big impact on you and your life, isn't it important to learn how we
can manage them.
Based on the above we
can see all these impacts are a direct result of your thoughts or habits
encountering an external or internal trigger point. It is clear external
trigger points are not in your control. So the only thing you can manage are
your thoughts and your habits.
So how to do this?
Thoughts are very
subtle and hard to monitor. For instance one random thought about food can lead
to a chain reaction of thoughts and next thing you know you are salivating
thinking about something you ate years back.
Thoughts come in
clusters, thoughts are normal and natural, excessive thoughts can make you
addicted to thinking. In particular the major impact of thoughts is that they
result in unwanted actions and feelings.
How can I manage thoughts and feelings ?
One of the ways to
manage thoughts is to watch them come and go and not get carried away with
them. The moment you shine the light of awareness on thoughts they disappear.
For this one of the most essential ingredients is acceptance of thoughts as
they are. If you try to change or control them or suppress them you then get
attached to them and can no longer watch them in an aware state. Initially it may be hard to watch thoughts,
so it may be better to start cultivating the practice of witnessing or watching
with something more grosser like feelings and desires.
A similar process
applies to feelings. If you are feeling pain or anger, just observing it makes
it disappear. The trick is you need to be aware of what you are feeling. As
feelings are more gross then thoughts, it is much easier to observe them.
As you observe feelings
you begin to realise that feelings collect other feelings, as well as they
result from unresolved thoughts. For example if you are feeling pain because of
a broken relationship, now if you have a physical pain, it too adds to your
relationship pain and together they create a collective mass of pain. So any
new pain you feel starts collecting with already existing pain. Over time you
become a collection point for pain unless you accept and clear the pain
backlog. This holds true for other emotions such as anger, fear, anxiety, etc.
But feelings of pain appear to be so real, how can I avoid them ?
To avoid collecting
emotions you need to be conscious and aware. To remove collected emotions you need to
simply watch them and accept them for what they are.
One practice that works
well is on a daily basis just pick a time perhaps before you go to bed to
reflect on how aware you were during the day of your emotions and your thoughts
and what if any learnings you had that can be applied to the next day. During
the practice assess if there have been any new emotional backlogs that have
been generated as a result of actions or thoughts carried out without awareness
during the day. This will ensure emotional backlogs are kept to a minimum and
emotional collections during the day are promptly cleared.
You can always use the
five step process of Intention, Attention, Observation, Awareness and Contemplation for understanding desires, to understand feelings as well.
Can you reduce the
number of thoughts ?
There are many different techniques that have been employed by seekers for thousands of years, below are listed some of the common ones -
- Anything you shine the light of awareness on, will disappear, so being aware of one's thoughts not only detaches one from the thoughts but also gradually sees the thoughts fizzle away as one becomes present in the here and now.
- Another technique that has been used for centuries by zen masters is the practice of zazen which is meditative technique used for deep contemplation and eventually emptying the mind of thoughts. There are many resources that can provide instructions on the practice, one of which can be found here.
- Another set of techniques which are based on Yogic principles focus on intense physical activity or breathing activity, which are built to a certain crescendo and then stopped, then suddenly silences the mind. These practices are followed by those on the path of energies, hence can cause significant side effects if practiced in the absence of a qualified Guru.
- One practice that is more suited to people on the devotional path is the practice of chanting a mantra. This practice whilst followed by many people, does not silence the mind if it is carried out in autopilot mode. Any mantra that is picked for chanting, has a certain intonation and a certain meaning. Chanting the mantra and with a focus on the meaning is enough to get a persons mind silenced. Quality is more important than quantity. There are certain base or beej (seed) mantras which when chanted result in instant emptying of mind (internal purification is required to achieve this).
- One of the simplest practices is the practice of attention on a single activity or single tasking (as opposed to multi-tasking), which ensures that one enters a meditative state of being one with the activity being carried out. This ensures one becomes immediately present. Initially this practice can be started with in-posture attention on an object, gradually applied to day to day activities and eventually can result in complete emptying of the mind and oneness with the activity or object of attention.
- Another strategy that works is time boxing the required thinking. For example allocating a certain time for daily planning or time boxing work related thoughts to weekdays only between certain times. This ensures that unnecessary thoughts especially those that lead to anxiety or depression are reduced and the thinking becomes focussed and targeted.
What are the impacts of reduced thoughts ?
As we know the more the
number of thoughts, more energy we expend and more likely we are to create
unwanted feelings, impact on the physiology of our body and generate
negativity. Reduction in thoughts leads to sharpening of the intellect, clarity
of purpose in life, manifestation of one's desires and intentions (that which
you want begins to happen) and above all return to the state of being and
oneness, which is the natural state of every person.
Once thoughts are managed, just having a strong intention has been known to cure physical ailments, manifest wealth, expedite spiritual progress and bring all that appears as illusory into the seeker's control if the seeker so desires.
In summary intentions, thoughts and feelings are the fundamental illusory forms that are the key building blocks that can transform a seeker. Managing them effectively not only makes an individual optimise their survival activities as well as speeds up the individual's spiritual progress and knowledge of the illusion, leading to a life free from suffering.