I might not know a lot about you personally (okay, maybe nothing) but there’s one thing I can assume with certainty; you’re a thinker. And as you read my stuff, there’s something else I might assume with a high level of probability (but not certainty); you’re a periodic over-thinker. Or worse; a chronic over-thinker.
Nothing wrong with thinking of course (it kind of helps with that whole ‘living life’ thing), but there comes a point in the cognitive process where healthy thinking morphs into unhealthy (obsessive, destructive, weird, compulsive, anxiety-producing, fear-driven) over-thinking. Bells?
In summary…
Thinking: good.
Over-thinking: shit.
The science of Meta-Cognition is an area which explores the notion of ‘thinking about thinking’, (among other things) which is both fascinating and relevant, but to be able to put it into some kind of practice in the real world and create some kind of a positive outcome on a personal level is tricky because after all, you are you, you think like you think, your self-created reality is your reality (only yours), your beliefs are pretty much set and like the rest of us, it’s all you know. And while you exist, interact and ‘operate’ in a physical, three-dimensional world (like the rest of us), the place you do most of your ‘living’ is in your head. Specifically, your thinking.
But….
What if there was a better way to see the world and yourself in it? What if the thing that held you back in life was not your intelligence, talent, education, qualifications, body, environment, opportunities or (insert barrier of choice)? What if your biggest limitation was, in fact, your thinking? Your crappy self-talk? Your self-limiting beliefs? About the world? And you in it? Your propensity to find problems, not solutions? To look past the good stuff and see only the bad stuff? To talk yourself down? Way down?
Okay, be honest and courageous, does any of that sound like you? A little bit?
If you answered no, you can stop reading now (well done, see you next time) and if you answered yes, well done also; you’ve just stepped into a place called self-awareness. Not to be confused with self-loathing. When we start to operate in a state of self-awareness, we begin to discover that ‘our reality’ is just that (our reality) and that we each exist and operate in a multitude of realities and possibilities, all created by the people around us. Operating in self-awareness helps us to understand, connect with and empower others. It also helps the world around us, and the people in it, ‘make sense’ (to us).
In life, there’s no doubt that bad things happen to good people but in the middle of that life, there’s you and me. The story tellers. The interpreters of events. The creators of experiences. And the makers of reality.
When we change our thinking, we change our life.
Til’ next time….
Larry, THANKS for this post! It reminds me of how our thoughts create every aspect of our lives. It may not be the easiest thing in the world to change how we think, but it can be done. In most cases, it’s worth doing.
Reblogged this on rosannelicata and commented:
Dear Reader,
This kind of wisdom doesn’t appear on our radar every day. In fact, it generates an “I knew that!” response from most folks. My question is, now that you’ve reached this level of awareness, what are you going to do about it? Let me know in the ‘Comments’ section!