Our thoughts, just like our breath, run on autopilot. Just as well really, otherwise we would need to think about every little thing we do all the time. Imagine needing full conscious awareness to drive your car, or walk down the street or get your card out of your wallet at the shops or send an email. Our mind helps us do so much without needing to consciously think about it.
We can drive on long trips and somehow our autopilot is doing much of the navigating. The mind is so useful and amazing with its massive bank of memory stored over a life time. We could think of it as data storage.
The mind is such a willing servant with all it’s stored info and always ready to solve problems for us. When we have questions, fears, doubts, anxieties…….the mind is willing to help out. But it doesn’t help so much when we get stuck in mind spins and whirlwinds of anxiety, depression, limiting beliefs and thought patterns. Our automatic mind doesn’t know when to stop! It’s job is to keep coming up with more information, because that is just what the mind does.
We have thoughts running in the background of our mind constantly and often outside our awareness altogether. What if these thoughts are fueling our anxiety? What if the thoughts are spinning out of control? Our body steps in and responds, chemicals are released and before we know it we can be in a total mess on the inside.
We might doubt something we said, regret an action we took or wonder about something we don’t comprehend. Next minute we can find ourselves launched into a world of suffering. A world of self criticism and judgements.
We unconsciously set up closed looped thought patterns that can keep spinning for days, weeks, months ………..a life time! And we can get really, really stuck! We can fall into a big pit of sticky suffering.
So what of pain and suffering? Pain will come to us in life of course. We will experience the loss of a loved one, maybe we lose a job or our health. Maybe we have broken bones and aches and pains. So yes, absolutely, there is pain. But our mind has the capability of creating incredible suffering when left unchecked. Suffering which is avoidable if we know how to work with and manage our thoughts and actions.
I love working with groups and helping people notice their internal processes by sharing the experiential tools I use that help me calm my inner state. Being in one’s body as we notice thoughts come up takes courage because it leads into physical discomfort. To notice our thoughts, while compassionately supporting and calling back our shadow parts, can be incredibly painful, and it can be really helpful to work with someone who knows this path experientially. Conscious expansion is something that we can all grow towards and into more deeply. This is the path to lasting inner peace.
