The Practical Side of All This Thought Stuff

Written on May 10, 2008 by Tom Stine / 28 Comments »

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I have a coaching client who has quite a bit of difficulty using his hands and arms due to a long-term problem of pain and stiffness. I frequently type notes for him during and after our sessions so he has a reminder of what we discussed, plus it is a good way to make certain he knows what he will be working on between sessions.

We’ve been working together for a while, and I have worked with him often on his beliefs about the various issues in his life. Obviously from my last few articles, I’ve had thoughts, beliefs and thinking on my mind of late, and during our coaching session last week, I said something to him about his thoughts and beliefs on a few subjects, and then I typed the following into my notes for him:

You will discover, if you are open to it, that much of what goes through your head, your thoughts and thinking, look suspiciously like the behaviors of a drug addict or alcoholic.

He pondered this statement for a day or two, and then he left me a message yesterday asking me to explain further what I meant by the above. I typed a response and sent it to him, explaining what I meant and why my emphasis on thoughts and feelings is helpful and extremely practical. He left me another message this morning begging me to post my response on my website because, in his words, “it was freaking brilliant and would help far more people than I could ever help by coaching alone.” Well, who am I to argue with a statement like that? So, here is what I wrote to him (with minor editing to preserve his privacy):

“Our minds, if we are honest, are quite obsessive. They get stuck on a topic and they keep going round and round and round about it. They don’t stop. Like an addict, they go back for another hit, another high, sticking with a subject or a belief until they literally fall apart from it. Just like an addict.

“We continually give energy to our thoughts by believing them to be true. We say, ‘Well, since I thought it, it must be true.’ But a touch of honesty reveals that most of what we think is no where near true. I would contend that none of it is true. It is all just mental noise, far removed from our actual moment to moment, minute to minute experience.

“So, what I’m encouraging you to do is to suck some of the energy out of the stories you tell yourself. That’s why I always emphasized working with your beliefs. Beliefs are stories. You only believe those things you don’t know to be 100% true. Do you have to believe in breathing? Do you have to believe in gravity? No. You may not know what gravity really is, or how breathing works, or whether gravity will be working tomorrow, but it seems to be the case that every time you jump, you come right back down. No believing really required.

“Let me be very blunt with you. You believe that you can’t make money because of your hands. We’ve discussed that many times. Do you have evidence even remotely as strong as gravity to justify this belief? Or did you decide at some point that it must be true? Do you see? You’ve repeated that story so much that if you will look, you will see that you are clinging to the belief that until your hands get better, you can’t earn money. But is it true? Is it real? Where’s the proof?

“And when you start to doubt your own beliefs, you will find that your creativity will skyrocket. Suddenly, things that seemed impossible start seeming possible. You have new prospects, new perspectives. But only when you question your old beliefs. This process is releasing in its most basic form. Real and true and deep Sedona Method releasing. Exactly what Lester Levenson did when he awaken and healed himself from terminal heart disease.

“Plus, as you shed these beliefs, your body will have a chance to relax. It will not be under so much constant mental stress. And who knows what good things might happen if you relaxed your body!

“Is this making more sense? Let me know….. Tom”

I’ve been thinking lately of writing more articles that focus on how to live from consciousness, spirituality, etc. Personally, I think that spirituality is the most practical approach to life and life’s issues. That’s why I work with people. That’s why I write. To help people with life’s ups and downs.

Spiritual awakening seems to me to be the absolute best solution to all of life’s problems and issues. It is difficult to explain, but it is truly amazing the relief that you feel when you start realizing that all of your problems are not a big deal because they aren’t your problems. Quite simply, there is no you to have them. They are just stuff, part of life, but they do not ultimately threaten who you truly are.

I encourage everyone reading this article to do what I encourage my clients to do: challenge your beliefs. Start to see that they are just thoughts, just ideas floating around they mind, and that they aren’t true and they certainly are not you. You will be surprised by what happens when you start to let all this stuff go. All I can say is, “magical.”

18 Random Thoughts About Thoughts and Thinking

Written on May 7, 2008 by Tom Stine / 55 Comments »

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How cool! Some of my regular and new readers are having a lot of fun commenting on my recent post, Are All Thoughts Untrue? I have quite a few responses to make, but I felt it would be more interesting to do another article on thoughts and toss in a little bit on thinking, too. So, here is a random series of thoughts on the subject of thoughts. (Personally, I find it hilarious that we have thoughts about thoughts and thinking.)

1. What are thoughts? They are sounds and images passing through awareness. In other words, the sounds you hear and pictures you see “in your head” are all there is to thought. The energy of thought then gets translated into the body and becomes feelings. And really, there is nothing more to it than that. I think. *grins*
2. “You can get more stinkin’ from thinkin’ than drinkin’.” The San Francisco sage Joe Miller had a cool way with words, didn’t he? Point well made. It seems clear to me that thinking has far more in common with an addiction than anything else. “Hi. My name’s Tom. And I’m a think-aholic.”
3. Who is thinking these thoughts? No one. That’s the ultimate rub of spirituality. The “who” you think you are isn’t. Don’t believe me? Go looking for yourself. In and of itself, that could be all the spiritual practice you need.

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4. Thinking is conditioned to the hilt. Whenever I studied psychology, I hated B.F. Skinner. I thought all that Behaviorist theory was nonsense. Well, old Burrhus was more right than I could have possibly imagined. Thoughts are incredibly conditioned by our environment. And we all know it, too. That’s why we say, “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree,” and, “You parent the way you were parented,” and lots of other expressions. We are heavily conditioned by our families, school, church, society, you name it. Until, well, you start letting it all go. And then what? Well, something else starts seeping in.
5. I seem to have no control over my thoughts. If I had control over my thoughts, I would be able to choose what I’m going to think. I can’t. I can say, “I’m going to think about the ocean,” and then a lovely image of the ocean enters my mind, I may even daydream about walking on the beach. But I didn’t choose the image I saw, the daydream about walking on the beach just popped into my head, and then I had a flash of memory about needing to buy bread at the store. And for that matter, why did I say to myself, “I’m going to think about the ocean.”? My thoughts seem to arise from nowhere.
6. We call the “place” where thoughts occur “the mind.” But where is the mind? What is the mind? Show me your mind! Or better still, go looking for it. Point to it. See it with your eyes, hear it with your ears, taste it, smell it, touch it. You can’t? Interesting, very interesting. I would say the mind is a concept about, well, more concepts (thoughts). But no more real than the man in the moon.
7. Our thoughts create our reality. True or false? A very popular belief in modern spirituality is that the sum total of all one’s thoughts, feelings and beliefs directly and accurately creates your world. Change your thinking, and you can change your life. You’ve seen The Secret, right? But, is this true? I haven’t a clue. At times it does seem like the world is a direct reflection of my thinking. At other times, the world seems to be exactly the opposite. Some would argue that the world reflects my subconscious thoughts. Maybe so. However….
8. Is there a subconscious? Everyone sure likes to believe that there are thoughts outside of our conscious awareness that “stick around” somehow or another. We call this collection of thoughts our subconscious mind. But is there one? No way to know, really. Because as soon as I become aware of a “subconscious thought,” that thought is now conscious and no longer a subconscious thought. It seems we use this idea of a subconscious to refer to those thoughts that seem to repeat themselves. But how can I be sure they repeat? Maybe they spontaneously generate anew each time. No way to know. Thoughts, ideas and beliefs are slippery, are they not?
9. We place our identity in our thoughts. We think we are our thoughts. And that’s the trouble. We are not our thoughts. Just for a moment, notice the thoughts you are thinking. Are they you? Do they tell you who you are? Or are you somehow “before” the thoughts? If you add up all your thoughts about yourself, do they really define who you are?
10. You are not who you think you are. Ramana Maharshi instructed people to look at their thoughts and see that they all arise from the I-thought, the one core thought that says, “I am all of this stuff I’ve been thinking.” But are you? If you investigate the I-thought, inquiry into “what am I?” and sit with this, you begin to realize that you are not the I-thought. And then it finally dawns: you are not who you think you are. You have been pretending. You are the Void, the Awareness, the Presence, the Nothing, the Emptiness, the Now that is prior to all thought. And that is the where the spiritual journey ends. And a new life begins.

11. And thus the native hue of resolution
    Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,
    And enterprises of great pith and moment
    With this regard their currents turn awry,
    And lose the name of action.
    As fate would have it, I read this bit of Shakespeare on a blog I love reading, Fake Steve Jobs (yeah, I’m a Mac fan). Perfect, just perfect: “the pale cast of thought.” Right on!
12. There is a difference between true and Truth. This one is a tough one, but I’ll give it a try. The Truth is, in my mind, synonymous with Reality or That Which Is. What is Reality? Good question. It is things as they truly are. And, I’m afraid, that is something that is beyond words, beyond thoughts, beyond the mind. That’s just all there is to it. We make a great attempt at describing it in words, but we really can’t. All we can do is point someone in the direction of Truth.
13. True with a small “t” is more akin to right or correct. And that is problematic in the world to say the least! What is right? What is correct? I have no answers to these questions. It seems to me that it might be better to ask, “What is helpful? What is useful?”
14. “Truth is true, and only Truth is true.” This line from A Course in Miracles gets it right.
15. Maybe the issue isn’t whether thoughts are true. Maybe the real issue is that we believe our thoughts. As one of my friends, Takuin, pointed out in his comments, “The problem is the belief in the thought…. The belief in the thought causes suffering. It is devilish and subtle, because the perceived problems seem real and we want to get away from them. But we can never get away because they only exist in our minds. And besides, who is it that wishes to escape? The believer that believes in the perceived problem.”
16. It seems to me that believing a thought is about the same as saying “the thought is true.” Not to quibble, but what is the difference?
17. Working with, “no thought is true,” has lead to greater peace and happiness. I can’t get away from this one. The more I identify thoughts that I have accepted as true (should I say “thoughts that I believe?”), and then question the truth of them, the happier and more peaceful I become. Doing so is a part of Byron Katie’s The Work, a technique that I like. I strongly feel that it leads to greater happiness and peace.
18. I still think no thought is true. There, I said it. It is, as one commenter, Evan, put it, overly simplistic and too absolutist. But, I still like it. It works for me. If anything, the above “thoughts” on thinking are enough to leave one confused.

So there you go. Some random thoughts. Honestly, as I mentioned in the last point, I can’t really make heads nor tails out of all this thinking stuff. It seems to be an experience we all have, thoughts entering our awareness, passing through consciousness, to be replaced by new and different thoughts. Constantly changing, constantly moving. All ephemeral and difficult to pin down.

Please feel free to leave your comments, thoughts, ideas, whatever, below. I look forward to seeing what the above brought up for you. Namaste.

Disentangling the Sense of I - Eckhart Tolle

Written on April 22, 2008 by Tom Stine / 9 Comments »

“When you don’t cover up the world with words and labels, a sense of the miraculous returns to you life that was lost a long time ago when humanity, instead of using thought, became possessed by thought. A depth returns to your life. Things regain their newness, their freshness. And the greatest miracle is the experiencing of your essential self as prior to any words, thoughts, mental labels and images. For this to happen, you need to disentangle your sense of I, of Beingness, from all the things it has become mixed up with, that is to say, identified with.”

Eckhart Tolle does a marvelous job of expressing the essence of the spiritual journey in this one little paragraph. A vast array of ideas, activities, thoughts, practices, you name it, are bundled into the concept of spirituality. But really, ultimately, spirituality is simply about what you are. It doesn’t get any simpler than that. Eckhart calls this disentangling your sense of I, in other words, discovering what you really are, discovering your beingness.

A New Earth is a truly inspirational book, and the work that Eckhart Tolle and Oprah are doing together is powerful and transformative. I feel a book review coming on! And a final review of the webinars from Eckhart and Oprah.

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