Minding my Mind

My mind can trick me into believing things. Sometimes it can be very convincing and start me thinking that things are not going to be okay. When this happens, I need a strategy to trick it right back.

The last thing I want to do is to let it get away with it. I KNOW that I can’t predict the future. Most people can’t, but my mind likes to pretend otherwise. It doesn’t help when I read those quippy quotes about believing or not believing because my mind can, at times, be cunningly pessimistic When I’m off balance and dis regulated, my mind left unchecked, will start right in on me. At the worst times, it wants me to believe the worst things!

I used to be gullible. I used to spend long sleepless nights worrying incessantly about the pessimistic future my mind would invent for me.

Now I’m onto it. When I challenge it, my mind might try to scare me with some misremembered evidence from the past. I counter with positive past evidence, because there is that too. It’s pretty obvious which is more helpful, but my mind, though it might be trying, is often not helpful .

I have learned that I can separate and observe the mind chatter with all it’s theatrical inventions and not become caught. I can let go and NOT believe. (In yoga they call it monkey mind, and if you know monkeys, they are clever little tricksters)

I can question the logic, I can suggest other possibilities. I can use my imagination to invent a favorable future. I can actually trick my own mind into considering and believing some good possibilities. Did you know that if you stand with your arms open wide for two minutes that your brain will think it’s more confident.? Or that smiling will fool your brain into thinking it’s happier.

I’m only suggesting that if my mind can try to make me feel sad and afraid and terrible, it’s only fair that I counter with tricks that help me feel better. Feeling calm and confident makes more sense. It makes me more productive. It helps me be more open to enjoyment and fun. I have a better chance for positive outcomes when I’m not sidelined believing my nay-sayer mind.

I don’t know why my mind chooses to worry when I’d rather be falling asleep. Even if I did know why, it wouldn’t probably stop. I’ve been a habitual worrier since childhood. For years I didn’t know that I had any power over this. I used to think thoughts came from what was happening, what happened or what was about to happen. Now I see that I have an internal commentator who swings the ‘facts’ into meaning all kinds of things, (not unlike some popular news stations). If my unconscious ‘agenda’ is to scare myself, then of course worry makes sense, but if I want to show up calmly confident, I need to pay closer attention and sternly question my monkey commentator. When she isn’t being helpful, it’s time for me to be strategic.