.:. WitNit .:.: 7. How the Mind Works

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April 14, 2005

7. How the Mind Works

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Of Melancholy and Madness

I've been following the downward trajectory of Acidman lately. I don't know the whole story, but clearly he's had his guts ripped out and shredded, and corrosives poured constantly on his heart. His mind is full of liquid metal fire. King Lear never had it so bad.

Despite the tone I take with these "instructional" posts, I have to admit that I don't have any answers. I don't believe answers come from others. In many ways, we can't teach others. Sometimes others may catch something from us, but in my view they teach themselves.

I post these Mind posts, partially for my own good, and partially in the hopes that maybe one or two people might catch one or two pieces of truth in here that work for them. And that's really the key, isn't it? I know that my wife and others are always suggesting various traditional and non-traditional remedies for what ails me, and I'm sure most of it works some of the time for some people. But it has to be the right remedy at the right time for the right person.

The same with advice. There are no catch-alls, no sugered affirmations, that are guaranteed to work. Nothing I write will ever be of value to more than a couple people here and there at the right time. Mostly, it works for me, and that's all I can know for sure.

Some of the things I know for sure about me:

I have a mind, but I am not my mind.
My mind is a good slave, but a poor master.
There are hamster wheels in my mind that can run me ragged, round and round with thoughts that can drag me down.
My mind's hamster wheels can drive me into melancholy, anger, and deep despair.
The hamster in the hamster wheel is my own thoughts, my own talky talky inner dialogue.
What I think and talk about myself--how I feel, how I should feel, how I believe I am, how sucky I am--creates that reality for me.
What I think and talk about others and the world often creates that as well.
My mind holds pictures about me and the world that eventually manifest the longer I hold those pictures in my mind.
When I hold negative pictures about myself, I become those pictures.
When I hold negative pictures about the world, the world becomes those pictures.
My mind operates automatically when I don't try to intercede with it; it will run off with those negative pictures, as if the default setting in the mind is Negative.

Sure, this is a simplistic way of saying it, and there are many caveats and exceptions, and it's not as easy as it sounds. But for me at least it's true. And my observations of others seems to support that it is often true for them as well.

You become what you dwell on. You move toward what you picture. Your thoughts are like lines of code in the computer program of your life.

The way to break the cycle is to switch off your mind's auto-pilot. Take hold of your inner dialogue and work hard every day, every hour, every minute, to hold the negative pictures and negative talk at bay.

The mind seems to work by the Law of Reversed Effort. The more you try to resist negative thoughts, the more you give them life.

The trick is not focussing on getting rid of those thoughts and pictures. The trick is replacing them with positive pictures.

Easily said.

This is why some people write positive affirmations every day. But that in itself is not enough to change the mind. What seems to work more often for some people is the Reality Formula:

I x V = Reality

Imagination time Vivideness equals Reality

You mentally say it. You vividly picture it, investing it with as much emotional feeling as possible, and that combination gradually begins to change the pictures in the mind.

Remember, the mind is a creature of habit. Left to itself, it will run negative programming automatically (unless you were raised in a profoundly positive family and with friends who actively reinforced a positive outlook on life). The mind's habits will continue, you will experience those hamster wheels, as long as you don't do something about it.

I think you can see why other people might be interested in making sure you never get clued in to the fact that you can control your own mind, your own imagination, your own reality.

Most of life here tells you that you can't.

Don't buy into that. You can take charge. It's difficult to break mind habits, to break the melancholy and despair, but it can be done.

One way is to moderate your intake of toxic thoughts, toxic environments, toxic people--thoughts, environments, and people that tear you down.

You're better than you think you are, and you can create a better self than you know.

Just my opinion. You do what you want.

More to come in 8. How the Mind Works.

*** If at first you don't succeed, quit.

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Posted by witnit at April 14, 2005 10:26 AM