Get Lost in Your Thoughts

There’s a statistic out there: we have approximately 60,000 thoughts a day. 

Many of these thoughts are habitual. Many are un- or sub-conscious. Some of these were told to us a kid and now we quietly repeating them on auto-pilot. Some are helpful. Many are NOT!

Bringing awareness to our thoughts empowers us to choose to give them attention or let them go. 

Have you ever ruminated on something for a really long time and then suddenly realized: what if that’s not even true? 

Or: Wait, why on Earth would my brain even latch on to that? 

Take any issue you have right now where you have a feeling or result that you really wish was different. Write down the circumstances: remember, the neutral facts only: keep it as specific as possible. Now: write down all the thoughts you have about that circumstance. Fill up some paper if you need. Or dictate away into your electronic notepad you tech geek:) 

Get them out of your head. What the most pressing one? The juicy one. The one that really is getting under your nails or feels like a gut punch. You don’t have to start with the hardest one, of course, but for this example: let’s dig in. 

I’ll give an example most parents of toddlers can relate to:

My daughter was probably 4 at the time. She’s a happy kid, often a peacemaker, a stereotypically first-born rule-follower, and truly an amazing gem of a daughter.  I recognize these are all my thoughts about her by the way!  Here’s a pic not from the morning described below:)

So the example unfolds one morning while we are running late to school. I had a meeting setup for essentially the same time as drop off, so I felt rushed and probably annoyed that it was a hectic morning. I had gotten our two-year-old in the car and my daughter sat at the doorstep, refusing to get shoes on, annoyed with how her toes felt in her socks and then fully melting down. My brain kept offering me: “Why is she giving me such a hard time? This mothering stuff is sooo hard…. and just sucks sometimes.” And probably a lot of other nonsense that wasn’t kind nor helpful.  

Bottom line: what stuck was: “she’s giving me such a hard time.”
The feeling that created was frustration, maybe spiced with a little anger and disappointment. I felt like I had done everything right that morning—Had tried my hardest to align the stars to make my juggling act work. And somehow the forces of poorly fitting socks and my four-year-old were taking me out at the knees. 

The rest of this “model” unfolded predictably. I responded out of frustration. My actions didn’t align with how I want to show up for my kids or myself. The result was I was giving her a hard time and ultimately myself a really hard time for showing up the way I did.

I went for a run after my meeting and was ruminating about the whole thing. I was listening to a podcast when suddenly, the thought popped in: what if she wasn’t GIVING me a hard time. What if in that moment, my brain had offered me: why is she HAVING such a hard time? One word put a 180-degree spin on things. I probably wouldn’t have been so reactive or angry or frustrated. I might have given her a hug and sympathized with the annoying seam on socks and the way it hits one toe can be really frustrating, especially when you’re little and can’t easily fix it yourself. I would have connected rather than disconnected, and certainly not have been so mad.

This got a little long-winded, but I hope it illustrates the point on how powerful our thoughts can be. They can drive our physiology and emotions in a blink of an eye… and if we can learn to recognize some of our common thoughts or thought traps, we can learn to pause early in our reactions and more powerfully choose. 

I use this example because it comes up often for me now. When my brain turns on auto-pilot and goes to the “why is he/she giving me such hard time?” I can catch it so much more often and pause to say: he/she must be having a really hard time. This comes up with my kids, my patients… and family, too.

And my approach changes dramatically.