A good friend of
mine was talking to me about a problem at work.
He was thinking about the problem, the role other people were playing, and
his experience dealing with this problem.
As he shifted from subject to subject I could see his feelings change
accordingly. He was disheartened. As he
talked he went from feeling bother to frustration, to confusion, to anger, all
of which are forms of stress.
The Principles are
simple. Understanding them reveals what
is true in each moment. For example, whatever
we are thinking right now, we will feel.
We are free thinkers. We are free to think about any subject in the
world. But we will always feel the
thoughts we are having about our subject.
At any moment you
could say that one of two things is going on for any of us. Either we are aware of the Principles, e.g.
right now I am feeling my thinking, or we
are not aware of the Principles, e.g. right now I am so engrossed in the
subject that I am thinking about that I am not aware that what I am thinking is
creating a feeling. In each moment we
understand the Principles or we don’t.
This is true for me, for you, and for every one of us.
As my friend talked
to me about his problem, he was so engrossed in the subject that he was completely
unaware that he was thinking up his own stress. Consequently, he thought that his discomfort
was because of what was happening at work.
He believed that whatever he was feeling was justified by the problem. As he was analyzing he was unaware of the
Principles and didn’t realize the way in which this thinking was creating more and
more stress.
Thinking up stress
is like picking up a hammer and repeatedly hitting yourself on the head while
talking about a problem. You are in pain
but you are oblivious to the hammer.
Thought recognition is seeing yourself hammering your head, realizing
the connection between hammering and your pain, and then setting the hammer
down. Setting the hammer down is not a technique. It is a built-in human response to realizing
the true source of your present moment stress.
There are many times
when I am thinking about a subject or an idea and I am so engrossed in the idea
that I don’t see the fact of Thought creating my experience in that moment. As I became more aware of
the Thought-feeling connection, my focus shifted from the subjects in my mind to the effect my thinking was
having on me. I was shocked to see how much
of my thinking was creating stress, e.g. seriousness, discomfort, anxiety, uncertainty,
and subtle tension. When I see that I am
thinking up this stress I don't tend to continue to think about the
subject at hand. With awareness it drops away. More and more of my thinking has been
dropping away leaving my head open and clear.
Being aware of the
fact of Thought allows me to see the pain- inducing hammering I am doing. This understanding allows the hammering to subside or stop. I start to feel better and think better. A mind free of stressful thoughts is the
gateway for the automatic arising of fresh thinking. This creates feelings of
well-being, higher level perspectives, and solutions to our problems. This kind of thinking does not create
stress.
I reminded my friend
of the role Thought was playing in his current stress and of the in-built
potential for new thinking. As he
realized this, his stressful thinking fell away. I saw him lighten up considerably. Right away he started having his own insights
into his problem. He continued to have
more insights the next day as well.
Stress is an
invitation to wake up to the Thought-feeling connection. Realizing the Principle-based foundation of our feelings results in more of our stress-producing thoughts dropping away. And how rewarding it is when our well-being fills
in the space left as this thinking clears away.
Every one of us can begin to wake up from the enchantment with the
subjects we think about. As we do, we see and set down the hammer of our
stressful thinking!
