I’ve been running Personal Development Seminars since 1996 and still, after all these years practicing what I preach, I wake up on the odd occasion annoyed by stupid thoughts – or the distractions come hunting for me as the day progresses, when I don’t expect them. But, of course, I should expect them because, unfortunately, the normal adult mind appears to be hell-bent on destroying our finest attempts to do our best during the course of our everyday lives.
Seventy years’ study in the field of psychology suggests that the ordinary mind is a loose cannon! Of course, you don’t need to look any further than your workplace, your football or golf club or your local newspaper for a load of evidence to validate all that scholarly research – and I haven’t even mentioned what you’ll find going on on the world stage! Normal lunatic people are forever misbehaving themselves and they seem unable to do anything about it. And, on the face of it, we are unable to behave ourselves – because our minds are pre-programmed to pay previous little attention to reality and plenty of attention to all the nonsense that really is not happening at all. If we decided to look for a culprit, our useless thoughts would be the prime suspect.
The normal mind is attacked by 50,000 random thoughts each day – and that’s while we’re awake, so we’re not even talking about a twenty four hour period. Some of our useless thoughts are simply stupid – like ‘I wish I was out playing golf or lying at the beach than stuck in here in this boring meeting’ – thinking that you’d prefer to be somewhere else doesn’t alter the reality of where you are! Nonsense aside, quite a few of our random thoughts are a little more dangerous. I’ve no doubt that you’ve got your own list but here are a few examples of what I’m talking about. ‘I’m so shy I’ll never be able to talk to her/him.’ (Delete as appropriate!!) ‘I wish I could be more assertive and not let people walk all over me.’ ‘I’m never going to get that job.’ ‘I’ll be happier when I’m three stone lighter.’
The problem with such useless rubbish is that, for starters, they confirm that, if your life is not-too-bad, that’s OK. It isn’t. The second problem is that this type of thinking enables (and that’s clearly not the right word) your subconscious mind to focus on all the things that it learned about you when you were a small child. These are the things – and the mind prefers to focus on the negative – that you currently believe to be true. This is the out-of-date nonsense that is standing in your way.
Don’t misunderstand me. Your mind will never stop being bombarded by useless thoughts – as I’ve said, it’s how we’ve been built. However, you can choose whether or not you will give this nonsense any of your precious energy. You must realize that you have a very real alternative to wasting your time, or your life on all that garbage – you could choose to devote your attention to the wonderful reality of the present moment. And, if that reality involves sitting through that boring meeting, you might just find that paying some attention to what’s actually happening might make you more effective, happier and more productive – the rewards that most people want out of life.
Tags: Focus Your Mind, Limiting Beliefs, Personal Development, Self Improvement, Useless Thought
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