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What Are Thoughts?

Past events get stored as memories. Your mind conditioning and beliefs are also stored as memories. All this is unconscious storage; the mind does all this in auto mode. Perceptions and interpretations are created in the mind based on its past “external” conditioning and also its natural conditioning (genetics). These interpretations, perceptions and judgments come up as thoughts in the mind, and they can positive or negative depending on the mind’s conditioning. Thoughts are generated based on the past incidents/memories, future projections and interpretations on the present life situation. It’s like a computer trying to predict or conjure up projection based on the data it has collected so far.

 

When thoughts are negative in nature (thoughts of worry, anxiety, stress, lack, resentment, guilt etc) they produce resistance to the movement of your life, and this resistance is felt as suffering. Negative thoughts will always stand in resistance to the movement of your life, like blocks of stone in the midst of a swift current of water. Life is a stream of pure positive energy and hence any negative thought will stand in opposition to it, causing friction which is felt as suffering in the body.

 

Mind’s main function is to produce thoughts. Thoughts are the seeds of actions and experience. Our mind works constantly.  We produce  around fifty  thousand thoughts in a day. The thoughts  vibrations  are the energy we produce. It can’t be seen but its physical and non physical impact is very influential. 

Our mental and physical health depends 90% on the thoughts that we create.  And the collective effect of all the thoughts create the social economic and political environment of a place. So managing thoughts can have a very positive effect in our day today life.

The type of energy depends on the type of thoughts.   Positive thoughts produce positive energy and negative thoughts produce negative energy.

The thoughts control our present and future. The more control we have on our  thoughts the happier and freer we will be and same for the future. When we have the power of managing and controlling  thoughts  and  feeling, we can choose how to react to different people and situations that comes in our life.

 

OUR EACH THOUGHT CONSUMES/PRODUCE  SOME ENERGY

For simple understanding we can use following hypothetical example

 

Type of thoughts                         Energy consumed /produced per thought

1. Necessary thoughts                           -1
2. Waste thoughts                                 -5
3. Negative thoughts                              -10
4. Positive thoughts                               +10
Sound sleep                                          +50000

         

MOST OF US KEEP TRACK OF OUR MONEY INFLOWS AND OUTFLOWS AND ENSURE THAT AT THE END OF THE DAY OR MONTH OUR MONEY INFLOWS ARE MORE THEN MONEY OUTFLOWS. BUT WE FORGET TO KEEP TRACK OF OUR ENERGY INFLOWS AND ENERGY OUTFLOWS THROUGH OUR THOUGHTS. AND THAT IS WHY AT END OF THE DAY WE FEEL EXHAUSTED EVEN IF WE HAVE NOT DONE ANY PHYSICAL WORK.  

Even sound sleep is sufficient to cover all energy lost in necessary thoughts.

1. Necessary thoughts        2. Waste thoughts 3. Negative thoughts 4. Positive thoughts Sound sleep   NET BALANCE

No. of thoughts 50,000 - - - yes

Energy consumed/gained -50,000 - - - + 50,000   0

 

A person with more of negative thoughts will always have net negative energy balance.

1. Necessary thoughts        2. Waste thoughts 3. Negative thoughts 4. Positive thoughts Sound sleep   NET BALANCE

No. of thoughts 10,000 10,000 25,000 5,000 yes

Energy consumed/gained -10,000 -50,000 -250,000 +50,000 + 50,000   - 210,000

 

A person with more of positive thoughts will always have net positive energy balance.

1. Necessary thoughts        2. Waste thoughts 3. Negative thoughts 4. Positive thoughts Sound sleep   NET BALANCE

No. of thoughts 10,000 10,000 5,000 25,000 yes

Energy consumed/gained -10,000 -50,000 -50,000 +2,50,000 + 50,000   + 1,90,000

DETAILS OF THOUGHTS :-

Necessary thoughts:- These thoughts are those which are necessary for our daily routine e.g. what is my telephone number ?, time to go to office. These thoughts comes to our mind as per as our needs and responsibilities. (But if  these thoughts are unnecessarily repeated they became waste thoughts.)

Waste thoughts:-Waste thoughts are thoughts that are  produced unnecessarily at untimely moments. They are of no use. They fill us with worry and anxiety. These thoughts are about things we can’t change or we are not related to them. These thoughts decreases our ability to concentrate. For eg. majority of such thoughts arise after reading newspaper, or after watching TV or after having long and useless conversations with our friends etc.

Negative thoughts: Negative thoughts are the thoughts which are harmful for us. They disturb our peace and weaken one’s inner strength. Negative thoughts rises from our inner weaknesses such as greed, lust , ego, anger , attachment etc. If these thoughts are repeated they hamper our both mental and physical health.

Positive thoughts:- The thoughts which gives us  happiness, peace, love etc are called the positive thoughts. They increases our inner strength. They make us constructive. Positive thinking normally involves use of spiritual quotient / meditation in solving all problems.

 

How to Stop Obsessive Negative Thoughts?

If you are asking this question, ask yourself another question – “is this question not another thought? It’s a thought about killing thoughts”. All your attempts at suppressing and stopping thoughts will fail because you will be using the mind to stop the mind. The police man and thief are both the mind, so how can the police man catch the thief?

So you cannot kill the mind by force. The mind dies its own death by the poison of disassociation.

 

What gives power to a thought ? – Your interest.

If you have no interest in a particular thought then it loses its hold over you. You can try this out now. Let the thoughts flow through your mind but don’t take interest in them. Just stay as a bystander or a watcher and let the thoughts float.

With a little practice you will get really good at watching thoughts and not involving yourself with them. You will stop giving power to thoughts by not giving them your interest. Thoughts die immediately when they are deprived of this fuel of interest. If you don’t associate with the thought or give power to the thought, it will wither away quickly.

The thoughts in your mind gain power from your attention and interest. Your attention is the fuel for your mind. So when you give attention to negative thoughts in the mind, you are unconsciously fueling it and thus attracting more momentum for these negative thoughts. The momentum of negative thoughts in your mind will slow down, and ebb away, automatically when you stop feeding your attention to it. Stay as an open space of awareness without contracting your attention on the negative thoughts of the mind, and soon they will lose their momentum.

You can focus on the positive thoughts generated in the mind, and thus develop a positive momentum in your mind. Every time your mind produces some positive thoughts, e.g thoughts of love, joy, excitement, abundance, beauty, appreciation, passion, peace etc, focus on it, milk it, and give attention to it. This will cause your mind to attract more positive thoughts and thus build a positive momentum. Whenever it thinks negatively, don’t give it attention or interest, this will cause the ebbing away of the momentum of negative thinking. It’s really that simple. Once you understand the mechanics of how thoughts gain momentum in the mind, you will be in total control of your state of being.

 

For immediate relaxation - One has to sit in a meditative stance (whichever kind suits the concerned person), close their eyes and breathe slowly. Then they must count each breath, concentrating on nothing but the count, for at least 50 counts.

Diverting ones attention towards things that give one a positive feeling is a very effective way to rid oneself of negative thoughts. Using one's free time for engaging in productive activities that gives one pleasure, would prevent one's mind from wandering. Thinking of something that would bring oneself happiness is an instant way to divert one's mind from negative thoughts.

 If negativity crowds your mind, replace it by positive thoughts. Divert your mind by not focusing on the negative exclusively. 

Negative thinking will just drain your energy which is not helpful. It’s just a waste of time. This reason alone is a validation to stop thinking negatively.

For instance if you catch yourself worrying about losing your job, stop yourself and divert your attention to an enjoyable game or recently watched movie.

 Try to find things that you are thankful about. That is also an affirmation that you are still blessed by some good things. Dwelling in negativity will just give you a miserable life. 

 For most of us, it's as if we only see the things that go wrong or aren't working in our lives and we have the tendency to blow them up in our mind and give them more attention than they deserve.  To shift from what's not working to what's working, make a gratitude list and feel your heart expand.

 

Walk with the positive people  and grow more positive.  We are influenced by our environments and friends more than we realize.  Check the people you chose to spend your time with.  Do they veer towards the positive end of the scale or the negative? 

 Positive inspirational  books/audios/videos  to the mind is like what food is to the body or water to plants.  It's nourishment and it's necessary to fertilize the mind for positive blossoms to grow.  (Sample audio videos can be downloaded free from http://easymeditation.bravehost.com/)

 Contribute to someone else's life - When we do something for someone else, it benefits us greatly.  For one, it makes us feel good about ourselves that we have something to offer someone else.  We're making a valuable and meaningful contribution in some way which feels good.  Secondly, we take the focus off of us and we put it on someone else which also helps to relieve some of the worry and anxiousness that focusing on our own lives leads to sometimes.  We momentarily forget about our own troubles and create something good for another person as well as our soul.  Three, we're able to be there for someone else and ease maybe some of their burdens to encourage them in some way. 

 Keep yourself busy- You may have observed that you tend to think more when you have nothing to do, however if you keep yourself busy, you won't have time to dwell on negatives. Nurturing a hobby, learning something new, exercising, reading and listening to music etc are all enjoyable ways of keeping yourself busy. Doing things that you enjoy, will also keep you in a happier frame of mind- and when happy you are more likely to feel optimistic and think positively

 Nothing is permanent  -  IF we observe things around us, we will find out that "None is permanent". Things, whether material or non-material, change constantly. Some of the changes are evident, some of them are not. Ever since life began, natural phenomena have been like this. From this point of view, we should understand that things always arise depending on conditions. When the appropriate conditions come together, things arise; when those conditions disperse, things cease.

 IF you could understand the point that Nothing is permanent, you will not keep thinking of something in your memory all the time, because it is impermanent and will eventually vanish, no matter how much you keep remembering it. In such a case, why don't we just leave it alone?

 IN the Universe, everything that we can see, hear, and think of all arising depending on conditions, meaning that everything is impermanent. The people we love the most or the situations we like the most will all vanish. The people we hate the most or the situations we like the least will all vanish too. Do we still want to persist in our own opinions of things that happen one minute and vanish the next in this world?

 

How does negative thinking affect your hearts health?

Researchers at the University of Kentucky found that patients who had negative thinking patterns, such as thoughts about not being able to justify their own existence, were at higher risk for developing depression. Heart patients with depression were shown to have more complications, including a higher risk of death!

 Your negative thoughts increase your stress levels and prevent you from focusing on attaining good health. When you are more focused on how unfit you are or how unfulfilling your life is, you are unlikely to take steps to improve your health.

 USEFUL LINKS FOR CONTROLLING NEGATIVE THOUGHTS.

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(Some inputs from www.ezinearticles. com/?Serious-Signs-of-Mind-Overload&id=4576535 , www.expertscolumn. com/content/thought-management-controlling-mind-managing-thoughts , Google search etc)