Life is testing you at every second, are you on autopilot or are you watching?
We can focus on listening to the birds chirp from out of the window while we make a cup of tea, perhaps we can focus on our thoughts while we make a cup of tea, perhaps we’re already complaining out loud about the birds chirping, perhaps we will be listening to someone speak while we make a cup of tea, or we can be on autopilot like we are most mornings when we’re making a cup of tea.
Are you standing in your way? Are you finding it hard to achieve things because of the story you’re telling yourself?
Why do we go to the gym? Why do we go to school, college or university?
We go to the gym to train our bodies or enjoy working out. We go to school, college or university to learn.
So why are we not training our minds?
We learn to drive cars, learn to become doctors, hairdressers etc.
To catch yourself on your mental desk following its subconscious patterns is hard. You have to be awake enough to catch it. You would want to change the patterns standing in your way so much that you really start calling yourself out on it and this is where things start moving forward.
Now, parents, this is going to take a bit more work from you. It is challenging when the happiness of your children is sitting on your shoulders.
With every single action, you take ask yourself why? Do you want to please everyone?
You know you can’t and if by the end of the day everyone is pleased then bonus points for you. So again, what is the focus or what will you focus on?
Once you got the focus of why you’re doing something and the outcome you want because of your why then the rest of the things going on around you is like atoms in the air. Yes, not so existent. You’re not ignoring it, you are acknowledging it but choose not to focus on it. Depends on you how much importance you want to give something. Depends on you how much importance you want to put on the negative.
You must be saying, “Damn, I am on autopilot so much because my responsibilities are huge. How do I even start to obtain this muscle to catch myself in my train of thoughts?”
- The minute you find yourself wallowing in your negative habit. Stop. Tell yourself, “Stop.” In fact, make a rule that you will no longer wallow in something for more than five minutes. I say five because it usually takes four minutes for you to realise you’re in the mud getting ready to wallow.
- Refuse to waste anytime on what doesn’t matter i.e. reading the gossip on the phone and perhaps start writing 5 things you’re grateful for while the kettle is boiling.
Remember rubbish is rubbish. We get tempted most by rubbish. Test that temptation, this muscle will also end up growing in other areas where you might have temptation.
- This one is my favourite. Meditate. If time is something you have very little of then I say start with 10 minutes of mindfulness meditation. Do this daily and religiously. When you do this correctly you train yourself at watching yourself and will slowly come to a point where you will pull yourself out on your thoughts.
- Remember this bit at the beginning of this article? “We can focus on listening to the birds chirp from out of the window while we make a cup of tea, perhaps we can focus on our thoughts while we make a cup of tea, perhaps we’re already complaining out loud about the birds chirping, perhaps we will be listening to someone speak while we make a cup of tea, or we can be on autopilot like we are most mornings when we’re making a cup of tea.”
Perhaps the minute you decide to go an make a hot drink for yourself can be the timer of a training session where you use five minutes of this time to catch yourself thinking your thoughts.
Meditation is a start to teaching you to be mindful but once this becomes a habit then 10 minutes of meditation daily means nothing if you’re not mindful during the rest of the day.
As you become one above your old self your vibrations increase, and you manifest your positive ideas even more. When you don’t betray what you’re focusing on you get stronger and achieve much more. Don’t let the petty things drag you down.
There is light in the darkest of situations, yes there is. If you look closely you will find it. It is your choice what you focus on in the end.
T. Dench Patel
Thank you for the comments and support. Thank you for offering to donate if there was a donate button on here. I prefer not to take donations. You can support by either purchasing one of my books (Paperback or Kindle), The South African: True Colours, The South African: Roamer or my children’s book Light. These books can be found on Amazon mainly and other sites in your country.
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Note: Do keep referring back to this site as much as possible, as I grow, a more profound perspective may form and so I will always come back to each of these articles to reevaluate them.
