Who’s in control, you or your thoughts?
We all have the ability to use our thoughts in ways that can help to motivate and inspire us, they can lift us up and help us be creative and free but if we allow our thoughts to dominate us then we can lose all perspective and have no control over our realities.
Think of a tiny baby, when they come in to the world they aren’t having thoughts about body image or what anybody thinks of them. However as time goes on they are subjected to a vast number of experiences and they will have many different thoughts about those experiences. At a young and impressionable age it’s likely that the thoughts they have will reflect the thoughts of those around them. The majority of children trust that their parents and carers or those in authority have a superior intelligence and that their way of thinking is correct.
As a child grows they will begin to have more independent thoughts although they will still be influenced and shaped by their upbringing. From these thoughts they create belief systems around themselves and of the world and act in accordance to those beliefs. This allows them to create their values and sense of self.
The child then forms a sense of purpose in their lives and creates an identity, but what if those thoughts and the beliefs are limiting? What if they hold them back? To quote the great Albert Einstein “ We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.”
Maybe it’s time to really examine those thoughts and check out their validity. After all if our thoughts were different effectively our whole lives could be different. They could be enriched and improved. Imagine if our thoughts were more positive, imagine if we focused on the good things and life reflected the same back to us.
The good news is that there are two different types of thoughts, those you give power to and those that you don’t. So what if we chose to give power to the warm, positive, motivating thoughts and not give the others the time of day, what changes do you think would happen, how different do you think you’d feel?
Take the time to study your thoughts, question how accurate they are and ask yourself if there are other ways of seeing a situation.
It’s important to remember thoughts only have the meaning we give to them. We all perceive life and experiences so differently to one another and we all get different outcomes. This surely proves we can choose how we see our lives and the events that take place within it. Why not choose to see a bright side, an adventurous side, a learning side and a fulfilling side?
Remember “Thought makes an excellent servant but a terrible master”