The world is full of addictions: addiction to drug, alcohol, pornography, sex. But there is an addiction which is pervasive and greater than all these – addiction to thinking. I call it the mother of all addictions. You probably have never read about thinking as an addiction. Well, the people you are expecting to write about it are also addicted to thinking and do not know it.
A thought usually starts very little and grows to become destructive. Thought is a little magnetic entity and it wants your attention in order to grow. It tries in subtle ways to get your attention. When it succeeds in doing this, it tries to pull you in. This is how little thoughts rise to bigger thoughts.
When the mind perceives there is a problem to be solved, addiction tends to intensify. You want answers. You want solutions. You want to figure it out because when you do everything will be better. Really? Overthinking makes things worse than they are. It ruins the situation, makes you worry, and ruins you.
Most of us are occupied with the content of the mind. The mind then reigns supreme. After using the comb on your hair, the proper thing to do is to drop the comb. Imagine combing your hair throughout the day continuously. That will be insane. The mind is a tool to be used when necessary in our practical life. After use, one should let go of the use of the mind and come back into the present moment. It is insanity to use the mind throughout the day, thinking every minute or second. But this is how most people live. They are lost in unconscious and unproductive thinking in which they addictively replay the same mental patterns again and again in their heads. Rather than being a helpful tool, the mind is more like a possessive master. Are you feeling depressed, troubled, or unhappy? If yes, then one thing is certain – you are thinking or over thinking about something. So you suffer. Thinking and suffering are inseparable.
One of the most prominent characteristic of typical addictive thinking is to externalize problems, to blame things on other people or situations. This tendency to play the role of victim and/or to be bitter about what life has “done to” him or her is totally unconscious on the part of the addict and is part of the denial system. Those addicts who have an easier time expressing hurt outwardly invariably take the role of being bitter or angry. The unconscious reward in this for chemically dependent individuals is that they never have to look at themselves, and therefore, never have to quit using substances.2
Are you feeling anxious? Are you feeling stressed? If yes, then you are addicted to thinking. The consequence of addiction to thinking can be serious: being lost in thought to the point of not being aware of what is happening around you. This can lead to accidents and missing out on the joys of life.
The racing of thoughts in your head is your mind’s way to flee the present moment. Your mind is resisting what is, and it is especially so when what is is not wanted or desired. So your thought goes to the past (What could I have done differently?) or to the future (What will go wrong?). It does not want to stay in the present moment. It is this resistance to what is that causes anxiety and stress. You lack peace then because your mind is filled with thoughts that just won’t stop.
To stop excessive thinking, you have to take a step back and observe your mind in action – you have to become a watcher. Watching your thoughts brings consciousness to it and consciousness dissolves thoughts. Much of your thinking happens on auto pilot and you are hardly aware that it is happening. Because you did not bring your presence to your thoughts, your thoughts seem powerful. Bring awareness to thoughts and they dissolve. You do not have to try to stop thinking. Thinking stops automatically when you are conscious enough to watch the mind in action without getting caught up in the content of the mind. In doing so you allow your thought to come up without following it to where it wants you to go which is into bigger thoughts.
Addiction to thinking is constantly pulling your attention to the past and future. Being present, focusing in the moment, is the key to breaking this habit. When you are present in the moment, you cannot be thinking; when you are thinking, you are not present in the moment. Do not try to analyze your thoughts. Doing that can get you pulled into your thoughts which usually gets bigger. Bringing your attention to the present moment is enough to deal with addiction to thinking.
He who is addicted to thinking is mind-possessed. The mind which should be a servant has become the master. Such a person needs to get back control and be in charge of his mind. The steps listed below can help one in becoming the master of his mind.
- Accept what is: What is is what it is – it already is. Resisting what is is one of the major reasons for problems and stress. It is in your resistance to what is that your mind flies to the past or future in an attempt to escape the present. What is is in the present. You have to accept what is if you want peace. Even if you consider your situation undesirable, then you have to accept what is first. This happens before the situation can be changed for the better.
You come back home one day and you find a pot on the table in your sitting room. You lose your mind because of this, or rather because you are resisting this. “A pot on the table in the sitting room! Why should the pot be in the sitting room? Oh, these children...” Your mind goes on. Do you see that your resistance to the pot’s presence in the sitting-room has not changed the location of the pot? But when you come back home to find the pot in the sitting room and you accept that it is there, the next thing that follows is not your thought that will be in resistance but your action that changes the pot’s location. By changing the pot’s location, you have changed the situation. Of course, you may afterwards want to know how it got to the sitting room, but the fact is that your acceptance came first and it did not cause you stress. You were in charge of your mind all the while. - Observe your mind: Thoughts continually show up. A thought starts as little and tries to get your attention so that it can pull you in. Once it gets your attention, the thought grows bigger. You may have started with a thought like, “Oh, I feel tired.” Before you know it, your thought has grown to be, “Oh, my life is so miserable.” This happens when you do not watch your thought. Your thought grows in your absence – lack of presence in the moment.
You have to be present in the moment to observe your mind. When a thought comes in, stay present and watch. Be a watcher. Do not analyze or judge the thought. Just watch. By being present in the moment and watching it, the thought does not get the attention it seeks, hence, it cannot grow. What happens to the thought? It leaves. Presence dissolves thought. - Make time for stillness: Stillness is what you may call meditation or quiet time. Stillness is good for your mind just as exercise is good for your body. How come we pay so much attention to the body trying to take care of it without caring for the mind? Yet the actions of the mind can ruin the body.
Stillness is a powerful tool for gaining mastery over your mind and it has been around for thousands of years. You try to focus your mind on the in and out rhythm of your breath, for instance, and what does your mind do? It wanders bringing up unsolved problems and old worries. Leave it unchecked and the peacefulness of the present moment turns into a spiral of fear and worry.
Stillness involves focusing on the present moment which can start with focusing on your breath, on the trees and flowers when you walk in nature. With sufficient practice, you begin to retrain your mind so that it can be the servant. When your mind tries to go off on its own, you can gently come back to the present moment. Stillness has some mental health benefits which include reduced anxiety and depression, addiction recovery, and enhanced creativity.
For the sake of peace, get back control of your mind. Your mind is a wonderful servant but a destructive master.
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