Considering the barrage of uncertainty life throws at us, it makes sense that we try and hold on to the few things we feel in control of. Unfortunately, the list of true ‘controllables’ is vanishingly small. If you’ve ever meditated for more than 5 seconds you’ll have a good understanding of how little control we have over our thoughts. They arise from seemingly nowhere, grab our attention by the balls for however long they please, and then vanish into nothing. Only to be replaced by an equally inane, attention-demanding thought. Ironically, the more we try to avoid or stop these thoughts the more power they have over us.
This lack of control extends to uncomfortable emotions. Attempts to control anxiety through avoidance, such as procrastination, provide nothing more than a band-aid fix. In the long-term they only serve to amplify the emotion. Despite the well-intentioned nature of these efforts, they are unhelpful. I mean, we’d rather these feelings and thoughts got weaker, not stronger.
The Surfing Panda
To illustrate this, I want you to NOT think of a surfing panda. For the next 15 seconds, close your eyes and don’t think of the panda, and definitely don’t think of it surfing huge waves. Ready? Go.
I’m guessing that you failed miserably. Not only were you thinking of the panda, you were also noticing yourself thinking of the panda. Your ‘observing self’ was watching your ‘thinking self’. This idea of two selves has been around in eastern philosophies for a long time, and has come to the west in the last 30 or so years in the form of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT).
We spend most of our waking lives fused with our thinking self. We feel as if we are our thoughts. Only on rare occasions like meditating do we actually engage with our observing self. A very important question then, is how do we get in touch with our observing self?
The answer is as straightforward as it seems banal: acceptance. By allowing painful thoughts and feelings to come and go without a struggle, we can diminish their power over us. No more ball-grabbing thoughts and emotions. I’m going to stop you mid eye-roll and give you some practical, actionable ways to put this principle into action.
Cognitive Defusion
One way to get some cognitive distance from unpleasant thoughts and emotions is to reframe the thoughts. When you are really pissed at your brother, instead of thinking, “Arghh, I hate my brother!”, you can reframe it to “I’m having the thought that I hate my brother”. That can then be changed to “I notice I’m having the thought that I hate my brother”. By doing this, your thoughts have much less power over you, as you see them for what they really are, thoughts.
One of the endless applications of this is procrastination. If you’re anything like me, when you get stuck writing your next Steemit post you’ll be drowned in a deluge of unhelpful thoughts and feelings. “I’m kind of hungry, maybe I should grab something to eat before I start”. Or “I’ll just quickly check Facebook, maybe my friend’s gotten back to me”. In the past, these thoughts hooked me and delayed me from doing what I needed to get done. To be honest, sometimes they still do. But the times I do notice and reframe these thoughts I am able to consciously take action in spite of them. Instead of mindlessly procrastinating I get to choose, will I procrastinate or keep going? Will I yell at my brother or wait till I’ve calmed down?
The Curious Scientist
Dealing with emotions like anxiety isn’t quite as straightforward. Reframing it to “I notice that I am having the feeling of anxiety” is helpful and can allow you to act in spite of the anxiety. But to truly reduce it, more needs to be done. Not only do we need to accept the feeling, we need to actually lean into it.
In ACT, there is an exercise called ‘The Curious Scientist’. When you notice an uncomfortable emotion, observe it like a curious scientist would. Breathe deeply into it and allow it to be there, regardless of whether you want it or not. Start to notice the features of it. Does it have edges? What shape is it? How big is it? Is it hot or cold? What colour is it? How heavy is it? What part of the body is it in? As you answer these questions and breathe deeply into the emotion, you might find that the intensity of it decreases, or even dissipates.
Trying to avoid or control our thoughts and emotions simply doesn’t work. Instead, try accepting and acknowledging them instead.
References
'Embracing Your Demons: an Overview of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy' - Russ Harris
'Your Two Minds' - Mark Manson