Mental Exercise 4: Mental Chatter

If you observe your mind, there is always a monologue going on. It begins the moment you open your eyes in the morning and carries on every single second till you close your eyes at night. More often than you'd like, this chatter prevents you from drifting off to sleep. And when you do finally doze off, it may well make that rest fitful.

Have you ever felt dissatisfied with your physical appearance? And then do you start to feel depressed or mildly unhappy? Is there a toxic person in your life? Perhaps a boss, maybe a relative, or even a "friend"? Does this person have the uncanny ability to leave you in a quivering emotional wreck for hours or days or weeks? Why do you hand over your emotional well-being to this person? Have you ever looked at someone and felt a stab of envy? Did you want, desperately desire, what you think that person has? Money, power, fame, prestige, cars, houses, boats, or planes? Are you best by fears? Do you obess about losing your spouse, your children, your friends or your job?

All these fears are all a result of your conditioning. You picked up this conditioning when you were still young, from your parents and teachers and your role models. You saw them all around you in society and they still broadcast to you from the media that surrounds you.

The problem is that this conditioning not only restricts you, it also restricts you from exploring pathways that could lead you to freedom. That is why you feel boxed in and enervated.

(Excerpt from "Are You Ready to Succeed" page 54, 61, 62)
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Do you recognise the small voice in your mind telling you things all the time? Emotionally charged voices, like "I always screw up.", "I'm going to fail my exams again. I'm just too stupid!", "How did you ever mange to pass your college?", "More work again! Why can't he just see I'm to busy?", "He didn't flush the toilet again! I've told him a million times.. He must be doing it on purpose to complain about my cooking!", "Look at the girl there! She's so pretty.. Not like me. Ugly. Fat. Unwanted.", "Darn! I'll be late again! This happens all the time! I bet the bus driver knew I was in a rush and deliberately drove slowly. Why do they always have to do that?!"...

Anything familiar?

Now that you know you shape your reality, what do you propose to do about it?

The first step is to recognise your mental chatter. Make a list of as many of your mental chatter as you can throughout your day. As you do this, try to be aware of your attached emotions -- common ones are negative feelings of being overwhelmed, fear, frustration and dissatisfaction, but they could be positive ones like peace and confidence as well.

Also, make it a point to notice when external stimuli hijack your mental state to something else. Does a news broadcast lead you to consider the very bad state of the world? Does seeing people on the streets remind you of your recent relationship breakup and lead you into despondency? Do you feel fear? Or depression? Or powerless? Or perhaps did a call from your family remind you of the upcoming dinner reunion this Saturday and made you light up immediately?

You might be surprised at the number of times you actually put yourself down, and how often we make snap judgment on everything, from serious matters to trivial ones like the color of the wall. That's normal. Most people have this devil inside themselves.

Notice that the consciousness of the mental chatter and its attached emotion changes your mental chatter already? Persist in this exercise, catch yourself more often in your destructive thoughts, and you'll realize that increasingly you have greater control of your thoughts.

This is the disciplining of the mind.
It's not easy, but it's mighty worth the effort. =)