Hi, folks. Today I'm going to go over the last Distress Tolerance skill in this module that we're going to cover, which is mindfulness of current thoughts.
So although we talk a lot about mindfulness, we have actually, as a group spent relatively less time talking about how to apply those skills to our thought processes.
I'm going to start off by just defining what it is that we're talking about here. So mindfulness of current thoughts is all about noticing and radically accepting thoughts for what they are, which would be a sensations of the brain that come and go or neural firings of your brain. The focus here is on accepting thoughts, this sort of spontaneously come into your mind, not necessarily thoughts that you choose to think about. And there is a difference, we'll do an experiential exercise on this.
When we think when we start talking about use of mindfulness for our thoughts, we're trying to essentially help you get more flexible with two concepts.
The first would be avoiding thoughts, suppressing them, pushing them away.
So sometimes when bad memories come up, for example, or painful emotions, our first instinct is to try not to think about something right make it go away. And yet, we know that this often has a rebound effect, where the more that we try not to think about something, the more magnified that that becomes in our brains. The other side of things here, is sort of overly grasping onto thoughts becoming really, really attached to them. So oftentimes, if you're worrying about something, it's like a thought that you just keep going back to that will not leave you alone, for lack of a better word.
What we're trying to do here is to essentially change our relationship to our thoughts. So as opposed to actually changing thoughts themselves, which is what we would do in, like, check the facts approach to things. Here, we're looking at painful and distressing thoughts, which are both accurate and inaccurate. And working on getting some space from that.
One thing that we always want to clarify, is that the goal of mindfulness to thoughts is not emptying your mind, it's not having no thoughts at all. And the goal here is to be able to notice thoughts as they come and go without clinging to them. And without pushing them away. Okay, it is nearly impossible to empty your mind, it's not how our brains function, and you will struggle pretty ceaselessly if that is your goal. That being said, letting go of thoughts is extremely difficult, it takes a lot of practice. And it is not the same as pushing them away. pushing them away is when you try and shove it away on purpose, like walking it up in a metaphorical room in your mind.
Whereas letting a thought sort of go by is noticing that that's happening without necessarily giving it a lot of attention. Okay. So, I've touched on this a little bit, but I do want to go over why we do this. So first of all, unnecessary suffering, and reactive target behaviors that all of us work on, are often caused by thoughts, beliefs, attributions that we have about a situation. And so we oftentimes will respond to our thoughts as opposed to the facts that they supposedly represent whether or not they do represent facts, I think is often a question. Observing thoughts also helps provide distance from them.
A metaphor that I often use here is that when you're going about sort of your day to day, and you are experiencing lots and lots of thoughts coming at you, you are like a general that is down in the midst of a battlefield that's going on around you. There's chaos everywhere.
Whereas when you are using mindfulness of thoughts, you're like a general who has gone up on a hilltop who can then oversee that battle below, and actually figure out a plan or use other skills to move forward.
Third reason why we do this observing thoughts reveals them for what they are helps you see that thoughts are truly just thoughts or neural firings of your brain. And oftentimes, when we react to a thought without using our mindfulness skills, it gets in the way of seeing the actual facts of a situation. Okay. Last couple of points would be that sometimes our thoughts are catastrophic. And that using this skill helps you see that at least thoughts themselves are not catastrophic, even if situations in fact are.
And it helps you get to a place of freedom, where you don't have to be ruled by whatever happens to go through your brain.
So how do we do this?
Step one, involves literally just observing your thoughts, pausing and noticing what's going through your brain. Acknowledging that they're they're taking a step back, and visualizing that your thoughts are moving down by step two, is to try and adopt an atmosphere of curiosity about your thoughts.
Notice how they come and go watch and ask, Where did these thoughts come from? Where did they go? Notice that every thought you have ever had, has both come into your mind and left your mind. Notice your thoughts without evaluating them.
Step three, is reminding yourself that you are not in fact your thoughts. So just because your thoughts for example, say you are a failure, does not mean that you are a failure, neither on the opposite end of the spectrum, if your thoughts say that you are a magnificent world leader, does that mean that you are a magnificent world leader.
Step four is about trying not to block or suppress thoughts. So again, this is sort of opening yourself up to the flow of thoughts without trying to get rid of them. This is something that is really abstract to talk about.
And so our last chunk of time and group will be spent practicing some exercises to try and get you to feel what this is like an experience what this is like.
So we'll talk about that some more. Have a great evening, everybody.
