Mindfulness Daily #1 - The Nature of Thought

Mindfulness Daily #1

Welcome to the first article in my mindfulness daily newsletter! If you're here reading this, you've developed an interest to learn more about thoughts, emotions, mindfulness, meditation, or perhaps you're just curious as to why a marketing professional is writing about "The Nature of thought." Though I am not a meditation teacher or instructor myself, I have a deep interest in mindfulness and have since cultivated my own daily meditation practice in an attempt to learn more about how the mind works, and how we can best work with it to understand its patterns. Here are 13 lessons that i've recently come across on the nature of thought, including teachings from the Buddha and Joseph Goldstein among others.

"Whatever we frequently think about, will become the natural inclination of the mind" - Buddha

In order to be stop our thoughts from blindly pulling us along in life, forcing us to act in ways that are not mindful, we must think about which thoughts are skillfull and unskillful.

2. Thoughts can be broken down into two different categories..

a. Skillful thoughts are those that are wholesome.

b. Unskillful thoughts are those that are unwholesome

3. When we are noticing unskillful patterns of thought, we need to be very active & vigilant with these patterns, so that we do not fall into the pattern of unskillful thought.

4. When we see an unskillful/unwholesome pattern of thought, and are aware of it, we can start with the simple reflection "these patterns of thought lead to my own affliction, and leads to the affliction of others"

But sometimes the thoughts persist, and we need to use a different approach:

5. Try meeting the thought with energy. Say "Enough." But don't engage with aversion, or anger, but instead do it with kind understanding.

When it comes to skillful/wholesome thoughts, we approach them in a very different way.

6. When you notice a skillful/wholesome thought, you need only be mindful that these thoughts are present. You do not need the hyper vigilance, you can simply sit back, and observe.

7. Oftentimes in meditation we can become upset that thoughts are happening, but we must consistently check our attitude on this matter. Whenever you feel yourself being disturbed about the fact that you've been lost in thought remind yourself that you are not practicing to prevent thinking, but rather to recognize and acknowledge thinking whenever it arises. It does not matter if the thinking stops or not, it is more important that you understand wether your thoughts are skill-full or unskillful, appropriate or inappropriate, necessary or unnecessary.

8. Ask yourself: "what is a thought?"

9. "What is so interesting [to me] is how much power unnoticed thoughts have. They are like little dictators saying: Go do this, go do that. But when we look at them, there is nothing much there. When we really look directly at the nature of thought, the more often we see this, and the less often we are seduced by the content of thoughts" - Joseph Goldstein

10. Once we recognize that thoughts are empty, they will no longer deceive us.

11. "Welcome your thoughts, Explore them."

12. Exercise: Sit down and wait for your thoughts to appear. Do nothing, just sit and wait. See what appears, can you notice when your mind is lost in thought? How long does it take for you to notice this?

13. Mindfulness of thought can lead us into mindfulness of emotions

(The Nature of Emotions, coming soon...)

If you have any questions about meditation, mindfulness and wish to access resources to practice, feel free to reach out to me!