The mind is a flickery thing at Greyshaman

How do they come up with these things? Science is a funny thing.

“According to Charlie Greer “the National Science Foundation put out
some very interesting statistics (…) the average person thinks about
twelve thousand thoughts per day. A deeper thinker (…) puts forth
fifty thousand thoughts daily.” [source]

Have you ever counted your own thoughts, started to put labels on them? That’s one about cars, and there’s another about mortgage plans, oh that’s the one about fears again.. That last one just doesn’t seem to go away.

You’ve never counted them? Well, neither have I. But I have realized time and time again that most thoughts are just reruns and repetitions of old thoughts. The most frequent thoughts that come up are mostly the same every day.

It can be a tricky thing to change old thought patterns. Especially if you want to stop negative thoughts from appearing. The best way is to confront them in an objective way. But don’t put to much energy into it. See the thought, hold it for a second and then let it go. Don’t work through them over and over, don’t dwell and turn them and look at it from every possible direction;

Just watch one more time, hold - and let it go.

A story about sand castles

Some children were playing beside a river. They made castles of sand, and each child defended his castle and said, “This one is mine.” They kept their castles separate and would not allow any mistakes about which was whose.

When the castles were all finished, one child kicked over someone else’s castle and completely destroyed it. The owner of the castle flew into a rage, pulled the other child’s hair, struck him with his fist and bawled out, “He has spoiled my castle! Come along all of you and help me to punish him as he deserves.” The others all came to his help. They beat the child with a stick and then stamped on him as he lay on the ground… Then they went on playing in their sand castles, each saying, “This is mine; no one else may have it. Keep away! Don’t touch my castle!”

But evening came ; it was getting dark and they all thought they ought to be going home. No one now cared what became of his castle. One child stamped on his, another pushed his over with both hands. Then they turned away and went back, each to his home.

Sand Castles - from the Yogacara Bhumi Sutra, translated by Arthur Walay.

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