In other words, stress is hard wired:

We expect negativity but try to get away from it. This creates a conflict within our self. By becoming aware of our tendency to think negatively, we can choose a different way of thinking about situations that reminds us that we do not have anything real to fear—there is no sabretooth tiger hiding in the bushes—and so we can relax.

Desire Certainty—Another aspect is that our brains are created to seek certainty, resist change, refuse to see things for what they are, our cortex evolved to analyze our past & evaluate our future. That means that even when change will be positive for us, we continue to do the same things that hold us back because we are familiar with them. However, once we are aware of this tendency for our brains to try to sabotage positive changes, we can choose to override our instincts and commit to the life changes we’re wanting to make. Confirmation bias—this is another powerful aspect of our brain function. What confirmation bias does is that it influences our perception to see and experience what we believe to be true. In other words you can have two people experience the same things and yet have a totally different experience. Therefore, our perception of something influences what we experience and our memory of it. For example, if you think today is going to be a bad day your mind will try to highlight every negative thing to help you affirm that it is a bad day. Your mind is basically helping you affirm your belief system. This is one reason why mindfulness is so powerful because it allows us to see things for what they are, not from a biased perspective of what we think it should mean. Belonging—Another aspect is that we have a natural need to conform to society and those around us because we are social creatures. This was part of our survival mechanism to work within a group. However, in today’s society we create a preoccupation with self, comparison with others and the need to be accepted by others which can push us away from following our purpose and living a life that is truly in alignment with us. By becoming mindful of our influences and how we relate to other people, we regain our power over our decisions. Understanding our monkey mind is essential to being able to create true lasting change and through the mindfulness techniques that you are learning you will be better able to manage your thoughts, where you spend your energy, and your ability to determine your own destiny.

Mindfulness of Thoughts (and How They Create Emotions) When you experience anything in life, it is interpreted by your brain, which means in a split second your brain compares what it is taking in through your senses, which tells it what is going on in your experience, to everything else you’ve ever experienced.

It’s trying to make a snap judgment of:

1. What is going on?

2. What does it mean?

3. How should I feel about it?

4. What should I do? The brain has evolved to rapidly interpret everything you experience and it’s so good at it that you don’t even notice it’s happening. That is, until something happens that causes your mind to interpret a situation as negative. It chooses a perspective or belief about the situation that creates an emotional reaction in your body. It’s unpleasant, so it’s noticeable. Your body reacts to this emotion, which is actually caused by the thought triggering your body to release any of a number of brain chemicals, often referred to as neurotransmitters or endorphins or hormones.

Your brain is like a chemical factory and there is a different neurotransmitter that is responsible for every emotion you can feel. 29 It all functions as it should.

Something threatens you, your brain interprets, triggers the hormones that shoot throughout your body inspiring you to spring into action. Someone tells you they adore you and you’re flooded with feel-good chemicals. Our bodies and brain are amazing machines. But sometimes, these emotional reactions get out of whack with what’s actually happening. You can feel anxious for no reason.

Something small makes you furious. You’re sad even when you’re doing something that usually makes you happy. What’s happened is that your mind has learned a pattern of thinking that is faulty.

Your brain is interpreting situations negatively, when they’re not. Your mind is judging situations, or yourself. You have unconscious limiting beliefs impacting your perspective that you aren’t aware of. Your brain was doing what it does best—trying to interpret your world in a way that protects you.

Unfortunately, as you lived life, your brain got programmed by the world around you. Your thoughts were influenced by the actions of others. Your core beliefs were adopted from the beliefs of others. And because you weren’t aware of any of this, your mind became trapped by its own faulty beliefs. Your thoughts run amok and you were never taught how to catch them. It happens to everyone.

Humans bodies and brains don’t come with an owners’ manual! But the good news is that the solution is simple. You can become more aware of this process. You can change your thought patterns and beliefs. You can reprogram yourself. You can become conscious of your unconscious thoughts and behaviors. You can choose to experience more positive emotions, and less negative ones. You have this power to control your own mind—a power that has been withheld from you your entire life. And it’s time to take your power back! Let’s Look at Emotions The best place to start a discussion about how thinking works and impacts your life is to look at emotions. Let me ask you a question, should emotions be trusted? Some people say, “You should always trust your emotions.” Other people say, “Feelings are irrational and can’t be trusted.” So, which is it? They’re BOTH wrong.

Emotions and feelings are neither right nor wrong, accurate or not. Emotions are simply your body’s reaction to what you are THINKING.

Your belief system and other unconscious thoughts are happening on autopilot all the time, and cause emotions. That’s why sometimes you have NO IDEA why you feel the way you do. Here’s an example of why emotions are never either right or wrong… because they’re just reacting to your thoughts…

• Think about something that you really, really wish you had, but that you don’t have. You may feel unhappy because you don’t have it, but that’s not true. You are unhappy because of the THOUGHT of not having it.

• Let me prove it to you: Have you ever been happy while not having it?

• If you didn’t have it but didn’t care about it, would you be unhappy?

• If you didn’t have it but were doing something that kept you from thinking about it, such as going down a roller coaster, would you be unhappy about it? No.

• You see, not having want doesn’t make you feel bad. Thinking about it does. Where do emotions come from? Sometimes our unconscious mind and senses are picking up cues from our environment that trigger emotions, such as reading a person’s body language or facial expression and having an automatic physiological response or sensing danger and having an automatic fear response. However, most of the time it is NOT the outside world or the situation that is happening that causes our emotional reaction—it’s what we’re thinking. It is the mental filter that the situation passes through—aka, our interpretation—that then causes our emotional reaction to the situation.

Situation

 Interpretation (thought)

 Emotion The key to understand here is that research over decades on CBT provides evidence that we can have control over our thoughts. And if we have control over our thoughts, we can control our emotions. It may be challenging to do this, but it is a skill that can be learned.

Here’s the process: Recognize Emotion

 Identify Thought

 Change Thought

 Change Emotion Changing the Thought Once you notice that a thought is happening it becomes conscious.

Since you’re aware of it, you can then choose to change it. Your mind automatically interpreted the situation, but now that you’re paying attention to it you can choose a different interpretation—a different perspective. This is great news because when you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change. Even in the same situation or with the same facts, if you change your viewpoint, your experience of the situation will change. Here is an example: a man was visiting a friend’s house and went into the kitchen to make some tea. He didn’t find a tea kettle, and so poured water into a glass coffee carafe and placed it on the gas stove. He returned to the living room and minute later smelled something burning. He returned and found that the handle of the carafe had caught fire. He quickly put the fire out. He apologized to his friend and was feeling both embarrassed and guilty. His friend, however, was laughing and complemented him on his “fireman” skills. Same situation, different perspectives—and the result was completely different emotional responses. Why this matters! This matters because, of course, you want to feel better. If you change your perspective of a situation, you will change your emotional reaction to it.

But, it’s even better than that! You see, your emotions are the driving force for your BEHAVIORS because the decisions you make are based on how you feel. As you get better at being aware of your emotions and thinking, you’ll be able to make decisions from a place of control—you might feel a certain way, but you’ll use your cognitive processes to choose to act from a place of rational thought. But, if you’re like most people, you’re not at that place yet—at least not all the time.

So, here’s where we are now: Thought

 Emotion

 Decisions

 Action/Behaviors

The behaviors you exhibit and the actions you take are a direct result of your thoughts. If you are experiencing behaviors you don’t like or have been doing things you aren’t pleased with, your thoughts are to blame. If you can’t yet see the behaviors or actions you’re doing that aren’t serving you, look around at your life at the results you’re experiencing. Have you been having any problems at work or in your relationships? Have you experienced anything unpleasant? Are there things you want that you don’t have?

On the positive side, what aspects of your life have you managed to create that you want, enjoy, or love? The reason we ask is because I’m going to take this cause and effect train one more step.

Thought

 Emotion

 Decisions

 Action/Behaviors

 Results/Outcomes

That’s right, your behaviors and actions are what determine the results and outcomes you experience in your life—both the wanted ones and the unwanted ones. By changing your thoughts, you can literally transform your life. Literally! So, let’s dive into more about understanding how thinking works. Observing Your Train of Thought Sometimes your thoughts are directly related to what is currently happening, whether it be the task you’re working on at your job, the turn you’re making in the car, or the food you’re cooking in the kitchen. But, most of the time your mind is thinking about something ELSE. It’s re-hashing the argument you had yesterday, remembering that time in college you embarrassed yourself, judging the neighbor for their ridiculous holiday decorations, or worrying about your upcoming interview. And these random thoughts have a strong tendency to be negative. This is why many people who study mindfulness or personal development say that they want to stop their negative thinking. Unfortunately, the truth is that you can’t stop thinking, even if it’s negative.

Thinking happens all the time. Once it’s there, you can’t simply stop thinking about something negative. In fact, trying to NOT think about something actually increases the likelihood you will think about it. It’s a psychological phenomenon called Ironic Process Theory. Try it now. Do NOT think about a pink elephant. We forbid it! What’s popping into your mind right now? A pink elephant. The same thing happens with your thoughts. You can’t stop thinking and you can’t exactly control your thoughts, but you can get better at managing or directing them. The key to developing better control of your thinking is to practice observing your thoughts. Thoughts come and go, like trains in a train station. Sometimes they move fast, other times slow. Sometimes they quickly pass through the station and other times you jump on board and get carried away by the train of thought until it gets derailed. And once one passes, there is another one right behind it. Sometimes they’re negative, sometimes positive.

Our minds are like our very own Grand Central Station with new trains of thought coming and going around the clock. It can become stressful and overwhelming when we don’t know how to take a step back and slow down the activity. The good news is that you have a choice regarding which trains you get on. If you were sitting at a train station would you simply hop on board whatever train came first?

No, you would decide where you want to go and then wait for a train that is headed in the direction you want to go. But, unfortunately with our thoughts, we tend to think we are obligated to ride every train that enters our mind. And the more negative and unpleasant the thought is the more tempting it is to get on board. All trains pass. If you find yourself on a negative one you don’t like, you can’t simply jump off. But, you can try to jump from that train to another one that passes by.

From wherever you are, find the best thought train you can and keep focusing on that one. With practice you’ll be able to break the habit of taking every thought train seriously and navigating your mind more deliberately.

It all starts with the simple practice of observing your thoughts. Mindfulness and meditation are tools for slowing thoughts enough that we can use them more deliberately. You can even widen the gap between your thoughts—those moments of stillness that happen when you find yourself in awe of a magnificent sunset or lost in the moment during a significant experience like a childbirth or the flow of your favorite activity. Here’s a simple technique to help you visualize the meditation process:

Mindfulness meditation is the practice of sitting in that train station in your mind and watching the trains of thought come and go. You’re not getting onto any of them — you’re making a conscious decision to let them pass.

Here’s the step-by-step:

• A train of thought comes in

• Identify it (“I notice I’m having the thought that…”)

• Now watch it leave, without engaging it

• Repeat for every thought that enters your mind (for as long as you can stand) What this does, over time, is to help you to detach from your thoughts, so you don’t just get on that first train that comes your way. Or, if you do find that you’ve gotten on board (and you inevitably will, often), then you recognize it, and get off at the nearest exit. This can be just as challenging as not engaging the thought in the first place, and detaching from a train of thought mid-transit is just as good of a skill to develop, so don’t be discouraged when your mind wanders. This just gives you another opportunity to practice disengagement.

Detaching from certain thoughts is difficult, especially for things are triggering for you. But the more you make this practice a part of your routine, the more control you will gain over the contents of your mind, and the easier it will be to let unproductive trains of thought