Cherish Your Thoughts

In this episode we explore the invaluable treasure of “thoughts” and the power to choose the highest quality thoughts, which ultimately influences all levels of our functioning and experiences.

Transcript

Hello, everyone.  Today's topic on cherish your thoughts. 

 In the world today, there is the attitude or the deeper belief that life is at random.  Many go about our life thinking it is random. What happens to us is just good luck or bad luck, and it just happens to us.  And we get up in the morning, we have a good mood, or another day we get up and we have a bad mood.  It just happens to us, and as if it is not in our control. 

 The spiritual knowledge, of course, tells us very different.  And if we are willing to experiment with that, if we are willing to explore that a little bit, it becomes very easy to observe that things are not so much at random, that there are causes for everything, there are reasons and there are consequences for everything.  And at the inner level, in the sense of what our mood is, what our clarity is, what our state of mind is, that definitely is in our own hands. But it is not that. It just kind of emerges. 

 One needs to nourish that, and one needs to as if educate the mind.  And one big, big area of our inner world, so to speak, is the area of thoughts.  It is very useful to begin to notice the process of your thoughts and the quality of your thoughts, and to begin to experiment choosing consciously your thoughts.  Thoughts are a big part of your mental energy.  And so how do you use your mental energy? 

 In what kinds of thoughts? And one observation that many of us can easily make is that many of the thoughts that are going on in the mind are cyclical. Same thought over and over and over and over and over and over again, same thought.  And many times those thoughts are not necessarily useful, not necessarily very practical, not necessarily contributing to what one has to do, let alone it being a positive thought, or maybe even a benevolent thought, an elevated thought, a spiritual thought.  But the choice of that is ours. 

 Okay? Our thoughts may be triggered by some memory, or some impression, or some tendency, or some deeper belief system, or something happening externally. Finally, the thought may be triggered, but the second thought is my choice. Do I continue on that same rent or not? That is our choice. 

 For example, if you have your hand and you make this arm movement hundred times, 200 times, 300 times, you will get tired. Muscles in the arm will get tired. We are not achieving anything by doing this. It is just a useless movement.  But energy will be used, and so arm will get tired, body will get tired. 

 So in the same way, when we have lots of useless thoughts, we don't achieve anything except getting mentally tired.  And lots of useless thoughts also they diminish the power of your intellect, meaning your discerning power diminishes your concentration. Power diminishes your power to take decisions. Clearly, it diminishes when there are lots of waste thoughts and lots of energy, mental energy that is wasted.  And so it is very useful for us to begin to look at this whole aspect of how do we use this big treasure of thoughts, this power to think? 

 Just like the ability to speak is a treasure, the ability to think is a treasure. And we can choose what kinds of thoughts to nurture, to cherish in our mind, which type of thoughts to hold in our mind. And every thought comes with its theme.  Every thought has a theme that it carries. So part of the theme of a thought is feelings and emotions. 

 A part of that theme is attitude.  Part of that theme is vibrations and atmosphere. So every thought carries with it its own atmosphere.  So, for example, if you have a thought of hatred that has its own vibrations, that has its own feelings and emotions, that carries with it its intention, and also a certain attitude and even a certain vision and certain words when there are thoughts of hatred. Same when there are thoughts of love or thoughts of peace. 

 Now, the practice of meditation means you consciously choose spiritual thoughts, and you, as you flood the mind with spiritual thoughts, as to create a spiritual mood in the mind, a spiritual atmosphere, spiritual vibration, a spiritual vision, spiritual feelings and experiences.  And you can ask, okay, what are those spiritual thoughts?  And of course, that is why it is useful to do a proper course in meditation, to learn about spiritual thoughts and the power and the impact of spiritual thoughts. But one simple spiritual thought is that we are nonphysical beings, beings that are invisible, beings who are timeless, beings who are a guest in this body, guest on this planet, travelers through time, spiritual beings who are innately made up of peace, spiritual beings who belong to the supreme. 

 And, of course, you can elaborate, and there are many, many, many details of that. But in meditation, you just consciously choose a spiritual thought, and you hold that thought in the mind so that the theme of that thought, the vision, the attitude, the feelings, the vibrations, the emotions, they also become spiritual. And you fill your mind with that spiritual energy, which is empowering, which is calming, which is soothing, which is  generating a feeling of lightness and a refreshment also,  and which helps shift a deeper  awareness from the physical to a more spiritual.  And so we very often cherish things that we feel are valuable. So, say, for example, that your grandmother gave you some ring or some object or a book. 

 We cherish it because we feel it is valuable. 

 Here we have a treasure which is intangible, but which influence all levels of our functioning and our experiences.  And that is the treasure of our thoughts and a treasure of the power to choose your thoughts.  So choose wisely.  Choose to not go into waste and useless thinking.  Choose to not go into destructive thinking. 

 And sometimes you might not feel that you can control it. It just comes. People tell me it just comes. It takes over like a storm, and it just goes on. And I don't want it, but it happens. 

 But that is because for a long time, we have not paid attention.  And so we can just start with this moment. What am I thinking? And let me choose to think of something else. Let me choose to think of something constructive. 

 And more you make that conscious choice, more you gain power to do that.  And you can even begin to address deeper belief systems if they are debilitating or if they are just wrong belief systems, wrong conditioned ideas that trigger all kinds of thought patterns.  Of course, this is a journey, and a 15 minutes power boost will not set everything completely right. But it is a very good start.  You begin right now. 

 Take a few moments and consciously choose thoughts that are useful, thoughts that are benevolent, thoughts that are elevating, thoughts that are spiritual in nature.  That is how you save your mental energy. Actually, you accumulate good energy.  You accumulate calm. You accumulate clarity. 

 You accumulate power. 

 And you will begin to see that your discerning power, your concentration power, will increase.  Your decision making power will increase. Your willpower will increase if you stop useless waste thinking.  But the only disadvantage of all of this is that nobody can do it for you. No, we wish that somebody else can do it for me. 

 Somebody can organize it and make it function. All right. 

 Only you can take charge in your own mind. 

 So let's take a few moments,  and as always,  as if, step back from  everyday activity for a minute,  but also  become like the detached observer, the detached observer  of the body, but also the part that  you, the spiritual being,  play out in this  game of human life. As if go beyond and observe silently. 

 And this real self is this timeless, living light, like a tiny star, observing as if from beyond the game of human life.  Not judging, not condemning, not criticizing, no opinion, just neutrally observing. 

 Free, mindless, innocent, pure being of light, tiny, sparkling star. 

 A being of consciousness, eternal, immortal soul. 

 And just for a few moments, hold these kinds of thoughts in the mind and allow the soothing, calming feelings. 

 No need to do anything, no need to go anywhere, just silently  observing  and being  a timeless, living light,  operating the body as if from the center of the forehead. 

 Loving, lean, peaceful, living light. 

 And as we gradually choose to enter again into sound and action, actively paying more attention to scenes of this game of human life. 

 Let us aim to pay attention to quality of thoughts.  Let us aim to cherish our thoughts and to choose more and more the highest quality of thoughts and even beyond benevolent and spiritual thoughts. 

 Thank you and have a good day.