Thoughts and Time Machines
We are at the mercy of our thoughts. How many of our thoughts are ours? How many of them have we inherited? How many of them are actually true? It’s a lot of questions.
These thoughts are programs that reside in our subconscious mind. We are following them without even realizing it. They try to protect us, keep us safe. And, in doing so ironically we stop ourselves from doing the things we want to do the most.
For example, what if you wanted to run 3 miles? Do you think of how fun it will be? Imagine as if this is something you really want to do. However there’s this voice inside your head that says you might fail. You aren’t fast. Let’s not do it. And then we have feelings of depression and inadequacy. And, we don’t run.
When people say to get out of your comfort zone, this is what they mean. Because even though you are not doing what you want to do, in this case running 3 miles, and these feelings are not helping you to feel good, they are comfortable. They are familiar. Your mind loves the familiar because it knows what to except. It doesn’t matter if there is any real danger. Your mind will always choose what it knows.
These thoughts and beliefs have been programmed in your mind without you even knowing. Your mind thinks it is keeping you safe. More thoughts that are not keeping you safe. Is this imminent danger? Are you being chased by a saber tooth tiger? In most cases, the answer is no. Maybe you have figured out the basics of time travel and there really is a saber tooth tiger. Then that danger is real and I would think about getting back in the time machine. For the rest of us, it is not usually real physical danger.
If you really want to change your life it’s important to recognize these thoughts and the feelings that are truly holding you back from being happy and from being the truest version of yourself. It’s us who are holding ourselves back. It’s important to take responsibility. There is no use in blame. Once we can take responsibility for ourselves and our thoughts regardless of where they came from then, we can make real change.
It takes a lot courage to really change your life. To stay the same is safe. What kind of life is that? If you would succeed and not fail, what would you do? Would you go for a run? Would you change careers? Relationships? Invent time travel? Ask a lot of questions?
How we define failure is also very important. Failure is not the end of the road. When something doesn’t work, it’s giving us valuable information. Ok, next time I won’t try to run 3 miles with a tiger on a leash. Maybe I will try something with smaller teeth. Is that a failure? Only if we don’t take the lesson in it. Only if we stop there. Only if we try to run a second time with a tiger. Take the lesson and keep going.
The interesting thing is have we ever truly failed? Our perception of ourselves and of failure plays a big role. Failure is something that we take on as our new identity. Because something didn’t turn out the way we had intended, we view ourselves as failures. This is a mindset.
Who would you be in the absence of this feeling that is restraining us? What would you do? How do we reprogram these self sabotaging thoughts?
We change our behavior first. Instead of going along with these thoughts, again assuming that there is not really a tiger, we change the behavior. The behavior here is our reaction to the thoughts. We release them. We acknowledge them, and then surrender the thoughts. The freedom to be is in surrender. Surrender of who we think we are. Surrender of the programs that we have been programmed our entire lives. Surrender of the energy that we have inherited. None of this belongs to us. Yet we have taken it on as our own and are holding ourselves captive. Becoming aware of these thoughts and surrendering them is the first steps to freedom and possibly a time machine.