In the vast landscape of our minds, thoughts can often act as invisible hooks, pulling us away from the present moment. Much like a fish on a line, our minds can be led astray, taking us on a journey through the past, present, and future. Many people struggle with their thoughts and how they affect their emotions and actions. They try to control or avoid them, hoping that they will go away or change. But this strategy often backfires, creating more problems and suffering. But what if we could unhook ourselves from these mental lines and reel ourselves back into the now?
The Power of Thought
Our thoughts can influence our feelings, behaviors, decisions, and actions. They can inspire us, motivate us, guide us, or teach us. They can also limit us, scare us, confuse us, or hurt us. Our thoughts are not facts or truths even though often they can feel true, but interpretations or opinions. They are not always accurate or helpful, but often biased or distorted. Our thoughts can create our reality, for better or for worse.
Our bodies and nervous systems respond to the thoughts in our minds as if they were tangible events unfolding in the material world. However, here’s the catch – our minds, with all their good intentions, don’t always provide us with helpful or accurate advice. In fact, they can be quite unhelpful and, at times, outright untrue.
The Need for Vigilance
Being vigilant is key. Ask yourself if the thoughts in your mind are genuinely helpful. Awareness is the first step, and the moment you realize you’re lost in thought, you hold the power to shift your attention away from unhelpful thoughts, redirecting yourself to the present moment. Ask yourself if your thoughts are helpful or unhelpful, true or false, relevant or irrelevant, important or unimportant, wise or unwise. Observe your thoughts, rather than getting caught up in them or reacting to them. Learn to detach from your thoughts, rather than identifying with them or believing them.
Getting Hooked: What it Feels Like
Getting hooked by our thoughts means that we lose contact with the present moment, and get carried away by our thoughts. It means that we treat our thoughts as reality, truth, importance, orders, wisdom, or threats. It means that we give our thoughts undue attention, power, or influence. We treat thoughts as orders, assuming they are wise and even viewing certain thoughts as potential threats, causing deep disturbance or fear.
Unhooking: The Liberation of Mind
On the flip side, unhooking from our thoughts allows us to recognize them for what they truly are – mere words and images. No longer blindly accepting them as reality, we understand that thoughts may or may not be true, important, or wise. They certainly don’t hold authority over us, and even the most negative thoughts do not have power to disturb or frighten us.
How to Practice Unhooking
There are many ways to practice unhooking from our thoughts, depending on our preferences, needs, and situations. Some of the common methods:
- Mindfulness helps us to observe our thoughts and feelings, rather than getting caught up in them or reacting to them. Mindfulness also helps us to connect with our senses, our body, and our surroundings, which can ground us in the here and now.
- We can imagine our thoughts as leaves on a stream, clouds in the sky, or cars on a highway, and watch them come and go without getting attached to them or trying to change them.
- Language can help us to change the way we relate to our thoughts and feelings, and to reduce their impact on us. For example, we can add the phrase “I’m having the thought that…” or “I notice I’m feeling that…” before any unhelpful thought or feeling, to remind ourselves that it is just a thought or a feeling, not a fact or a reality. We can also repeat the thought or feeling in a silly voice, such as Mickey Mouse or Darth Vader, or sing it to the tune of a song, such as Happy Birthday or Jingle Bells, to make it less serious or scary.
These are just some of the many ways to practice unhooking from our thoughts. You can experiment with different methods and see what works best for you. You may find that some methods work better for some thoughts or feelings than others, or that some methods work better at some times than others. The key is to be flexible and curious, and to use the methods as tools, not as rules.
Unhooking from our thoughts is a powerful and effective skill that can help us to live a meaningful and fulfilling life, even in the presence of difficult thoughts. Unhooking from our thoughts is based on a psychological approach called Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). ACT helps us to accept what we cannot control, and to commit to what we can: our actions and values.
