Thought

I hope these next few postings pertaining to my self-growth will help someone that may need a little guidance.  This is something that most people probably go through?  I figured I’d document my growth, in hopes that it may help someone out there.  I have restructured my blog so that deeper understandings are posted after this one.

From what I gather, this seems to basically be wisdom… knowledge.  I’ve done quite a bit of research, reading and self examination, about 2 years worth.   I began this journey w/ my girlfriend pointing out that I had some issues w/ negative emotions.  God bless her for being used by God to plant a seed.  One of my earlier readings I read was from a google search “Anger always stems from unfulfilled expectations.  Let go of the expecting and the anger will be no more.”  Huh!  I was getting frustrated because I was expecting everyone in the world to do as I would do, say as I would say…act as I would act.  That’s insane!  lol.

I guess I’ll start by talking about thought, self talk and so on.

I would feel negative emotions when addressed with many situations in life.. (stress, depression, frustrated, angry, sad, hurt, worry, anxious, etc).  When I would get a negative emotion, I began to analyze my thoughts, body, emotions, and so on.. from a 3rd party standpoint (praise God).  In order to do this, I had to slooowwwwww way down.  And watch.  My thoughts were always clouded by tons of self-talk that would escalate the negative emotion.  For instance, if i was upset, my self-talk was saying “He/She shouldn’t have said/did this…. He/She is saying hurtful things…  He/She is making me feel..” etc.   And the words/phrases kept on going.  I was consumed because of an unfulfilled expectation.

What I realized at this point is that once the body is consumed w/ an emotion, it is very hard to escape that emotion until the mind is clear.  I have experienced this almost every day of my life w/ myself and have witnessed it many times by talking to others about it.  If we are upset w/ someone or we are having a hard time in life, no matter what is said, the frame of mind continues (not always, but it is very common).  We’re in a rut and we will listen to nothing unless it matches our own emotional state/self-talk.  We look for others to justify our emotion.. I like to call it “jump on my bandwagon so I feel justified on what I say/do/feel.”.  At this point of understanding, I began to analyze the emotional states.  I noticed how my eyes would first view actions from the outside world.  I noticed self-talk stirring and this caused a chemical release/flush of an emotional state.  I evaluated the self-talk, watched how it triggered the emotional state, then literally felt the emotion begin to consume my body…starting from the waste and working its way up.  It was like a flushing type feeling.  A warming sensation.

After weeks of analyzing my emotional state at many moments, I caught the trigger.  I was doing dishes in the kitchen sink and picked up a plate, then felt an emotion come over me.  I was able to stop to analyze right away due to many days of evaluating the pattern.   As I felt the emotion starting, I watched it begin its flush at my waist.  Immediately I stopped and said in my head “where did that just come from?  that’s anger”  I immediately noticed the words within my self-talk.  I was trying to catch this trigger for weeks, so I already knew what an emotional state felt like (the flushing feeling, heart rate change, emotional disturbance, etc), but I could never catch why because my thinking would be clouded by tons of garbaged self-talk and most importantly, it happens very fast.

Within milleseconds.. the body reacts to the thoughts.  Sometimes, we think the emotions are automatic and then we use thought but that’s not what I have experienced.  The thought always comes before the emotion, and the timing from self talk to the emotion is extremely fast, almost instant.  Once the emotion is triggered, it fuels additional self-talk… we’re stuck.  The original self-talk fuels the emotion, which fuels self-talk, which fuels emotion… etc.  But this time, I remembered what my self talk said prior to the emotion.  My self-talk were exact words that I heard within society as a child.  Those words in my head were exactly the words I had heard many times as a child, and I knew from where.  When I realized this, the emotion flowed backwards out of my body.  That warming sensation vanished and I wasn’t frustrated/angry.  From that point on, I did in-depth analyzing of my self talk.  I began to find a lot of incorrect thinking.  I realized that I was listening to the thoughts of the Flesh versus from the Holy Spirit (what I was molded to believe, molded to think, molded to act, etc).  It was the beginning stages of breaking the molds.  This was the beginning stages of being remolded away from what the world told me I was suppose to act like.  After I was filled w/ the Spirit, I was given a gift to see these things whereas I was not able to see them before and/or I just justified what I was doing.  The Holy Spirit started showing my soul the correct way to think, feel, etc.  He basically tore down the molding of my being that took place during my childhood and began to restructure myself while using the righteousness of the Spirit.  My soul was getting remolded.  The thoughts I was having were built in me, molded in me, throughout my entire life.  I must think <x> in <y> situation.  But now, the Holy Spirt was remolding my soul.

My next topic will be coming in a few days.  It involves stepping the mind back further.  Examining deeper.. the fuel that was fueling the original self-talk that triggered emotions.  I knew there was more to it than just catching it and changing the state of mind.  It took around 2-3 months of working on the above realization before i felt comfortable in moving on.  I continue to listen to my self talk, realize the state (Spirit or Flesh), and reverse it when necessary (I have found that all negative thinking should be reversed..I’ll get to that later).  At this point, after many years, I’m still not able to do this 100% of the time.  I’m at about an 85% success rate.  The other 15% of the time, I realize what I am going through.  I’m conscious of it 100% of the time.  If something is bothering me, I can recognize my emotional state in almost realtime.  I’ll evaluate my self-talk and while in the emotional state, I’ll say to myself “You’re doing it again, right now, be aware.  Choose you words wisely.’  I’m not sure if it is possible to be in a perfect state of mind 100% of the time, but this is my goal.

For me, this wasn’t enough.  I knew there was more to evaluating the self-talk and catching an emotion before it happens.  Working backwards in an analytical manner with my thoughts, I realized for me that the previous step in my thought process was Wisdom and Choice.

Please follow and like us: