Far more important than fixing all the problems you are constantly worried about is dealing directly with compulsive thinking, which is what makes all of your problems seem worse than they really are.
When you come to the realization that it is your own mind you are suffering more so than the circumstance you are in, you are already well on your way to recovery.
But simply knowing that it is the mind that needs to slow down, unfortunately, does often not by itself make it so. Finding an activity that sufficiently and sustainably steals one's attention away from the freight train that an overactive mind can be, isn't always easy.
The question of how to deal with compulsive thinking is a quite fundamental one. In fact, it is the same question as how to meditate. In meditation, what we are trying to accomplish, is a better alignment between the body and mind. In this state, we reach a deeper satisfaction with what is going on right now because we get out of survival mode and thereby relax into a state of non-escape.
When we arrived at the state of meditation, the things we could still potentially worry about becomes manageable. This is what your busy mind is currently not mirroring and why you are tempted to continue feeding the stream of words spinning around inside your head.
When not needed, your thoughts need no more engagement from you than the sounds of birds chattering outside or a car passing by. You notice they are there, and that it is okay. And then you leave them to themselves. But this isn't easy to do when you perceive the noises themselves to carry messages about pressing dangers.
When desiring to get rid of compulsive thinking, it is important that one does not make the problem of compulsive thinking itself seem like a bigger problem than it is. This is in itself just how compulsive thinking makes things seem. Quieting the mind, in reality, only requires a subtle change in one's focus. And this is to simply move the attention to what is going on here and now. What is going on here and now is not something that can be thought of in an analytical way, but instead what you directly experience with your senses. In this way, you can look at the mind itself as being one of your senses that you can choose to just listen to instead of identifying with.
The more energy you put into avoiding compulsive thinking the more you feed it. Your compulsive thinking is in other words entirely feeding on your resistance to it. This means that you are trying to control something you cannot directly control.
When you look in the direction of presence you are no longer trying to seek control over your mind and, in that, you will no longer need control to get to a state of peace.
As long as you are trying to get away from something, it will feel like there's something trying to get you. And this is the relationship you are having with your mind when you are compulsively thinking.
When the mind begins to become quieter, let it quiet even more. Be careful not to use the extra room it creates right away. If you do, the compulsiveness will likely ramp up again. Let time and patience become your allies and not your enemies.
Thank you for reading this article. I hope it will help you better understand how your compulsive thinking works so you can handle it more effectively.
