Thought vs. Circumstance

"You are creating your experience of everything in your life through the way that you think about it."

-Michael Neill, Super Coach

One of the fundamental distinctions that underlies the transformative coaching work that I do, is that of Thought vs. Circumstance.  Often times I'll meet with somebody for the first time, and their primary concern is that they don't like their current set of circumstances, and they want me to help them get better ones.  Most of these individuals also believe that these new set of circumstances will bring feelings of happiness, joy, well-being, and love.  This is quite possibly the biggest myth in western civilization: I'll be happy when I get what I want.  This is simply not true.  Our feelings can't come from circumstances.  This is why when you go see a movie with a friend, you can feel uplifted and inspired afterwards while your friend can feel disappointed and annoyed.  Each person has a different feeling after the movie, which means the feeling is not inherent in the circumstance; it comes from somewhere else.

That's pretty easy to see if you are willing to look in that direction.  The next question is, well if my experience of life(my feelings and emotions) don't come from the world outside me, then what is the source?  The answer is, your thinking.  This is what Sydney Banks calls the missing link, our thoughts.  We live in a thought centered universe.  When we thing a scary thought, we experience fear.  When we think a joyful thought, we feel joy.  When we think about being close and connected with someone, we experience love.  We quite literally feel our thinking.

There is a story of a brilliant psychologist George Pransky, where he was speaking with a client about the nature of thought, and she asks, "so are you saying my thinking is just a mirage?"
He responds with "Well, let's put it this way, it's a real mirage."

The problem is not our thinking, it is when we mistake our thinking for being something more solid and real than just thought.  When we make our thoughts important, and meaningful, and something to be taken very seriously, the result is we get to struggle and we get to suffer.

The intention of making this distinction is NOT so that you can begin to attempt to control your thoughts and emotions.  And I certainly don't want you to bring out the thought police.  The purpose is to have a deeper understanding of how your experience is being created.  When you know that you only ever feel your thinking, and you take ownership of that, life can gets really simple, and really wonderful.  You no longer experience yourself at the mercy of your circumstances.  Sure there will still be things that happen that you would like to be different, but you won't attempt to change them anymore so that you can feel better inside.

Why is this relevant? When you are no longer looking to change the world in order to change the way you feel, it frees up a tremendous amount of energy and mental clarity to actually create some pretty wonderful things in the world.  So much of our time and energy is spent mistaking our thinking for reality, that we don't have much oomph left to actually show up in the world and create from a place of possibility.

When you understand that your thinking is just your thinking, it's not real, then you don't actually have to take it seriously.  It can take some time to really see the truth of this, but I promise that when you do, your experience of life will transform.  As your understanding of the nature of life and thought increases, you might just find yourself feeling less stress, not taking things personally, having less fear, connecting more with others, being more creative and fulfilled, and experiencing more peace and love then ever before.  These are your natural states of being that get clouded over by your thinking.  And when we begin to lessen our hold on our thoughts, and reduce our investment in them, they begin to fall away.  At that point we return to the essence of who we are, joy, peace, intimacy, connection, wisdom, and love.

If you don't believe me, just have an experience of this.  As an experiment over the next week, I want you to pretend as though your thoughts just aren't that important.  What if those fearful or insecure thoughts didn't carry any more weight than your thoughts about what to have for dinner?  Do you think you might take some different actions?  Do you think you might feel differently?  Do you think you might have a quieter mind?  Do you think you might be able to access and follow your inner wisdom? The answer is yes, yes, and yes.  But don't take my word for it, go find out for yourself.

Until next time, live boldly and love everyone!

Coach Ty

If you want massive support from me in creating 2012 from a place of ease, joy and well-being, please contact me about 1 on 1 coaching.