Improve Your Thoughts

The environment around us stimulates a lot of our thought process. What our senses perceive has a direct impact on our thinking. Reading negative news sub-consciously activates negative thoughts. There is a build-up of fearful, anxiety-ridden thoughts. Similarly, when we encounter a smiling and friendly person, it activates positive thoughts. Your mood lightens. When we come face to face with an inspiring personality or read an inspirational book, we experience inspired thoughts.

Our environment should activate positive, creative, and useful thoughts within us.

What can we do to create the right environment for the right thinking to happen? Here are four specific ideas to help you.

Subtract:

Imagine your mind to be like a polluted lake full of impure and dirty thoughts. Cleansing the lake and water starts by removing the pollutants first before you can add new clean water.

So, consciously evaluate what your typical day looks like and take out from your immediate surroundings, people, or routines that stimulate shallow thoughts. If eliminating is tough, at least discipline yourself to consciously reduce your exposure.

I keep coming back to the same point. Unhinged, unconscious access to the infinity pool of Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp Forwards, etc deteriorates your thinking faculty. Reduce it.

Similarly, regulate the influence of people who do very little to add value to your thinking. Keep them at a distance. Don’t let them occupy your time and mind space.

Add:

Surround yourself with smart people who are positive and challenge you to grow and become better. Anyone who is into sports understands this well. Your game’s caliber improves by order of magnitude when you play against a more skilled opponent. Similarly, when you engage with more “smarts,” you develop your thinking.

If you don’t have smart, inspiring people in your circle, go for the next best alternative. There is fantastic content out there in terms of Books, Podcasts, Ted Talks that are all available at a click. Read, Listen, Watch . You have 24 hours in a day. Find at least an hour for this.

Another thing for you to add to your daily routines. Meditation. Sitting in Meditation allows the polluting thoughts to settle down so that you can access clarity.

Simplify:

We are all suffocating out the empty time and contemplation from our lives. Sitting in peace, without stimulation of any sort, seems like the scariest thing to do. I have had people tell me they feel like they waste time if they have to sit in silence. What an irony!!

If just sitting in silence seems like an improbable task, then try this. Do some activity like walking or exercising or maybe even cleaning (your mom or spouse will be happy) for at least 45 minutes every day. Give your mind some time to breathe and rest. Most inspired, creative thoughts happen in moments like these.

Journal:

I came across this amazingly profound quote that says- “I write because I don’t know what I think until I read what I say. ” Put simply, when you write, you think. Journaling is a great way to control your thinking. There is no better Gym for the mind than capturing your random thoughts and writing them down. Journaling disciplines the thinking process. This has been one of my most important personal transformation tools.

When you improve the quality of your thoughts, you will improve the quality of things you attract into your life.