The Power of Thought

We've all heard lots on the Power of Thought...The Power of Intent.

It's not new....but let's try and understand a little more on how it works.

A small experiment to just show how the power of thought is something we experience on regular basis, even on our own bodies, but we're pretty much not conscious of it. And then we'll see how this stretches into the world beyond ourselves.

The easy one: Close your eyes, center yourself a little, and think of a nice...sweet.... juicy lemon. Cut it. Smell it. Lick it. Feel the taste........Mouth salivates?

A step further...Close your eyes. Center yourself. Think you've just landed in Manali.  It's cold and windy outside. You're going to the Everest base camp. You're surrounded by snow and there's a raging blizzard outside. You stay with that a few minutes and your body will soon start to feel cold.

Little more intense; there have been experiments under simple hypnosis, when a client is told that a burning cigarette is pressing into his palm. The cigarette used is not lit. Yet the palm develops a burn.

The Subconscious mind does not distinguish imagination and reality. It only reads the thought.

Just as the thought can make things happen on the body, it can also travel beyond.

Again, examples from everyday life.....knowing who's calling when the phone rings.... knowing which song is going to be played on the radio even before it starts playing.

How does this happen?

All physical reality is made up of vibrations of energy. And your thoughts too are vibrations of energy, just at a different frequency. And for the skeptics, this is no longer random concept or belief, it's what quantum physics says.

The more you think the same thought, the more power to that particular strand of vibration. And the Subconscious mind does not discriminate, it will equally earnestly manifest success or abundance, as it will failure or lack. It's mandate is to make that thought happen.

Focus on success and you attract success. Focus on fear and failure and you attract fear and failure. The whole concept of affirmations is based on this.

Thought recognizes neither time nor space......and it's on this principle that remote healing is based, be it through Pranic Healing or Reiki.

And it's this that also explains Telepathy, Telekinesis, Teleportation, Clairvoyance and all such. Which is why all those who mastered it, keep saying 'anybody can do it'.

Yet, we're such cognitive beings, that our rationality kicks in with that seed of doubt. What's brilliant now is that it also has a nice rational explanation. It does open up a whole new world...... hop on, and be ready for the roller coaster ........after all we're yet learning to ride :)

The Upside of Anger

This is one movie that seeped into me slowly. 

A compelling story with strong and difficult characters......and flashes of dark humor, which I, as is, struggle with. It also cracked through some deep mindsets, which I didn't realize I had. 

                               

As story goes, after her husband runs off with his secretary, Terry (Joan Allen) is left to fend for herself and her four daughters. In the words of the youngest daughter, you get introduced to Terry as the once very sweet woman who is now in the total grip of anger and resentment.

                

The daughters deal with the abandoning by their father way better than their mother. They all seem smart and focused on what they want, and headstrong enough to  handle their mom's quiet seething anger and resentment in their own ways. Like Terry herself says, 'one of them hates me and the other three are working on it.'

As she slips into the stupor of anger and alcohol, she finds companionship in her neighbor and drinking buddy Danny (Kevin Kostner) a former base ball player, and current radio game host.

While the four girls are moving their own paths, and fairly comfortable accepting the quiet relationship between their mom and Danny, it's Terry who doesn't seem able to let them be. She's always trying, and making a royal mess of their situations. Intrusive, opinionated, rude.....all coming out of her own seething anger.

Joan Allen and Kevin Costner create these powerful but disturbing characters.... smart, intelligent ..... depressing, alcoholic ..... angry, unorganized ..... disrespectful, exasperating even and totally impervious to any need or suggestions of normalcy or goodness....and you learn to give them their space....or rather they take it.

It's a serious movie as is, but if you watch, you'll see it's transcending even the leveling with anger and resentment. It's intense and deep in provoking thought and a kind of horror at the tricks that life can play on you.

Chicken Soup for the Soul

Yesterday, I read a blog post on 'Chicken Soup for the Soul', and as I looked up from my laptop, straight ahead was my copy of  'Chicken Soup for the Soul'.

First reaction......the nostalgic pull, as the book was part of the going away gift I'd gotten from IDBI, Hyderabad when I was transferred out to Bangalore, way back in 1997. Picked it up...and it had this beautiful personal message. (the little things that make a huge difference). True to what it said, I actually reminiscenced for a bit. So many cherished memories. 

And then I started to browse through the book. As always, within half hour I'll hit some story which brings out the tears. 

It's such feel good stuff, and all true.......the thought in my head was, why is it that newspapers can't carry stuff like this on front page. I think it could alter the texture of the day to so many. 

Alongside instructions on how to read....savor like wine it said, it also spoke of sharing a story, and I decided I should. The book had a dog ear, and I'm putting here the story that was marked out. Another nostalgic connect. It was the story I'd picked to tell a bunch of kids who I used to do weekend spoken English with. I'd thought then it was pertinent to them, but now I see how it's as pertinent to me, us, anyone.

The Magic Pebbles 

"Why do we have to learn all this dumb stuff?". One of the complaints and questions I have heard most frequently from my students. I would answer it by recounting the following legend.

One night a group of nomads were preparing to retire for the evening when suddenly they were surrounded by a great light. They knew they were in the presence of a celestial being. With great anticipation, they awaited a heavenly message of great importance that they knew must be especially for them.

Finally the voice spoke"gather as many pebbles as you can. Put them in your saddle bags. Travel a day's journey and tomorrow night will find you glad and it will find you sad" 

After having departed, the nomads shared their disappointment and anger with each other. They had expected the revelation of a great universal truth that would enable them to create wealth, health and purpose for the world. But instead they were given a menial task that made no sense to them at all. However, the memory of the brilliance caused each one to pick up a few pebbles. 

They traveled a day's journey and that night when they reached into their saddle bags they discovered every pebble had become a diamond. They were glad they had diamonds, and they were sad they had not gathered more pebbles.

It was an experience I had with a student, I shall call Alan, early in my teaching career that illustrated the truth of the legend to me. When Alan was in the eighth grade he majored in trouble and suspensions. He was a bully and a thief.

Everyday I had my students memorize a quotation from a great thinker. As I called roll, I would begin a quotation. To be counted present, the student would be expected to finish the thought.

Alice....'There is no failure except..................."

"In no longer trying......'I'm present, Mr.Schlatter"

So, by the end of the year, my young charges would have memorized 150 great thoughts.

"Think you can, think you can't...either way you're right"

"If you can see the obstacles, you've taken your eyes off the goal"

"A cynic is someone who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing"

"If you can conceive it, and believe it, you can achieve it"

No one complained of this daily routine more than Alan, right up to the day he was expelled, and I lost touch with him for five years. Then one day, he called. He was in a special program with one of the neighboring colleges and had just finished parole.

He told me that after being sent to juvenile hall and finally being shipped off to California Youth Authority for his antics, he had become so disgusted with himself that he had taken a razor blade and cut his wrists.

He said "You know what Mr.Schlatter, as I lay there with my life running out of my body, I suddenly remembered that dumb quote you made me write twenty times one day. "There is no failure except in no longer trying". Then it suddenly made sense to me. As long as I was alive, I wasn't a failure, but if I allowed myself to die, I would most certainly die a failure. So with my remaining strength, I called for help and started a new life".

At the time he had heard the quotation, it was a pebble. When he needed guidance in a moment of crisis, it had become a diamond. And so it to you I say, gather all the pebbles you can, and you can count on a future filled with diamonds.

John Wayne Schlatter

I really wish every teacher and every school could just incorporate this into system. So many pebbles.....so many great thoughts imbibed. So simple and profound a habit. Wonderful stuff .

The Subconscious Mind - A Deep Dive

While we're all familiar with the fact that we have a Subconscious mind, there's very few of us who know how it works, what it's role is, how much of what we do is governed by it.

Maybe you'll ask the 'Why'...... 'Why do we need to know?'

                                         

Because....it can be a powerful ally. Once you understand it, you can actually learn to harness it. It's after all you. It's just that it's highly programmed based on past experiences, and functions from that space. It's just about how we can access it.

Think about it. There's tons of books out there that tell you how to be a great leader, and they're all good stuff..... yet we have very few great leaders.

There's tons of books on how to get rich, good stuff again, yet we all think....if we could read a book and get rich, the whole world would be rich, haha.

There's books on how to make relationships work. Again, the same...we all want to, but how many of us can sustain great relationships.

So, Why?

Why is it that we seem to know what we want, know what we need to do....... yet don't get there?

It's because it's the Subconscious mind that's controlling your behavior....and believe it or not, to a large extent it controls your external reality as well.

Let's try and get a little more familiar with this hidden and mysterious facet of ourselves.

I'll take this in two parts. First, what it's about and how it controls behavior. (the controls external reality, another time, another day :)

                      

Recall Understanding the Mind?  We said the conscious mind was 12% and the Subconscious mind 88% of the mind. And because it works on pre-programming it's way way more powerful.

And the subconscious mind in turn had two components; the modern memory,and the primitive memory. For the purpose of this write up, let's stay with Modern memory. 

Modern memory is each and every memory that's been sensed by the body since the time of birth. Sensory plus Feeling. It is a ware house, a data base of every single memory of your's, and it's capacity is unlimited. 

Under hypnosis, older people can often remember, with perfect clarity, events from fifty years before. Your unconscious memory is virtually perfect. It is your conscious recall that is suspect.

And it stores all of these experiences in patterns, and the patterns start to form early in life, pretty much done by the age of 8.  And that's set the stage for the programming.

And then, it's job is to ensure you respond exactly the way you were programmed. Your subconscious mind makes everything you say and do fit a pattern consistent with your self-concept, your “master program.”

The subconscious mind has no volition of its own. It will simply act upon what resides and vibrates within.

Your subconscious mind has what is called a homeostatic impulse.

Homeostatis by definition is the tendency to come back to balance or equilibrium.

For instance, the heartbeat...in fear or exercise it gets rapid, and its the subconscious that brings it back to equilibrium. It's also for instance what keeps your body temperature at your 98.4 C.

And on the same principle, the subconscious works on the mental realm, by keeping you thinking and acting in a manner consistent with what you have done and said in the past, based on which it's been programmed. For instance, if the child has been exposed to clear hierarchy in decision making in childhood, that will be the homeostatic state for that adult.

Which is why behavior patterns are so difficult to change.

But then, this is exactly where we can harness it. It does not think. Your conscious mind commands and your subconscious mind obeys.

"Your subconscious mind is an unquestioning servant that works day and night to make your behavior fits a pattern consistent with your emotionalized thoughts, hopes, and desires. Your subconscious mind grows either flowers or weeds in the garden of your life, whichever you plant by the mental equivalents you create."

All your comfort zones, pleasurable or painful are memorized and patterned, and it works to keep you in them.

Your subconscious mind causes you to feel emotionally and physically uncomfortable whenever you attempt to do anything new or different, or to change any of your established patterns of behavior.

The key is to change those patterns. First become conscious of them. We are so attached to this image of what we are and how we think, that even the thought of consciously changing a pattern seems alien.

But think about it. Think of other perspectives. Better still....think of non judgmental. Think of it deep..deep...deep.

Play around with the idea. How empowering would it be to move from that 12%......move to 20, then 40, then 70, then 90......and at 100, you'd be Jesus. 

Freud said, “We learn as children how we react emotionally and this is carried into adulthood. When we are children, we do not have the faculties that we do in adulthood. We do not know what we are going to need in adulthood to cope. Therefore, as adults we (often) react as children.”

Whether Buddha or Jesus....what they really did was to harness their entire minds into the present.

Maybe we don't want to be Buddha or Jesus........ but we can surely shift that bar....become better me's :)

Striking a Chord

From Seth

Commonly misunderstood and misspelled as "striking a cord."

A cord is a single strand that connects. You can strike a cord, but not much happens.

A chord, on the other hand, is the resonance of multiple cords, more than one vibrating together.

That's rare, and worth seeking out.

It probably won't happen if you don't do it on purpose.

Where the Bees Go

We've all heard n number of times about 'focusing on change within, rather than on the external'  

In context of a product launch in Google, if I remember right, there was discussion on customer opinion and market need and feedback and stuff......... and this wise guy comes up with 'focus on your product, and the users will come.....make your nectar sweet and the bees will come'. 

This applies not just to a product, but across the board. It's just this subtle shift in focus.

You want others behavior to change....look inward, and change within, and this will invariably influence the dynamic

You want more readers on your blog....don't focus on spreading the word, focus on your writing

You want to achieve that sales target....focus on process and your pitch

You get the drift.....

                       Diksha's pic , on the way to Coonoor

This tree, which I used in yesterday's post, kind of exemplified this for me. It was a lone tree, nice, full spread, healthy, pretty spaced out.......... and, had almost thirty huge beehives on it. Look closely and you'll see them.

We did our oohs and aaahs on it.......this was in Bandipur, on our way to Coonoor, but missed a picture. We thought there would be many more such trees, but surprise, surprise, there wasn't even one other.(In fact we got the picture of the same tree on our way back.)

Guess it's doing something different. All the bees are there :)

And this kind of also shows how it's that 1 out of  100 who seem to crack that code. The power is really within, work on it, not just superficially, but authentically.......shift the energy within, and watch your whole universe change. Nice aha there !

To “LET GO” Takes Love

TO “LET GO” TAKES LOVE
by author unknown

To “let go” does not mean to stop caring,
it means I can’t do it for someone else.

To “let go” is not to cut myself off,
it is the realisation I can’t control another.

To “let go” is not to enable,
but to allow learning from natural consequences.

To “let go” is not to care for,
but to care about.

To “let go” is not to judge,
but to allow another to be a human being.

To “let go” is not to be in the middle, arranging the outcomes,
but to allow others to affect their own destinies,

To “let go” is not to be protective,
but to permit another to face reality.

To “let go” is not to deny,
but to accept.

To “let go” is not to adjust everything to my desires,
but to take every day as it comes, and to cherish myself in it.

To “let go” is not to criticize and regulate anybody,
but to try to become what I dream I can be.

To “let go” is not to regret the past,
but to grow and live for the future.

To “let go” is to fear less and love more.