The world as we have created it is a product of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.

– Albert Einstein

I read a book that discussed thinking about thinking. I can’t go over all the details, but it explored the way humans form thoughts. It is common knowledge that feelings succeed thoughts. Your thoughts basically produce your feelings. But, what comes before thoughts? What creates and influences thoughts? Are thoughts a reaction or response to situations around us, or are they a result of our beliefs and/or aspirations?

T. Harv Eker calls it programming. His argument is that we have all been programmed by our environment and immediate society, so we think out of that programming. I would like to take it a step further. I believe that thoughts and emotions are reciprocal, you think what you feel and you feel what you think. After a while the cycle produces predispositions for certain modes of thought, and then we get stuck. We get stuck in a certain ‘genre’ of thoughts. This, of course leads to the production of the same kinds of results, this can either be very good or very bad.

So, how do we change our thinking, I have a suggestion that works quite well for me.

Think about your thinking and have a reason. This is a step beyond monitoring your thoughts, it involves understanding your thoughts and their origins. This is difficult sometimes. It has exposed some not so honorable motivations and attitudes that I wasn’t willing to accept I had. Ultimately, it helps you understand yourself better, your motivations, fears, interests, and pain.

To change your thinking you must know, believe and accept that your thoughts produce your results, simple and short. You should have a very good reason for changing your thoughts and that is usually because you want different results or a different state of being. That reason serves as an anchor or a goal. Take for example, an introverted person who is in business (that was me). He knows networking is a pillar of business. He would like to make more friends, engage with people more etc. He starts from the outermost. “I need to network more. I don’t because I’m too introverted for my own good. Why am I introverted? Well, maybe cos I don’t really like people in my space, I prefer to observe from a distance or I probably have some insecurities. Why? Why the distance and insecurities?”. At this point, deep seated programming and modes of thought begin to emerge. He can ask himself questions like “what do I feel when I am insecure? what do I think of?” Once some of those answers are gotten, the process of changing the underlying feeling-thought relationship can be started.

It may seem like going down the rabbit hole of your own mind, and that is exactly what it is. The more you think about the way you think, the better you will be able to understand yourself and make changes where necessary.