Not long ago I was reading about a man who was no longer drinking, sober after a long and troubling relationship with alcohol, looked back at his “assessment test” he had been given before entering treatment.
He noticed that if he substituted the word “thinking” for the word “drinking” this gave him a pretty clear assessment of his own mind.
I decided to look at some addiction assessment tools myself to see if this applied to …ahem… my own mind.
I found some good assessment questions that were created for people wondering if they have a problem with drinking…..but I substituted “thinking” to see what my answers might be.
Take the following test to find out if you have THINKING that is hazardous to your health:
*Have you found that you have not been able to stop thinking once you have started?
*Have you failed to do what you expected yourself to do because of thinking?
*Have you had a feeling of guilt or remorse after thinking?
*Have you lost time from work due to thinking?
*Is thinking making your home life unhappy?
*Have you ever felt remorseful after thinking?
*Have you gotten into financial difficulties as a result of thinking?
*Does your thinking make you careless of your family’s welfare, or your own?
*Has your ambition decreased when thinking?
*Does thinking cause you to have difficulty sleeping?
*Has your efficiency decreased when thinking?
*Is thinking jeopardizing your job or business, or relationships?
*Do you think to escape worries or troubles?
GOSH!
That would be Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes….and Yes. To the whole list.
That’s why I love doing The Work.
It’s a prescription for recovery from the pain of believing stressful thoughts, at least it sure has been for me, and for hundreds of people all over the world.
Maybe since thinking seems to bring on some tough results like the list above, it’s not only helpful to do some in-depth looking at it….but pretty dang important.
So important that without looking at your mind and questioning the usual beliefs and processes you have in place…it may be hazardous to your health, and hazardous to your peace.
“If all you experience is mental noise, then you begin to derive your identity from the thoughts in your head, what the thoughts tell you about yourself….and you are trapped in that identity that is based on identification with thinking.” ~ Eckhart Tolle
There is something more than what we are thinking. (Thank goodness!) In fact, almost every spiritual teaching suggests to find out what it is!
And if your thoughts are getting in the way, in any part of your day, from experiencing peace, then diving right into them to understand and investigate them, may be one of the most important, amazing, fun, difficult, powerful things you will ever do.
Avoiding the thoughts, forcing yourself to be different, sweeping them under the rug, and wishing they weren’t there all don’t work.
If you notice that your thinking starts to dominate your experience, and you generate a false sense of self where your mind and beliefs are telling you who you are…and you’d like the incredible power of a group and a structure to support your inquiry process…then join Life Support For The Compulsive Thinker starting in six weeks.
This is an entire year of inquiry, three telesessions per month and two weekends retreats in Seattle, Washington, USA. We start in June on Tuesday mornings Pacific time.
Quite a few people have written to ask if they can do the teleconferences ONLY, since they live half way across the world. The answer is YES.
This whole year is a guided step-by-step look at all the topics that bring on stress and pain in our thinking.
We’ll be able to tag the thoughts, identify them clearly, share via email, and stay on track.
See the details and the payment plans and hopefully all you need by clicking HERE.
“An uncomfortable feeling is not an enemy. It’s a gift that says, ‘Get honest; inquire.’ We reach out for alcohol, or television, or credit cards, so we can focus out there and not have to look at the feeling. And that’s as it should be, because in our innocence we haven’t known how. So now what we can do is reach out for a paper and a pencil, write thought down, and investigate.” ~ Byron Katie
Much love,
Grace