Thinking Towards Freedom

There is a very old book by Prentice Mulford entitled, “Thoughts Are Things.” Many personal development gurus have written on this topic and there are volumes of information on the subject. I wonder, however,  just how many people have really thought about the phrase?

Thoughts are things.

It is such a simple statement that most people probably move right past it, getting on with their lives - lives of thinking wrongly.

In “The Miracle of Right Thought,  Orison Swett Marden wrote, “Freedom is essential to achievement. No one can do his greatest work when his mind is cramped with worry, anxiety, fear or uncertainty, any more than he can do his best physical work with his body in a cramped position.

Absolute freedom is imperitive for the best brain work. Uncertainty and doubt are great enemies of that concentration which is the secret of all effectiveness.”

Mental discord is fatal to freedom, or even the pursuit of freedom. The destructive emotions - worry, anxiety, hatred, jealousy, anger, greed, selfishness are all enemies of freedom and, in fact, are a form of prison. These are all worse than a literal prison because someone who allows these emotions to rule his life often doesn’t realize they are being held captive.

At least when you are in a literal prison, you know an approximate release date. How can you possibly know when you’ll be free of negative thoughts, if you don’t recognize that you’re being controlled by negative thoughts? It’s time to see them for what they are and do something!

Self-Control

Do something - but what?

The next time you are in a crabby mood and you have a short fuse, when you’re feeling anti-social and every person around you seems to irritate you, try this experiment:

Leave whatever you are doing and go to a different location. It could be outside, it might simply be the next room, or even a different area of the same room. If you cannot leave the room, can you at least look out a window? The point is to change the immediate environment.

It’s time to close your eyes and take a mini-vacation in your mind. One of my favorites is to travel back to a cruise ship experience: sitting on the balcony watching the dolphins chase us through the ocean. Another favorite is playing “Jack and Jill” with my daughter when she was two years old. We went up and down the hill in the park for three hours! What a great vacation! In a place like that, all is well. My mind and spirit are renewed and I can go back to the task at hand encouraged and with new energy.

You may be surprised at how productive you can be when you focus on positive thoughts and feel positive emotions. They wipe away the negative and you can choose whether or not you want to stay with the positive or go back to anxiety, anger and the confusion that comes from them. Identify those thoughts that are your weak points and realize that you have control over them. In 2 Corinthians 10:5, the Bible tells us that we can take thoughts captive.  Better to take captive the negative thoughts than to be held captive by them.

Marden wrote, “The majority of people who make a failure in life do so because they never learn to guard and strengthen their weak points.” Positive thoughts are the best way to guard your mind and strengthen it against negative thoughts.

It’s that simple.

As always, I welcome your feedback…

Tags: Awareness, Right Thoughts, Self-perception