How to wrestle the octopus of your thoughts.

Have you ever felt that your brain doesn't always produce high-quality thoughts? It might be a thought on loop about some stupid thing that happened in the past, or maybe it's just a noticeably negative stream of thoughts that seems never-ending.

If you've ever tried to change your thoughts, you might have noticed it's not as easy as flicking a switch. It's more like wrestling an octopus - your opponent is very sticky and hard to shake, the wrestle can sometimes futile.

One such wheke that I wrestle occasionally is The Lomi Room’s social media – specifically posting consistently. I feel it’s important to have a social media presence because it helps people get to know The Lomi Room. 

The problem is that I found that the effort it took for me to “do” my social media activity was unsustainable. I’d inevitably hear a voice in my head say “it shouldn’t take this long to create your posts Naomi”. When I’d have an extra busy week, everything would fall apart.

Quietly in the background, tension was mounting because I was developing a thought error in my mind that if I couldn’t do social media consistently, I couldn’t do anything consistently. Which led me to select tasks based on the “truth” of my thought error. Can you see how I began wrestling? I resisted starting The Squeeze because of the tricky position I’d created for myself. I baulked at “the commitment” of starting The Squeeze. Not knowing what I’d write beyond two weeks gave me anxiety.

We’ve all had a thought error enter the mind, triggering an all-out wrestling match with tentacles that slither into the soft folds of our thought processes. It can make you feverish, or you might not notice its effects until you find yourself behaving out of character.

Some people aren't bothered by having a relentless stream of negativity running through their minds. Here are some reasons why you might want to take on the challenge to wrestle with your octopus:

• What you think over and over will become a belief. Your beliefs will become an unconscious driver of your behaviour, which can cause sabotage if the belief isn't in alignment with what you want.

• Your thoughts create your feelings. Feeling bad? there's likely to be some bad-feeling thought triggering it.

• Nobody else has to live in your head but you. Isn't it worth making your thoughts a nice place to be?

• Your low-quality thoughts might be ignorable or overcome-able in good times, but if you have a whole pile of stress come online you might find it much harder to float.

Learning how to observe your thoughts to identify and change the ones that don't work for you requires intention and effort. This is called Thought Work. It's not glamorous, but boy is it powerful!

Here are some things to remember when you're wrestling the octopus of your mind:

Not every thought you have is right and true. Sometimes, it’s just plain wrong – and mean. Just because you think it, doesn’t mean you have to accept it.

If you’ve found yourself in a death-grip with slithery thoughts, here’s an approach you can try:

Get ready to rumble – it’s dangerous to believe all your thoughts are right and true. Start by saying to yourself “I’m willing to be wrong about some things”.

Patrol for intruders - like virus protection software on your computer, you need to scan your mind for poor-quality, yucky-feeling, bothersome thoughts.

Call the suckers out – when you have a thought that isn’t true, say to yourself “this is a thought error”.

Defeat one tentacle at a time – find a new thought to latch on to. Choose a believable thought that is better aligned with the truth. For me, that sounded something like “it’s possible to be consistent with social media, I just haven’t figured out how yet”.

HERE’S THE SQUEEZE

Thought work is never-ending.

My little wrestle with this octopus is slowly coming to an end. As it turns out, just letting go of all the social media angst and focusing on something new – The Squeeze – has helped me to a) prove to myself that I can be consistent at something and b) given me a whole bunch of ideas to introduce to social media.  

If you find yourself in a wrestle, I highly recommend you attend to your thoughts.  You will benefit from taking yourself through the process as well as the improved outcome.  

Arohanui / with much love,