All this talk about cognitive psychology and the power of thoughts has reminded me of a great book by Miguel Ruiz, The Four Agreements. My son gave it to me for my birthday a few years ago, and when I finally got around to reading it, I was amazed at the power of the agreements. They're so simple and yet so profound.
Back to the subject at hand...thoughts. The first agreement is "Be impeccable with your word." Dr. Ruiz reminds the reader that impeccable comes from the Latin word pecatus which means sin, and adding the im to peccable means without sin. He then goes on to say that everything we feel or believe or say that goes against ourselves is a sin. Bottom line: Don't engage in negative self-talk. Anytime you tell yourself "I can't," or "I'm a loser," or "I'm stupid, ugly, mean," then you're sinning against yourself.
To quote him from page 45: "Tell yourself how wonderful you are, how great you are. Tell yourself how much you love yourself. Use the word to break all those teeny, tiny agreements that make you suffer....Impeccability of the word can lead you to personal freedom, to huge success and abundance; it can take away all fear and transform it into joy and love.... you can transcend the dream of fear and live a different life."
It's a great little book, one that you can read in a couple of hours but that will affect your thinking forever (or at least for a long time). For now, react to the gist of the the "agreement." Do you think that thoughts are so powerful that by changing them, we can transcend the dream of fear and live a different life? Are the thoughts we have about ourselves really that important?
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4 comments:
Yes, I think what you think about yourself, has a lot to do with the way you feel about yourself. Not only that but the way others tell you has a lot of effect by the way you feel. If a lot of people were to tell you you were ugly, you are going to start telling yourself that. Then you will start to think of yourself that way. So I think the way you feel about yourself is an effect; but also the way others feel as well.
Thanks for your comment, Summer. Now if we could only figure out a way to get people to stop buying into the negative things that people tell them....Better yet, it'd be splendid if we get get people to stop saying ugly, demeaning things to the people they supposedly love.
I think that the thoughts that each of us have are very important to us. I believe that what you think reflects the way you act as an individual and therefore reflects the way you go about living your everyday life. I don't really think that by changing your thoughts about something necessarily means that you can change the way you live, at least in some cases. In some instances, I think your first thought is kind of like a real or true thought and no matter what you do to try to manipulate that thought, it remains there!
I LOVE cognitive psychology. That said, I DO think we can change our thoughts, but I also think that it can be very difficult to do so at times. For instance, sometimes we don't even know exactly what we're thinking from moment to moment...or how certain thoughts can hurt us. Then too some people find it easier to hang onto old thought patterns than to change them. After all, if you change your thoughts, then you might have to change your behavior, right??? And some people don't want to do that.
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