On Dealing With One’s Own Thoughts
On any given day, thoughts seem to flow in the hundreds if nothing is done to stop them. Indeed, they often have no relation to what you actually want to think about, and such thoughts fill the mind with a wandering numbness. In order to focus on this problem more seriously, I feel we must first accept the fact that, if left unchecked, thoughts overwhelm the self with nonsense.
I speak of the kinds of thoughts produced by free association, or a lack of structure — without some desire to make sense of our thinking, as well as study the many paths of thought we might choose, I fear we are mostly helpless. Thinking could be aimed towards something, or it could be left to its own devices, but in order to get anything done, some degree of aiming will always be necessary. Nearly everything I can imagine, including studying, philosophizing, reading, writing, chess, handball, and dealing with people, requires a good amount of deliberation and calculated forethought.
While intuition is helpful in solving real-world problems, it cannot do the work necessary to figure things out. In order to analyze ideology and make sense of it, for example, we must learn to think rationally, since it would seem that the ideology would do the thinking for us otherwise. Instead of learning how to think, we would become filled with pre-made thoughts which are not our own. Another example is in depressive and anxious behaviors, like the acknowledgement of very miniscule details or mistakes, or the constant belief we’re being judged. These two examples exist in the wider world, and many people are subject to these conditions. Intuition would lead a depressed person to believe that their depression is in control of them and their lives, while reason would have them assess their behaviors and rethink them. Thoughts are inevitably coming from an associative faculty in us, and thus, I would argue that we must learn how to associate our thoughts properly.
I can say nothing about the actual difficulty of getting there, though. My stream of consciousness is vastly different from to day to day, and I find that I usually have more thoughts than I know what to do with. I find that it is possible to compartmentalize those thoughts, starting with “what must be done”, then moving on to “what I want to do”, and finally organizing “how I feel today”. Subjectively, this is not easy for some people, seeing as there are outside pressures, and a myriad of ways to fall into the ruminating, moving-around-and-around emptiness of cyclical thought. I find that doing things that are somewhat difficult, even simple ones, is a way around this problem.
I believe that structuring our thoughts helps us attain a sense of understanding where it might not have been. By ascribing steps to our thinking, like in the algorithmic “if this, then that” of chess, we may find it easier to navigate the world. The world itself is unstructured, and much happens that we could not predict or prevent. Therefore, it becomes essential to mold our reactions to irrational changes, which points to a very strong mind. It also removes emotion or ego from the equation, since, instead of intuitively thinking “I want/need/deserve/this”, we are mentally aiming “here is how thing A could be done to work towards outcome B, and that will lead to mental change C”. No acknowledgement of selfhood may even be necessary here, since it generates I-oriented, non-doing thoughts.
Thoughts do not exist in themselves — they are a product of our associating something with something in the world, and that could be true or false. To even begin assessing which thoughts of ours are true and false, we must first be willing to accept that we are prone to assumptions, presuppositions, prejudices, and such, and that that’s completely human and okay. We must be able to forgive ourselves for having negative thoughts, even if they are demonized by wider society. It’s not as though the phenomenological experience of depression is particularly easy, after all. This is why I tire of social expectations, which draw out the most unhappy of thoughts and put one on the rumination carousel again. We must NOT feel like others can tell us how to live or how to be, especially if we are dealing with our own thoughts. We must train on our own, or with someone we could trust. The process of improving one’s thinking is the process of realizing what efficient thinking is like, and I believe that consists in the recognition of logical problem-solving as superior to simply worrying about things.
To-wit, the main argument I am trying to make in this piece is that we should be trying to learn to think for ourselves — any externalities will get in the way of that, and prevent us from developing a healthy theory of mind. The mind, since it is so vulnerable to association, may find reason to believe any number of things, and since we are taught certain values from a young age, our thinking becomes even more limited and ingrained. Thus, I feel that there are two things we must constantly strive to achieve: 1. The freedom of thought and a widening of its scope and capability, and 2. The strength to choose which of our thoughts matter and which ones take us away from a good life. This relaxes the mind and welcomes more objectively useful thoughts.
And then, once you have a thought that is useful, the will can begin to help by making that thought realizable, rather than just something left in passing. By training ourselves in association, we may find more meaningful and impassioned thoughts coming out of us, even when we didn’t previously have them. This training could also help us deal with the thoughts required of us in practical situations, like in a workplace, because we will already have the prerequisites of ‘aiming’ and ‘will-directing’. And in times when we can think however we want, we will begin to ruminate less and focus more, so as to find meaning in everything we do. Thinking is a gift, and we must cherish it. Thus, a proper methodological approach may help restructure our minds.
