How to stop unwanted thoughts

Have you ever had thoughts or worries that are coming into your mind and you cannot control them, and you don’t know what to do?

It’s like you can’t stop yourself from thinking about it. You cannot control those unwanted thoughts or ideas or even emotions or fears like some people have a fear of dying or some have a fear of illness and disease or whatever other fears, whether they are for themselves or for someone close to them or even family. If you have had these kinds of thoughts, ideas, and fears, or if you know someone who goes through this kind of situation, then this article is for you.

Let’s talk about recurring thoughts or fears that we cannot control

To give you a perfect example of this, I will mention my good friend who is in this exact kind of situation. Now, he has gone to many doctors. He has done all of the possible medical check-ups, blood tests, heart and lung tests, body resistance, endurance, whatever, any kind of test you can think of, he’s done them all.

Listen to this Article:  

And yet, he cannot stop worrying that maybe there is something wrong with him. And then he went to the doctor and the doctor says ”Well, you are not just well, you’re not just healthy, you are way healthier than anyone your age.” He’s over 40. And then the doctor says ”Your body is like 20 years old. So I don’t know what you’re doing, but you’re kind of like…too healthy.” So even though several doctors said that to him, he’s still worrying a lot.

And I had this conversation with him recently and that actually inspired me to write this article because I think it will help you as well. So here’s what I said to him and here’s what I say to all of my clients and also to my students when I talk about this topic. You see, every time we worry, every time we think of something and that thought or idea or fear comes into our head, it’s because we have this, what we call, ”the two minds” – the conscious mind and the unconscious mind.

The conscious mind is the logical, the thinking, the decision-making mind, whereas the unconscious mind is the emotional, the instinctual mind. Every time you get a thought into your mind, it surfaces from the unconscious mind and goes into the conscious mind. And between these two minds we have a bridge, we have an open channel of communication and that is our imagination.

Now, you go about your business, and then this thought, this fear pops into your mind saying ”Oh my God, what if that happens?” ”What if I forgot the oven on when I left home?” ”What if my child is in danger?” ”What if I got this disease?” – Every time you get that idea into your head, that is actually thought or a fear that comes from your unconscious mind into your conscious mind.

Everything that you worry about and that you’re afraid of is actually something that reaches the surface of your conscious mind and now you are simply aware of it. Until you are aware of something, you cannot be afraid or worried about something, you’re only aware of those things that pop out into your conscious mind. And so, when I was talking with my friend, I said ”The very fact that a worry coming into your mind, just think of it as coming from the unconscious mind into your conscious one.”

And as I was talking to my friend about this, his phone rang. And I said ”Listen, this is exactly how this process works. So, you’re minding your business, and then your phone rings. As soon as the phone is ringing, you have one of two choices: You can either answer the phone or not answer the phone. It’s as simple as that, right? And it’s the same with the worrying thoughts and ideas and emotions and feelings that are coming to your mind. You can either pay attention or not pay attention to them.”

That is your call, that is your choice. The problem is that most of the time we are taking for granted whatever comes to our conscious mind from the unconscious mind. Not only are we paying attention to what comes into our conscious mind, but we respond to it and we treat whatever comes as being real.

I’ll give you an example:

Let’s say you’re walking down the street at the night, and then all kinds of thoughts and ideas and fears are coming into your conscious mind from your unconscious one. Right now you’re alone, you’re on the street, and it’s dark outside.

Your unconscious mind is creating all kinds of scenarios in your head and they are being projected onto the screen of your conscious mind and you are basically seeing the projection and you go:

“Oh my God, look at this. I’m afraid someone is going to come and hit me. I’m afraid someone is going to rob me.”

“Maybe there is a dog out there and it’s trying to bite me.” All of these movie scenarios get played on the screen of your conscious mind, being projected from your unconscious.

The thing is that once you pay attention to that movie, you give it energy and power. And when you pay attention, when you accept that movie, then your entire biochemistry changes. Your biological functions start changing: your neurological system is changing, and your nervous system is changing. Everything in your body is changing in response to whatever is being projected on the screen of your conscious mind.

Therefore, when that is changed, it will feed into whatever is creating the movie in the first place. So right now you’ve created a loop, which is like a self-fulfilling prophecy because this loop will feed these fears, right? Then your body gets into a fight or flight response automatically that will increase even more.

So you start escalating this whole experience. And all of this started with the fact that you’ve been picking up the phone, referencing my previous example. The phone rang, the image has been projected here and you paid attention to it.

In my friend’s case, I said to him “I’m talking to you right now and the phone is ringing – you are thinking of something right now and then this other thought or fear comes into your mind. Now, you can continue thinking of whatever you are thinking, you can continue conversing with me or you have a knee-jerk reaction to pick up the phone and stop paying attention to me and see whatever is happening on the phone. But you don’t.”

You can make a choice to continue to think of whatever you are thinking and not pick up the phone. You have two ways to control this. Every time a thought or a fear comes into your mind, the very first thing you have to ask yourself is “Is this something related to my very current moment situation that I’m in right now?”

Let’s say you’re walking through a park at night, it’s dark and then you have this fear surfacing “What if a dog comes?” You have to ask yourself “Is there a dog right here, right now barking at me, chasing me, trying to bite me?” If that is not the case, then drop the idea and don’t pay attention to it anymore. Focus on whatever you are doing. Focus on whatever you were thinking before that thought or fear popped into your mind. That does not mean you shove it under the rug. No, it means “I’m aware of this thing that came from my unconscious mind into my conscious mind. I’m aware of it. And then I just simply decide to unwind as I continue to focus on whatever I’m focusing.”

Now, let’s say you are unable to do that because it does indeed require a little bit of training. But then again, this is the training – maybe it’s not going to work for the first time, but the second time, third time, tenth time, you’re going to be able to be aware that this fear or thought came up into your conscious mind movie and that now you’re watching it.

Another way to go about it would be “Hey, you know what? This fear or thought popped into my mind and I can just be conscious of it and let it play without me being involved with it.”

And this idea leads to one of the biggest problems – that we believe all kind of bullshit that pops into our mind, we treat that as being the ultimate truth – But pay attention – Is this something that is happening for real right now? And if it’s not, then disregard it.

Think of it like you’re walking down the street and somebody completely unknown to you comes up to you and tells you all kinds of stuff that you don’t like, that you don’t agree with. What are you going to do? Are you going to continue to listen to that person and take to heart what they say or are you going to disregard it?

How to stop unwanted thoughts

Imagination is a two-way highway. You can either receive into your conscious mind thoughts, ideas, emotions, and beliefs from your unconscious mind, or you can do it the other way around and say “Do you know what I consciously want? I decide and choose to have this kind of an experience.” Therefore, when fear comes up into your mind, you can say “You know what? I don’t want this. Actually, you know what, I want to feel this way instead.”

You are not reactive anymore, you are proactive and therefore, you’re not rejecting but actually telling your unconscious mind “This is what I want. Make this happen for me. Create this instead of that.”

So then I say to my unconscious mind “I create this. I generate this into my body and into my mind.” I say “Hey, unconscious mind, here’s how I want to feel when I walk by myself alone in the dark. I want to enjoy the silence, I want to enjoy being alone with myself.”

You either respond to what comes from the unconscious mind or you create how you want to feel and you project that into your unconscious mind and therefore your unconscious mind will make that happen for you. This is a process that works and that I always use with my clients and I hope it has helped you as well.

 

Let me know in the comments below if you enjoyed this article. Let me know if you have different other processes that you are using to control these inner fears and the unwanted thoughts and let us start a conversation.