Reading Your Mind
How often do you mind your mind by taking stock of the thoughts swirling around in your head? We are often so busy just responding to the demands of daily life that we tend to limit our focus on the world around us, rather than the world within us. By becoming mindful of our own mind, we take time to check in with ourselves and perhaps nab any offending thoughts that may be knocking around the old ‘noggin.
Mindfulness is about awareness, not insight. You may be mindful of the thoughts rambling through your mind, but struggle to connect the dots to better understand the origins of your thinking patterns and how early life experiences may have predisposed you to think in ways that lead to anxiety, depression, anger, worry, and guilt—the five pillars of emotional problems. But insight is not a necessary precondition of change, although as a practicing therapist, I know it is often helpful to patients to have a context to understand how their distorted thinking patterns became imprinted in their mind. Think of it this way— you may contract a disease and fully recover after taking an effective drug, even if you have no idea how you contracted the disease in the first place. So too, you can change how you feel by changing how you think, even if you have no idea why you tend to think that way in the first place.
"Hey, he pushed my buttons"
Many people believe that others push their emotional buttons, that “so and so” made me angry or depressed or “got under my skin.” The fact is that no one can make you feel anything, not unless you let them. Not the server with the “don’t bother me” attitude, not the IRS, and not even the DMV (well, maybe the DMV).
People may say annoying things or treat you unfairly. But emotions are internal mental experiences that hinge on how we react to events, not on events themselves. We make ourselves angry by thinking angering thoughts and make ourselves sad or depressed by falling into a negative mindset about ourselves and our life. By rethinking our thoughts, we can shift into a cognitive gear that allows us to maintain our equilibrium. Yes, “stuff happens” in life, but what makes us miserable or enraged is not the “stuff” of daily life, but rather the meanings and interpretations we impose on events that turns irritation into anger and disappointment into despair.
Are you an actor or an observer?
Social psychologists introduced a concept called the actor-observer effect that can help explain why people don’t take stock of the thoughts that trigger their emotional responses—why they think that others push their emotional buttons. The actor-observer effect is the tendency to explain our own behavior in terms of external circumstances or situational demands we face in life, while also explaining the behavior of others in terms of dispositional factors within themselves, such as their personalities or underlying motives.
When we perform an action, we are actors; when we observe others performing the same action, we are observers. Our frame of reference changes with the roles we play. Consider a scenario in which a store clerk is surly or inconsiderate. According to the actor-observer effect, we assume the other person’s behavior says something about the type of person they are. But when it comes to our own behavior (or actions), say when we ourselves are acting surly, we tend to fix the cause on something outside of ourselves, such as the daily stress that’s piled up or the effects of losing sleep, or just about anything that puts distance between our behavior and our self.
The psychologist Franz Heider explained the actor-observer effect in terms of differences in perspective. Heider argued that when we assume the the role of an actor by performing an action, we are looking outward toward the environment, which engulfs our view. But when we observe another person's behavior or actions, our perspective is focused on the actor and so we tend to attribute the cause of the action to factors within the person.
Becoming mentally mindful shifts your frame of reference from a focus on the outside world to the inner world of your thoughts, feelings, and sensations. When we are mindful of our own minds, we become aware of what we are saying to ourselves under our breath and to the nagging, disruptive or negative thoughts that may bounce around in our minds unfiltered and unchallenged.
Are you mindful of your own mind?
How well do you read your own thoughts and feelings? How often do you take time to check in with your mind to know what's knocking around up there? Here are some tips to become more mindful of your own mind:
Take note of any negative thoughts or feelings you may be experiencing at this moment in time.
The one word you would use to best describe a negative feeling you may be experiencing at this moment is ________________. (If you’re not aware of any negative feelings, think back to the last time you had a disturbing feeling.)
What thought or thoughts pop into your mind when you feel this way?
Think back to other times in your life when you felt this way? What thoughts did you have at the time?
Is there a persistent thought or thoughts that trouble you when you experience negative feeling states?
What thoughts linger in your mind when you are alone with your thoughts?
What are you saying to yourself right now that might make you feel down, angry, anxious, worried, or guilty?
What other negative things are you saying to yourself under your breath?
Whose voice—or whose words—does this inner voice remind you of?
Cue yourself to check in with your mind at specific times during the day, such as when preparing meals, or leaving the house, or checking your mail or email. Make it a habit of mind.
Becoming mindful of your mind involves observing your mind in action, in real time. By becoming mindful of our own minds, we get in the habit of stopping ourselves whenever we become aware of negative thoughts or feelings. But its not mere idle observation. It's a mental framework that prepares you to make changes in how you think and how you engage the world. At the end of the day, we need to ask ourselves whether our thoughts are working for us and be willing to open our minds to rethinking thoughts that work against us.
I encourage patients to adopt a type of recipe for change I call the STS method, which stands for STOP, THINK, and SUBSTITUTE. The first step is to stop yourself whenever a negative thought (or angering or anxious thought) pops into your mind. Second, think about the validity of the thought. Does it hold up in the light of reality, or might it be exaggerated, distorted, or catastrophizing? Do you tend to focus only on the negatives and dismiss the positives, put things in all-or-nothing or black-and-white terms, personalize things that may have little or nothing to do with you, or jump to conclusions. Third, find calming, rational thoughts you can substitute, even if they don't seem obvious at first (or personal "mantras" as some patients call them). Or simply remind yourself, “it is what it is,” and then go do something else rather than continuing to stew in your own juices. Other entries on this blog highlight specific ways in which you can turn your thinking around by substituting more adaptive or rational thoughts.