Mindworks Coaching Montreal

When you were born you came fully equipped with an exquisite piece of technology. You entered the world outfitted with the most sophisticated computer known to exist. It gave you incredible abilities and left you with even greater potentials just waiting to be explored. Because of its incredible power, you were destined for greatness.

Your internal computer came loaded with all the necessary hardware and a few basic software programs to get you going. You picked up most of the other necessary programs along the way, but besides not coming with an instruction manual, there was something else it was missing; anti-virus software.

What? No anti-virus software? To make matters worse, no salesman has come knocking at your door with this much needed software, the solution to a problem you didn’t know you had.

Just like a computer, the mind takes in information. This information is then processed and results in output. In order for processing and output to occur, programs run. These programs are thinking, feeling and behaving. When information enters a computer it is scanned to ensure that it’s not harmful. The computer has a quality control mechanism to protect it from anything that could potentially be damaging. There are so many viruses out there that if you don’t have anti-virus software, your computer will slow down, freeze up or simply crash if it’s not protected.

The mind is the same. Toxic information leads to harmful programs running and without quality control, bugs begin to show up, functioning is far from optimal and system failure can result. With the mind, data enter, are processed and result in output. Garbage in, garbage out…. and plenty of garbage comes in.

If you open the task manager on your computer, you will find a list of processes running in the background. Even though you only have a couple of applications open, there are many more programs operating in the background. And there are many programs running in the background of the mind as well. Most of them you are unaware of, but they drive your thinking, your emotions and your behaviour. Some of these programs enhance your well-being, others make life hell. But how can you do anything about them if you don’t know they are running?

If you were to run an anti-virus scan of your mind, what would you find?

To function at our best and lives lives of happiness and empowerment, we need anti-virus software. But how can we begin to run quality control on our thinking? The key lies in a psychological principle called reflexive awareness. As you know, everyone has thoughts and feelings. What you might not know is that we also have thoughts and feelings about our thoughts and feelings. “I am angry and I feel guilty about feeling angry and I think it is frustrating to feel guilty about feeling angry….” etc.
The mind does not exist only on one level, but reflects back on itself. Most often this reflexivity manifests as chains of self-criticism and self-contempt. We are used to being prisoners of our mind because this type of thinking is like quicksand… the more we fight it, the more it takes hold of us. But there is a secret to getting out of quicksand.

Unknown to most, self-reflexivity can be used to quality control our mental programming. Just as we have thoughts about thoughts, we can step back from our thoughts and observe the products of consciousness to determine if this is a program we want running… or not.

When you step back from your mind and from your thinking, you step out of the programming that holds you prisoner. Essentially by stepping back you become the witness. You enter a state of neutrality in which you merely observe. With this type of awareness about your own thinking, it becomes difficult to do anything that does not enhance your life and empower you as a person. Quality control frees you from the grip of toxic thoughts and emotions.

This type of awareness has been praised for centuries. Yogis have professed the benefits of “cultivating the witness” and becoming the observer of your own thoughts and emotions. Buddhism teaches Mindfulness meditation, a practice in which one merely witnesses thoughts, emotions and bodily sensations. When you become mindful, you step back and observe in a state of calm detachment. You cannot be swept away by thoughts and emotions because they lose their power over you. In this state you realize that they are just thoughts and emotions.

When I studied Vedanta and Yoga, which teach that becoming the witness leads to enlightenment, it seemed as though this would require a lifetime of work. Perhaps this is so if you want to enter this state of mind perpetually. But becoming the witness when needed is really quite easy. The way I see it, there is a time for just immersing yourself in life and enjoying what is, and there is a time to step out of things and get the big picture.

Witnessing is merely a state of mind and we go in and out of various states of mind throughout the day; contentment, joy, frustration, anger, curiosity, and the countless others that your day would not be complete without. When you recognize that witnessing is just a state, it is easy to step in and out of.

To enter into a state of witnessing, consider what it is like when you are simply observing. You are not involved, but rather, you are on the outside, just a spectator, like when you are on a balcony a few stories high looking down on the hustle and bustle in the street below. Notice the breath of witnessing, the muscle tension and the facial expression of witnessing. You can even imagine stepping back from your own body and looking back at yourself.

The first program you may notice running when you do some quality control is the ever so common “I can’t control my thoughts and emotions” program. Shut this one down because it won’t make your life a party. When you know how to run your own brain, it becomes easy, and stepping back is the first step, literally.

A computer can only act out of its programming, but we can program ourselves. When we access the higher levels of our mind, we access our own personal power to decide what programs will run in our mind. When you step into this state and merely witness your own thoughts, you become the CEO of your own mind. You can begin to drive the bus instead of it driving you. Who is in charge anyway?