Do we choose our thoughts?

[JonW]

Hi.
I should also add that I'm not qualified to judge whether meditation is advisable for someone on methylphenidate or amphetamines. This situation is not one I have encountered in my teaching.
All best,
Jon

[Spikeycloud]

Hi.
I should also add that I'm not qualified to judge whether meditation is advisable for someone on methylphenidate or amphetamines. This situation is not one I have encountered in my teaching.
All best,
Jon

I understand but at the moment I'm not on them. I did take them once in a month or so, but they gave me bad side effects afterwards. Though now that I did stop with them, I can't say I feel any better so I doubt they were the problem to begin with..Also other people who still take them don't encouter the side effects that I do so it is hard to say what exactly is the problem is.

Next week I'm going to visit an aura reader. I'm very curious what she has to say.

[JonW]

'I understand but at the moment I'm not on them.'

Thank you for clarifying.
And good luck with the aura reader.
Best wishes,
Jon

[Spikeycloud]

Thanks, btw can you explain what changed for you before you started mindfulness and now? I then mean the qaulity of your experience.

[JonW]

Sure. I lived most of my life in a state of anxiety with frequent bouts of deep depression. And now I don't. I'd say that my life is now lived in a state of quiet joy. I still have the same problems I always did but they no longer seem problematic to me. I can barely recognise the old me. Apart from fatherhood and deciding to get a dog, discovering mindfulness was the best thing that ever happened to me.
Cheers,
Jon

[Spikeycloud]

Sure. I lived most of my life in a state of anxiety with frequent bouts of deep depression. And now I don't. I'd say that my life is now lived in a state of quiet joy. I still have the same problems I always did but they no longer seem problematic to me. I can barely recognise the old me. Apart from fatherhood and deciding to get a dog, discovering mindfulness was the best thing that ever happened to me.
Cheers,
Jon

Thanks, that sounds very reassuring. I go now through what you are describing too – and despite trying many things, it did not change for the better yet. I hope that mindfulness can do the same for me.

Btw during that deep depressive state, did you feel very tired and mindfoggy almost all the time? That you have littarly so many thoughts that you can barely read stuff on the internet?

[JonW]

'Btw during that deep depressive state, did you feel very tired and mindfoggy almost all the time? That you have littarly so many thoughts that you can barely read stuff on the internet?'

My anxiety was fairly constant but my depression was mostly circumstantial - for example, I would suffer a lot of depression after relationship breakups. That depression was fuelled by negative spirals of thinking but just as much by feeling disconnected from my body.
At my most depressed, it was a struggle to get out of bed in the morning, let alone look at stuff on the internet.
Since taking up meditation and practicing daily, I've experienced no depression and rarely feel anxiety. But that's just my story. As a teacher I'm always careful to point out that everybody's mindful journey is unique. So, even regular practice is no guarantee of an anxiety-free life.
I might add that I'm a firm believer that timing is everything. One needs to be ready for mindfulness. For example, I doubt if I'd have taken to it in my thirties or forties, when I was drinking heavily and worrying constantly. A big part of my story is that I needed to realise that the way I was living was no longer sustainable before I was open to radical change. And that's exactly what mindfulness in its purest sense actually involves - radical change.
What mindfulness has gifted me is a whole new perspective on life, enabling a whole new way of being – emphasis on ‘whole’. Living more with a sense of wholeness it’s likely that, whatever our burden in life – anxiety, depression, addiction, disability, phobia – we will be better equipped to relate to our situation, better able to live in the moment as fully and as wisely as we can. Even in the midst of great hurt, humiliation, shame, sadness and anger, we see that it is possible to find what T.S. Eliot called ‘the still point of the turning world’, where we can observe our experience as it unfolds from moment to moment, where we are much better placed to avoid feeling overwhelmed.
All good things,
Jon

[Spikeycloud]

'Btw during that deep depressive state, did you feel very tired and mindfoggy almost all the time? That you have littarly so many thoughts that you can barely read stuff on the internet?'

My anxiety was fairly constant but my depression was mostly circumstantial - for example, I would suffer a lot of depression after relationship breakups. That depression was fuelled by negative spirals of thinking but just as much by feeling disconnected from my body.
At my most depressed, it was a struggle to get out of bed in the morning, let alone look at stuff on the internet.
Since taking up meditation and practicing daily, I've experienced no depression and rarely feel anxiety. But that's just my story. As a teacher I'm always careful to point out that everybody's mindful journey is unique. So, even regular practice is no guarantee of an anxiety-free life.
I might add that I'm a firm believer that timing is everything. One needs to be ready for mindfulness. For example, I doubt if I'd have taken to it in my thirties or forties, when I was drinking heavily and worrying constantly. A big part of my story is that I needed to realise that the way I was living was no longer sustainable before I was open to radical change. And that's exactly what mindfulness in its purest sense actually involves - radical change.
What mindfulness has gifted me is a whole new perspective on life, enabling a whole new way of being – emphasis on ‘whole’. Living more with a sense of wholeness it’s likely that, whatever our burden in life – anxiety, depression, addiction, disability, phobia – we will be better equipped to relate to our situation, better able to live in the moment as fully and as wisely as we can. Even in the midst of great hurt, humiliation, shame, sadness and anger, we see that it is possible to find what T.S. Eliot called ‘the still point of the turning world’, where we can observe our experience as it unfolds from moment to moment, where we are much better placed to avoid feeling overwhelmed.
All good things,
Jon

Hmm not expected u were already above 50. But still when you think of it, it is kinda unfortunate that you needed to a life of depression and anxiety the first 50 years - before things get better for you. I really don't want to wait that long. (I'm in my thirties btw) - before I enjoy my life. Though one could argue, that our real selves (awareness) are enternal. It is just our story, our persona that is temporal. But that persona is not who we really are in the core.

[JonW]

I'm 57 this year.
I guess I got lucky when I found mindfulness when I did, and the most luckiest part was finding a teacher who helped me to ground myself in the practice. That was six years ago. I'd say that another crucial element for me was the reading I did after I completed my first mindfulness course - not just books about mindfulness, but also Zen, Buddhism, non-duality etc. Those books enabled me to see through the illusory fixed self that had suffered so much. Letting go of the sense of myself as an anxious, depressed person was pivotal to the changes in my life. It was as though I previously saw life through a narrow prism. Then, gradually, the view was widescreen. In the process, i rediscovered the sense of wonder I'd mislaid somewhere along the way.
Jon

[Spikeycloud]

I'm 57 this year.
I guess I got lucky when I found mindfulness when I did, and the most luckiest part was finding a teacher who helped me to ground myself in the practice. That was six years ago. I'd say that another crucial element for me was the reading I did after I completed my first mindfulness course - not just books about mindfulness, but also Zen, Buddhism, non-duality etc. Those books enabled me to see through the illusory fixed self that had suffered so much. Letting go of the sense of myself as an anxious, depressed person was pivotal to the changes in my life. It was as though I previously saw life through a narrow prism. Then, gradually, the view was widescreen. In the process, i rediscovered the sense of wonder I'd mislaid somewhere along the way.
Jon

Thats very interesting thanks for telling me. I know for some time now that I'm not that negative self. But it is extremely stubborn it just keep appearing and appearing. Or rather said..it feels as if I'm played out automatically as the negative patterns. And it is very hard for me to see myself that way. Even though it is not who I really am, I still experiment it as me when those patterns play out.

Mindfulness does show me that we can observe ourselves and that we can stop the thoughts from generating more thoughts. But it did not change the severity of the indentification in real life. If the volume on a amplifier can be from 1 to 10. My volume is most of the time a 9-10. In such a way that I get completely lost and even forget mindfulness al together.