Looking vs. Thinking: You May Be Overthinking Things...

Have you ever stopped and looked at a thought?

Not think a thought. Not think about a thought.

But look at a thought?

One day not too long ago I was looking at a situation in my life and I realized I was going down stream with my thoughts.

You know, like a canoe going down a river.

However, I wasn’t really separate from my stream of thought.

I was in the stream.

And there’s a big difference.

It’s really quite subtle because you think you are looking at things when in fact you are really part of the stream.

Now, if you let your canoe-thoughts go down that stream and then you left the canoe, you know, like leaving your body, and you were above the canoe and the stream, well then you would be looking at that stream of thought.

At first you are like WTF is going on here?

Because you are aware of being aware that you can just LOOK.

And then you’re still like, WTF?

You begin to realize so much of your life is in that stream.

You know: “Thinking about this.” “Thinking about that.” And you think all that thinking has value. That somehow it’s important.

And here’s the weird part:

None of it has any value until you look at it.

Because up until that time you were part of the stream.

And you were influenced by the other thoughts in that stream.

Don’t believe me?

“What will they think?” “He probably won’t like it.” “She’ll probably disagree.” “What if I’m wrong?” “I have to think about this.”

You are not looking when you are thinking.

It’s like WTF x 100.

Your “think-mind” might tell you, “You have to think things over.”

No. You have to look at things. There’s a big, big difference.

Looking is an activity of awareness.

Thinking is compressing your awareness into a thought stream.

The end result of compressing your awareness and not just directly observing, is to think.

It is way different LOOKING at and OBSERVING the water rush by than being in the water and THINKING about it.

With any situation you have right this minute you've been chewing on and thinking about, you need to stop and just look. 

It's so simple it gets missed.

So what happens when you look at a thought?

It’s crazy weird. And it’s also extremely exhilarating.

Exhilarating?

Yes, exhilarating.

Because when you get out of the canoe and out of the stream, you can pick up one of your thoughts, like it was a single strand of uncooked linguini. I know. Best example I could think of. Stay with me on this.

You know, when you go to the grocery store and buy that whole bag, and there’s 50-80 of strands of linguini in there.

You just take out one strand and look at it.

Like looking at one thought.

And then you look at that single strand.

That thought is separate from you.

BECAUSE YOU GENERATED THAT THOUGHT.

I know, right? You’re the like the SOURCE OF LINGUINI!

Stay with me now...

And then you often laugh!

Laugh?

Yes, laugh! Because YOU were BEING THE THOUGHT.

Listen, when you get “all involved” in “What would they think?” you are being part of that thought. You are in the water.

You are going down the stream.

And you know that thought can take you downstream for your whole friggin’ day. 

You can still be “thinking about it” when you get home!

You were in that canoe in that stream all day!

And just like the stream. It just keeps streaming.

Because that’s what thoughts do.

Yet, if you LOOK at the situation you will become AWARE that your own thoughts about it influenced you as well.

Well, I hate to go all Yoda on you, but if you are “one with the linguini, then you are going to be influenced by the linguini.”

So, you have then come way from being exterior to or separate from the thought or thoughts you are having.

And listen, it’s not bad to be in the thought stream thinking about things.

We all think about things.

But if you LOOK at it, thoughts themselves never do anything except stream.

A thought never did anything. Not ever.

But since you are the SOURCE of your thoughts, you can also say, “Okay, I’ve looked at this situation with Mary and I’m just going to tell her so she knows where I’m coming from.”

And be done with that and move on with Life.

You don’t need to carry that single strand of linguini with you all day and “think about it” like a bad piece of chewed bubble gum.

Many of the things we “spend time thinking about,” are just that.

They are just the things we’ve been thinking about.

I can think you might not like this article.

And what I think didn’t change the article or me one bit.

Unless…

Unless, I didn’t write this article because the thought you might not like it took me down stream and I ended up thinking about that and not writing anything.

Think about it.

Not.

Yoda, out...

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