There are plenty of different ways we can use our minds. There is knowing, teaching, and there is learning. We can use our minds to search, hope, imagine and believe. We can witness something, focus on something else, and think or problem solve a difficult situation. Creatively, we can write, create music, or advance science. My point, is that there are no limitations on creativity, except for those we create ourselves.
Try to remember a wonderful experience from your past. Imagine having the best choices, “rock star choices.” I recall reading about a well-known classical composer who claimed that he “remembered” a now famous score and wrote it down. Was he merely using his imagination?
Self-Discipline
This is what it sometimes seems that we’re trying to discuss in a therapy session. We’re going around and around, hoping that someone will land on and begin expressing this as a goal. How do you do it? Do you even attempt self-discipline?
We can be disciplined about anything though, right? A psychologist ought to assist their clients to access their groove or to get into their zone. They might try to inspire and use themselves as an example, since they probably maintain their own groove every day. I know I do.
Accessing the zone is less a cognitive exercise than it is a practice or discipline. Listen for the “sound of silence,” the sounds you hear when no one, not even yourself is talking. This means prioritizing a moment of non-thinking ahead of thinking. As Deepak Chopra once said, “help your client to slip into the gap between their thoughts.”
Replace your on-going thoughts with a momentary focus on “white noise.” Like peripheral vision, focus not on your thoughts but on what you sense peripherally. Focus, not on your peripheral thoughts, either, but on sounds, visuals, smells, and feelings.
Focus on these without judging, making meaning, or categorizing them in anyway. Do this ritualistically, multiple times each day to ultimately find yourself on your way into the zone.
If this sounds like I’m advocating a practice of meditation and mindfulness, then perhaps I am. Personally, I began my process by learning Transcendental Meditation, then I began to discover other forms of mediation, and as a psychologist, I studied hypnosis for a number of years. These practices are about taking hold of and mastering your psychological states. You’ve likely read or heard someone say, “change your thinking, change your life.” Well that’s what I’m talking about.
Change your state of emotions by changing your thoughts, and behaviors. Then every single little situation you experience throughout the day is faced and dealt with a better psychological state. You will literally think, feel and act better, more naturally, and successfully.
