Thoughtful Thoughts…
The choice is always yours about what you think.
In 2005, the National Science Foundation published some results of a study it conducted on the average number of thoughts we have per day.
Their research suggested that each person has an average of 60,000 thoughts a day. Now if you look at other studies, this figure can be anywhere between 50,000 to 85,000. So, as an approximation let’s take 60,000 as being the figure.
That’s one thought per second in every waking hour. What was also found was that of this 60,000 thoughts per day, 95% are the same thoughts repeated every day. So every day we churn through the exact same thoughts over and over, and over again. To take it one step further, on average this same study found that 80% of those habitual thoughts are negative. Now that last figure is really, really scary! 80% of our repeated daily thoughts are geared towards the negative. Given that we know that we become what we think about all day long, that would suggest that more people than not live their life in fear, with self-limiting beliefs or invisible prisons they place themselves in. There is nothing empowering revealed in this study…unless you choose to do something about it, of course.
Why do we choose to think so negatively?
While we may not have control over the number of thoughts per day that we have, we certainly have a choice about the quality of those thoughts. We can control our thoughts and we can control whether our thoughts will be negative or positive. If we are going to have 60,000 thoughts per day, why would we not choose to think in the right way? To me, it goes back to Robert A. Heinlein’s view that, “in the absence of clearly defined goals, we become strangely loyal to performing daily trivia until ultimately we become enslaved by it”. We go on auto pilot and we form habits over time that do not serve us. Until we question what we are doing and become aware of our thoughts, we will continue to do what we are doing and wonder why we do not get the results we want. This is the critical part, we have to be honest with ourselves and we have to be aware of our own behaviour. We have to also want to change our focus and thought process, and if we can’t do it on our own, we have to be willing to search out the person or group of people that can help us do it.
Once we become aware of how we think and once we seek guidance, we can then train our minds to focus on what serves us well. We can train our minds to focus on what we want. It takes work and training but over time and with constant repetition, we can change the thoughts we have. This has a flow on effect where we will begin to change our perspective and feeling, which will then lead to taking the right action that will yield the desired results. The process and techniques I use are very effective and they work every single time. So, long as there is a desire and a commitment, the results are phenomenal. Within 24 weeks you can change your whole life and have it just how you want it to be. The choice is always yours to make in any given situation. No matter what life throws your way, you always have a choice on how you think and weather you respond to the situation or react to it.
