Saturday 4 February 2012

Shepherding thoughts away from Bears!

Hello

I recently watched a very interesting documentary about a man who went to spend time alone in the wilderness, he was a very courageous man, he was also very honest and open and I felt great admiration for his guts and determination. He spent fifty days alone amongst mountains and great lakes in Canada with nothing but the odd moose for company!

I found myself absolutely fascinated with the way his thoughts progressed throughout the time he spent alone there, I believe he had no previous experience of being alone in the wild in a survival situation and that he took advice from a psychologist on what to do if he was feeling low. Amazingly to me he appeared to have been given no advice on focus! Gradually through the program (and obviously I'm only going on what was actually shown, who knows what the editor was thinking?) his thought processes deteriorated from optimism to pessimism and then gradually into paranoia.

Okay, so I haven't spent fifty days alone in a Canadian wilderness, but I do wonder how the experience might have been for him had he vigilantly spent time choosing what to think about. I have spent such a large part of my life simply allowing my thoughts to prattle away completely unhindered, that I know very well the consequences of not DELIBERATELY THINKING.
So much of the man's time in the documentary was taken up worrying about bears that he seemed permanently anxious, and secondary to that whenever he went out hunting for food, before he had even set out he seemed to be imagining finding nothing or at best not enough.

 Practicing Choosing Good Feeling Thoughts, which I am now doing nearly all the time, (although I still have occasional lapses into poor thought patterns), means thinking about ideal situations all the time, regardless of current 'reality' . So if I don't have the ideal car I imagine that I do, and if I wanted to go out one evening and my circumstances prevent me then I choose something beautiful and inspiring to think about or do. I picture what I would love and imagine that I have it. At the moment I have moved into simply picturing myself happy with my world exactly as it is. If I can attain complete peace with each moment exactly the way it is there will be no need to change my circumstances - everything will feel pleasant, because I feel pleasant.

I wonder what kind of experience that man would have had had he spent his time shepherding his thoughts, perhaps he could have thought about the delicious food he was about to find or catch, perhaps if bears came to mind he could have imagined there were tastier morsels out there than him.

This reminded me of swimming in the sea in Australia with my big sister, we swam on un-netted beaches and while I found it really hard to relax my sister frolicked around feeling safe because she felt there were tastier morsels in the sea than her! Neither of us got eaten by sharks, but she had a better time than me simply because of her thought processes.
I remember reading years ago about research done on 'optimistic' people versus 'pessimistic' people and how successful they were in life in general, rather unsurprisingly the optimists had a much better time, they were more successful and long-lived than the pessimists !!!!!


Intentionally and deliberately CHOOSING GOOD FEELING THOUGHTS means I spend my time feeling great, nothing much in my life has changed except me. Maybe one day I will go into the wilderness and see how I get on with the bears!!

                                                I love shepherding my thoughts,

           I LOVE FEELING GREAT, INSPIRED, EXCITED, ENTHUSIASTIC, LOVING,      
                                                          OPTIMISTIC, 


                                                      AND THANKFUL.

Today I am Thankful for the Canadian Wilderness
I am Thankful for my skin - it's amazing!
I am Thankful for frosty crunchy soil
I am Thankful for my bow and arrows
I am Thankful for my baby's laugh
I am Thankful for snowdrops
I am Thankful for generosity
I am Thankful for great company
I am Thankful for feasting
I am Thankful for my thought choosing mission

love Klara.

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