Don Paglia | Marriage and Family Counseling. Constellations Workshops

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Tip # 3:

“Fly-fishers are usually brain-workers in society. Along the banks of purling streams, beneath the shadows of umbrageous trees, or in the secluded nooks of charming lakes, they have ever been found, drinking deep of the invigorating forces of nature – giving rest and tone to over-taxed brains and wearied nerves – while gracefully wielding the supple rod, the invisible leader, and the fairy-like fly.” James A. Hensall, MD, 1855

In our present times of the information society where we live lives of an ever-increasingly rushed, unreflective and over-frantic pace it is only those that have the discipline to literally pull out of their self-imposed importance, and if necessary even flee into seclusion, that are able to preserve and maintain a life worth living. Solitude and quiet reflection is the necessary disciple that our souls require. It is not a luxury, but a requirement for a sustainable life. Otherwise we can spend our entire lives merely thinking thoughts but never thinking about our thinking. At first this may not seem significant, or even important. But where else do we get to have “down-time” in order to think about our otherwise unquestioned assumptions or un-reflected ideas?

One of the problems we humans have is that we think we are our thoughts. We certainly have thoughts – and lots of them – and so it is easy to assume these thoughts are us – as though we and our thoughts are one in the same. A much enlightened way to consider that we merely have thoughts – some good and some not-so-good – but we are NOT our thoughts. For starters, we are much more than our thoughts. Equally true is that we are not our feelings; we simply have feelings. Thoughts and feelings are fleeting and change all the time. It may be easy to accept our feelings as transient and that they come and go. But so too is it with our thoughts. While less transient than our feelings, we certainly we can realize we’ve had particular thoughts in the past we no longer hold, and in fact, we may even presently hold an opposite thought from a prior time.

The point is we aren’t our thoughts either; we simply have thoughts. But by living in a mostly unreflective realm it is easy to become addicted to seeing our thoughts as us.

Sometimes a particular thought ends up bumming us out. And the irony is we’re bummed out all the while not realizing we were the one who created the thought to begin with. So, we miss the realization that we always have the option of changing our thoughts. Why not create newer, more enlivening thoughts? Why not create thoughts that move, touch and delight us? Well, it’s just a thought.