If you look at a calming image, the mind can relax and let go all on its own, but it only happens when you stop trying and expecting it to happen. This is a good primary method to relax and calm the mind. If trying to stay present doesn’t calm your mind, try using a distraction like counting down from 100 by 7, or picking a color and finding all the objects in the room with that color. This will help take your mind off invasive thoughts. Then, you can refocus it on the present moment.
Be a better listener during conversations. Take time to really absorb what the other person is telling you, instead of half-listening while you worry about other things. Ask questions, share advice, and generally be a good conversationalist. Consider volunteering or otherwise getting involved in your community. You’ll meet new people and be exposed to interesting and important topics that may just outweigh the thoughts and feelings you’re trying to let go. Look down at your body. Pay attention to where you’re sitting. Be attuned to your immediate surroundings. Focus on the sensations of where you’re sitting or your feet on the floor. Your reality is where you are right now. It’s impossible to go back to yesterday, and it’s impossible to predict what will happen tomorrow. Keep your thoughts engaged with your physical presence in the current moment. Say something mentally or out loud. The physical act of making a sound will pull your thoughts to the present. Say “This is the present,” or “I am here. " Repeat it until your thoughts are pulled to the present. Go outside. Changing your immediate environment can help your thoughts move back to the present as your senses are occupied with expanding to take in more data. Observe the way is the world is moving around you, each being living in his or her own present. Focus on small changes, like a bird alighting or a leaf whirling on the sidewalk.
Practice being more present by doing activities that completely absorb you and make you feel confident in your abilities. For example, if you’re good at baking, savor the experience of sifting the dry ingredients, mixing the batter, filling the cake pan, smelling the aroma of your creation as it fills the kitchen, taking the first bite when it’s ready. When you experience present moment awareness, explore it and remember how it feels, as well as how you got there and recreate it as often as possible. Remember that the only thing keeping you from feeling that freedom in other situations is your own mind, and put aside self-criticism from your daily thought process.
Research suggests that it takes around 21 to 66 days to change a habit, depending upon the person and the habit you’re looking to change.
The mind doesn’t always need a theme to think, that’s when the mind chatters away over what seems an illogical and fairly wild stream of thought. The mind is using thought just like a pacifier or a distraction and often does it when there is physical pain, when it is afraid or trying to protect itself from something. If you watch the mind like a machine, you can sometimes see the mind just grabbing whatever it can find or sense to use as a theme or topic of thought. Theme based thinking is much more obvious, you might be angry, worried or have a particular feeling over an issue and you think about that issue. These thoughts tend to be repetitive and focused just on the theme at hand. The difficulty is that there is a pretty central problem: essentially the mind has to be disinterested or disenchanted with the theme & process of thinking or emotionally feeling. Often this is helped greatly by recognizing that the theme and the feeling or thought process at hand is not helping us at the moment. There are a lot of feelings & thought subjects we don’t want to let go of or view as being stressful because we often want to explore the themes and issues they represent (such as when being angry, or being anxious etc, we want to think about the who, where, what, why etc). This specific “wanting to think about” or just “wanting to think”, is more powerful than our desire to let go - letting go is really hard when it is simply outweighed by a stronger desire. When we aren’t careful or being aware, we just start fighting ourselves which is also part of the trick if you are thinking for the sake of thinking. Fighting becomes another distraction from the issue the mind is running away from - the mind is still in complete control, even though it doesn’t look like it. You have to counter the strong “wanting to think about” with a gentle but very persistent “OK, it’s time to move on and let go” until eventually the desire to let go is stronger than the desire to think about the issue. The other problem is feelings are something we see as part of our identity or part of us. We have no desire to recognise that part of us can cause us pain or misery, or that they are able to make us unhappy. People are often trained to think that “all” feelings are precious when they are “me” or “mine”. Some feelings cause stress, but some don’t. This explains the whole method, you have to observe the thought and feeling long enough to decide - without condemning yourself - if the feeling is worth keeping, or worth letting go of.
Try as hard as you can to avoid thinking about a polar bear, or (more unusual) a purple polka-dot flamingo drinking a cup of coffee. This experiment is quite an old one but still a good one to show the dynamics of thought. The simple fact of the matter is to be able to maintain an effort not to think about polar bears, or when we experience an unhappy thought, we struggle against it, both trying to suppress a thought and struggling against a thought both require applied and sustained effort and the theme (such as the polar bear) as an object. If you keep trying or fighting not to think about it, the bear stays put. Say you are holding a pen in your hand and want to let go of it. In order to put the pen down, you have to be holding it. When you continue to want to put it down, you have to “continue” to hold it. Logically you can’t put it down when you are still holding it. The more effort and intention applied in “wanting” to put it down, the more grip is applied on the pen.
The way out is instead of forcing it, just relax the grip. The pen falls out your hand all on its own the same as thoughts and feelings. You may need a little time - if you were using force it may be imprinted on the mind for a short while, because the mind is so used to fighting it so it has become almost ingrained as a mental occupation. When we clamp on to thoughts and feelings by exploring them, or trying to destroy them - they are going nowhere - they are locked in tight. We have to relax the grip in order to be able to let them go.
Have you ever read a book, seen a movie or done anything so many times you know everything about it and it just seems uninteresting and boring? If you do the same and watch the thought and be uninterested with it, there is no more attachment to it so its easier to let go.
A useful mantra in facing the feelings and thoughts is to recall that you must be responsible for your own happiness and they don’t have to control your life. Ultimately if you let the past or worries about the future as well as other desires control your happiness, they will never come up with the goods. Manipulate the thought. Run it backwards, twist it, bend it, change it - eventually you can see that you are running the show. By substituting an unpleasant thought with a more soothing thought chain, is a temporary fix, but still a good one in times of need. You can let go of the issue easier when you feel you have more safer ground to stand on. If your racing thoughts and feelings are related to a problem you have yet to solve, think it through, then take measures to remedy the situation, even if you have to accept that the situation is completely beyond control.
Practice gratitude in these moments. Try an activity like writing down 3 things for which you are grateful. Doing this in the moment will give you something to look back on for clarity when your thoughts are more invasive.
Get plenty of sleep. When you’re running on a sleep deficit, it’s difficult to keep your mind functioning in a positive way. Get 7 or 8 hours of sleep every night. Eat well. Have a balanced diet full of all the nutrients your brain needs to stay healthy. Make sure you get plenty of fruits and vegetables. Exercise regularly. Having a good exercise routine will keep stress at bay as well as helping your body stay in good shape. Both of these effects have a big influence on the thoughts and feelings that occupy your mind. Avoid alcohol and drugs. Alcohol is a depressant, and drinking it too much can cause your thoughts to spin out of control. The same is true of many types of drugs. If you regularly consume a lot of drugs and alcohol, consider cutting back to improve your mental health. Seek counseling when necessary. Caring for mental health is as important as caring for your physical health. If you’re having trouble controlling your thoughts, don’t try to manage everything on your own. Seek out a professional - a counselor, religious advisor, social worker, or psychiatrist - who can help you get back on a positive path.
