How to Break Up With Thinking and Just Be Friends

Why do we think that thinking is special?

…

See what I did there?

You do it to yourself. As soon as you think one thought, you’re thinking about thinking, and it’s off to the races.

What you THINK about THINKING is just more thinking. How could it tell you anything about it?

For our purposes, let’s let “thinking” be “making words or pictures in our minds.”

What if I told you that were optional?

Maybe you’d be like, “Why wouldn’t I think, though?”

Well, have you FELT what not thinking FEELS like? It RULES.

Now, I’m not saying thinking is BAD.

How could it be bad?

Thinking is USEFUL.

When you have to figure out how to do something, thinking is the best move.

When you have to move a heavy box, picking it up (from a low center of gravity using your leg muscles) is the best move.

But you can hurt your back lifting a box wrong, and you can hurt your brain thinking wrong.

Think (😏) about it like posture:

If your lifting posture is lazy, you’ll hurt your back.

If your thinking posture is lazy, you’ll hurt your brain.

So what is lazy thinking?

Ironically, lazy thinking is thinking TOO MUCH, in undisciplined (or totally out-of-control) ways.

If you aren’t disciplined with when, how, how much, and for how long you think, you get sucked into thinking the thoughts are REAL THINGS.

And they AREN’T.

Remember how thinking is words and pictures?

See, you can make MODELS with those.

And if you’re just thinking thinking thinking all the time, you can turn your whole life into a model.

Of course, there’s more to your life than what you can think about.

Unbelievably much more.

I’m going to take a turn here and narrow my focus to people who suspect that I’m telling the truth.

If you don’t want to stop thinking at all, that’s fine. Please think very well and solve some dope thinking problems.

But lots of people want to think less, so this is for you.

One of the best things about not thinking is experiencing what things are LIKE.

The best way not to experience what something is like is to immediately start thinking about what it’s like.

Thinking CAN’T TELL what anything is like. It can only THINK about what it’s like.

So if you aren’t super familiar with not thinking, you probably want to know what not thinking is like!

That way you’ll have a better sense of when to think and when not to, depending on what things are like at the moment.

“But תַּעֲלֻמוֹת, HOW DO I STOP THINKING?”

Let’s go!

Simply stop thinking.

I’m not kidding.

If you can’t do it, try just plugging the hole with a paradox.

Like, think of not thinking.

If you just hear the words “not thinking” in your brain-ears, try to PICTURE not thinking.

Feel it?

No? Ok. Let’s try something else.

Take the deepest breath in and then YELL INTO YOUR PILLOW AS LOUD AND AS LONG AS YOU CAN!!!!

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

…

Feel it?

No? Ok. Let’s try something else.

There are lots of ways to stop thinking. One of my teachers likes to suggest dumping multiple buckets of ice water over your head first thing in the morning. I’ve never done it, but I bet it works.

But really, they all come down to one basic principle:

Remember the rest of your body.

Shock-based ones are pretty good, but they aren’t always available. Also who wants to be shocked all the time?

Moreover, how does that help you go through life deciding when to think and not think, which is the actual goal, right?

This is why you need the whole body’s help.

This varies by culture, but in cultures where people end up extremely online, by and large, thinking can feel automatic.

What it actually is, though, is habitual.

Habits can be changed.

All postures are habits, and you change them the same way:

On purpose, at first.

What would a daily posture of not thinking be like?

It starts by understanding that thinking is one of many things going on in your body at the same time.

What’s that? Thinking is going on in the body? I thought it was in the mind!

…

See what you did there? Thought again.

Yeah, we’re gonna start doing some “meditation” now. It was unavoidable. Hey, I’m tryin’ to help here.

But I’m not going to linger on this and be like, “Notice the subtle sensations of when thought arises and recedes,” oh no. Don’t worry.

It’s easier than that.

There is something way, way, way, WAY more interesting than thinking going on in your body all the time.

And I do mean interesting.

Interesting sounds like a mind-y think-y word, doesn’t it?

That’s how I want you to understand it.

BREATHING is the most interesting thing.

There’s nothing like breathing.

Is it automatic? Is it manual? Are you doing it, or is it doing you? It’s so easy to just… stop breathing. But if you stop breathing for too long, you DIE!!! That’s so weird!

Best not to think about breathing too much.

What’s interesting about breathing, though, is that it STAYS interesting when you aren’t thinking about it, as long as you’re FEELING it and experiencing what it’s LIKE.

Maybe because you still have to do it, so your mind is engaged, but with no words and pictures.

But just as thinking and moving boxes, breathing has postures, too.

It doesn’t take much fast, shallow breathing to realize that it feels awful and makes you want to pass out.

Have you ever caught yourself doing that in the middle of a situation?

How was your thinking then?

See, all these things going on in your body at once are all tangled up. Sensations produce thoughts. Thoughts produce sensations. Tension in your back produces tension in your mind.

But I’m gonna let you observe how that works in your own system.

I just have one suggestion:

Try straightening your spine, including your neck and base of your head, and breathing in slowly, gradually, and quietly through your nose and taking it alllllll the way down into into your belly.

Let your belly expand a little, at the very bottom, just below your navel.

Hold it there for a couple seconds, and then breathe out all the way, but hold that spot below the navel right where it is, still expanded out a little, as you push the air out with your lungs.

Keep that spot buttoned to the front of your body there as you keep breathing.

That’s the hara.

If you practice breathing from there — like, always — I promise you, what it’s like to be you is going to change.

And thinking is going to be less of a big deal.

Instead of energy being consumed with thinking all the time, you might notice it coursing through the hara and circulating throughout the body.

You might notice in your movements. You might notice it in your stillness.

You might notice that you can MOVE it around.

Once you begin to FEEL that cycling of energy around your body, you might notice what’s happening to it while you’re thinking. Like spinning and buzzing in your head area.

Keep breathing into the hara, and DROP that energy DOWN from your head, down there into your belly.

Hey!

Where’d the thought go?

No thoughts.

Head empty.

Belly full.

Have fun.