Own Your Thoughts
Have you ever set out to watch something new but found yourself going back to your old TV shows? Have you ever set out to go somewhere and found yourself going to the wrong place? Maybe you were headed to eat and found yourself driving to your old job.
The human brain loves patterns. Patterns can be thought of as the path of least resistance. They are familiar, comfortable, and easy. When it comes to our thoughts, we tend to follow what’s familiar. In a sense, we follow our thoughts rather than leading our thoughts.
We all have those thoughts and behaviors we go back to. The more we go back to a particular way of thinking, the harder it can be to break the pattern. Our default thoughts are so easy that we do them without thinking about it. As a result of this ease, it will take deliberate and intentional action to reclaim ownership of our thoughts.
How do these default thought patterns begin?
The biggest contributor is our past experiences. These are the events and circumstances we have lived through. They are the behaviors we have seen modeled from a young age. Repetitive exposure to circumstances helps shape how we will respond to these in the future.
Much of our current view about ourselves comes from these default thoughts and beliefs. So what do we do when these are wrong? Many of us play these thoughts on repeat without realizing they’re not true. We inadvertently shape our lives with incorrect and incomplete information.
In her book Reset, Debra Fileta shares some examples she has collected from years of counseling. Let’s take a look at some of those examples.
- You have to work hard to be valuable.
- People won’t stick around unless you give them a reason to do so.
- I need to care for others and not myself.
- Showing feelings is a weakness.
- I don’t fit in, and I never will.
Maybe you listen to this list, and you think they are silly. Or perhaps you find ones on that list that you identify with. Maybe you have some of your own you would like to add to that list.
“If you want to change your default thinking, you have to recognize it first.” Debra Fileta
Own Them Before They Own You
If we are going to be both mentally and emotionally healthy people, we need to be able to identify the negative patterns of thinking and then face them.
Even more, we need to be able to get to the root cause.
Remember that thoughts lead to feelings, which lead to behaviors. We need to address the underlying thoughts so we can change our behaviors.
Oh, and remember that your current default thoughts didn’t happen overnight. So, offer yourself a little grace as you go through this process.
Verse for Reflection
“We take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ” (2 Corinthians 10:5).
Source
[1] Fileta, D. (2023). Reset. Harvest House Publishers.
