Thought Patterns

This morning I came across a Facebook reel by Mo Gawdat, a 59 year old male of Egyptian heritage who is an author, engineer, former tech executive, and bereaved parent, on The Power of Neuroplasticity. According to AI, neuroplasticity is the brain’s ability to change, grow, and reorganize its structure throughout life. Part of how that happens is by structural remodeling based on daily habits. How to support this includes continuing to learn new things, exercising, and getting good sleep. He says he meditates every day and only allows his brain, who he has named “Becky”, to share thoughts that involve something he can do or that evoke joy.

In my book, The Art of Radical Self Love: The First Steps to Healing and Well-Being, the premise of positively rewiring your brain through practices that focus on health and happiness is in every chapter. We have the power to actively choose happiness by being loving, forgiving, and grateful. We can remind ourselves that we are immune to negativity from any source, and then engage in behaviors that strengthen that immunity.

I would like to remind my gentle readers that Earth was not created to be a slave planet. To paraphrase the poem “Invictus”, we are the masters of our fate and the captains of our souls. We all have the innate power to choose our response to undesirable circumstances because of the infinite power which is within each of us. Again, any difficulty needs to be countered with love, forgiveness, and gratitude. Today’s society often is seen as training our brain to be fearful and disappointed, focusing on people and events that we have no control over. We can constantly train our brain to refocus on what really matters, which is anything love based.

I would suggest that everything we recall or project is fantasy. Memories and predictions can be objectively inaccurate. The only reality is the present moment. All else is a construct of your imagination or that of someone else that you choose to believe. Choice is pro-active. Take back your power to choose how you think right now. The vibration of that energy can restore balance. What we consider good health is actually maintaining balance, called homeostatis, which is an active process of keeping everything internal balanced even when external conditions change.

In the modern Japanese martial art of Aikido, instead of meeting aggression with similar but hopefully greater force, one is taught to blend with the attacker’s momentum and redirect their energy. Self-defense is focused on resolving conflict without inflicting severe injury. We have an inborn reaction to protect ourselves and loved ones from harm. That is where the fight or flight stress reaction comes from. It’s an animal survival behavior. However, the human mind can override animal programming. That is the essence of free will. Our brain does not control our thoughts. Our mind (consciousness) controls everything. Mr. Gawdat says he limits the thoughts his brain can have. I think his mind is remodeling his brain – neuroplasticity – which is an important distinction. There was some source choosing his preferred thought patterns, and it isn’t his animal brain, because animals respond to external behavioral cues, while humans respond to both external and internal.

We are all free in the present moment. Our body can be relaxed and perfectly responsive to healing balance and harmony with our spirit and mind. As the mystic Edgar Cayce maintained, spirit is life, mind is builder, and the physical is the result. When we notice our thought patterns are temporarily out of harmony, we can immediately do a course correction through breathing techniques, affirmations, or any other practice that restores a peaceful, loving state of mind.

Choose your thought patterns wisely, and revise them as desired. If your intention is to be loving toward yourself and others, you will contribute to healing the world. Be well.