You know the kind of thinking I am talking about….it whirls around, and around in your head, and demands that you do something about this situation/behaviour/person NOW! You feel compelled, uncomfortable, angry, resentful, anxious… and it all looks so urgent, demanding action now.
It can be very hard to see through this kind of thought as not telling you something ‘real’ about life, but merely as thought in the moment, about something in your life.
It’s not telling you something valuable about you, or how you are doing, or about the situation at hand.
It has been so helpful in my own life to be able to ‘catch’ this urgent-style thinking and to see that when I am experiencing it, it’s actually a signal to do the complete opposite…instead of taking action NOW, if you have the space to recognise that you are in the midst of urgent thinking….do nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
If your kids are driving you crazy with arguing and fighting, and your urgent thinking is telling you, you need to fix this sibling rivalry now – don’t get on the internet to search for a book on parenting or yell at them…do nothing.
If your thoughts are telling you to go and speak to your boss about your co-worker slacking off again – do nothing until the urgent-ness of it has passed.
If it looks like you need to fix your binge eating/weight problem/smoking/drinking NOW because otherwise you will ruin your health or are a useless person. Stop…do nothing.
Only when the urgent thinking has cleared, and your mind has settled (which it will do in its own in time) will you be able to see more clearly what you might need to do about the situation.
I find that often a ‘problem’ that looked so urgent and in need of fixing, from a quieter mind, often isn’t even a problem at all.