Thinking with Mindful Awareness
How becoming aware of your thoughts and feelings creates change
One of the first and most important steps you can take on your journey to creating change in your life is to start becoming intentionally aware of your thoughts and feelings. By learning to observe your thoughts, you will gain insight into your thinking patterns and begin to notice that thoughts and feelings come and go like waves in the ocean. You’ll also start to see the relationship between your thoughts, emotions, and behaviours and, in time, will begin to understand that your automatic thoughts (those thoughts you have been thinking over and over) are likely not true.
Your thoughts consist of things you keep telling yourself; the conversations and self-talk that go on in your mind all day long. They include images, memories, daydreams, and plans, and create emotions, sensations and feelings in your body. Awareness of your thoughts allows you to more accurately perceive a situation.
Self-awareness not only helps you create change, but it leads to greater wellbeing. This ability to know ourselves a little better starts with our thoughts and feelings and helps us understand why we behave the way we do.
Becoming aware of your thoughts and bodily sensations helps the brain to create change. An easy way to remind yourself to consciously pay attention to your thoughts comes from a tool used in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and is to say to yourself, “I notice I’m having the thought that……”. This allows you to step back and become the observer of your thoughts as well as create some space for mindful reflection and the opportunity to ask yourself if the thought serves you. If the thought creates a negative feeling in your body, is it useful? Is there a better thought?
Even changing some of the words can feel better. For example, instead of saying “I have to go to work.…”, what about replacing that with, “I’m choosing to go to work” or simply, “I’m going to work now”. Notice if the words “have to” create any negative sensations in your body.
One of the best ways I know to start learning how to be more aware of your thoughts, is to start observing your thoughts during a mindful meditation. The goal of meditation isn’t to empty your mind of thoughts but to simply notice your thoughts as an objective observer. Here’s a meditation to help you become more aware of your thoughts as they come and go.
Thought Awareness Meditation
Find a comfortable position, either seated or lying down.
Take a few moments of interoceptive awareness or perhaps do a brief body scan to notice how you feel.
Become aware of the sensations as you breathe in and out.
After a few minutes of noticing your breathing, shift your attention to any thoughts that are coming up. Let them stay if they want to and then watch your thoughts float away. You can even imagine that they’re disappearing on a cloud.
Try to notice, without attaching to them, the content of your thoughts. Don’t resist them or try to change them. Just notice.
Get curious about your thoughts. Do you think in images or mainly in words? Are your thoughts in colour or black and white? Notice the emotions and physical sensations that accompany each thought. Take your time with this step.
Anytime you need a break from your thoughts, simply return to concentrating on your breath. Breathe in and out until you begin to notice your thoughts again.
This meditation can be as short as a couple of minutes or as long as you want. Practicing becoming aware of your thoughts daily will, over time, help you to determine whether thoughts are useful and help move you forward or whether they’re not useful and keep you stuck. By bringing awareness into your daily exercise or mindful movement practice, and following that up with mindful journaling, it will help you build even more momentum on your journey toward self-awareness.
It really is possible to use awareness to change your thinking, get unstuck from those unhelpful automatic thoughts, and create new thoughts and feelings to bring change into your life.
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"I felt at complete ease with Sharon from our first conversation. She has a wonderful, gentle but firm way that made me focus on my thoughts / feelings so I could remove / change to move forward with a completely different feeling to what felt like obstacles. It was great having regular coaching that gently kept me accountable to actioning and moving towards my goals. Sharon has vast experience in so many areas, I felt that makes her an amazing coach.”
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