Successful living requires us to respect the power of our thoughts
Mind training is essential

There is no such thing as an idle thought. All thoughts are active, creative and powerful. 'Our thoughts', it has been said, 'are written in fire across the sky'. And thoughts cannot be measured in levels of power, with some being powerful and others less so. All thoughts are equally powerful and visible in our lives.

Because we cannot see our thoughts it's easy to fall into the trap of thinking that they are temporary visitors to the world of our mind, and, as they leave the highways of our brain, they leave no trace. Wrong! A wise swami said this 'our thoughts, our words, our deeds are the threads of the net we throw around ourselves'.

Thoughts are a form of energy, and you direct that energy. Your thoughts cause energy to surge through your body. Negative thoughts create a negative energy that weakens your body. Positive thoughts do exactly the opposite, spiralling into your body to empower and strengthen your physical system.

And in the same way that our body immediately responds to our thoughts, so does the world in which we live. Each moment we are engaged in a mystical dance where our thoughts embrace the rich ethers of life around us, informing, moulding and directing. Life dances to the tune of our mind. We need to honour the power we wield with our thoughts. We need to actively call in divine inspiration to direct this awesome power.

Moreover all our behaviour arises from our thinking process. Take the story of the man who ran out of petrol very late at night. Stranded on a quiet country road, he left his car and slogged over a field towards the nearest farmhouse. As he walked he wondered whether being woken up late at night would upset the farmer. As he trudged along he began to picture how the farmer, all sleepy and cross, would open the door and give him hell for the intrusion.

Finally he arrived at the farmhouse and knocked on the door. The lights went on and when the kind farmer opened the door, the traveller shouted 'you don't have to be rude, all I'm asking for is some help'.

And aren't we all the same? We do the wrong thing because we have been thinking the wrong thoughts. And then we trigger others to behave badly because our thoughts get us to do so first. We use our thoughts to construct all sorts of images about things that have not yet happened, and all too often, our uncontrolled negative thoughts become the building blocks for personal horror movies: On screen 1 you can turn on 'most painful diseases to die of'; On screen 2 you can see 'financial Frankenstein comes alive in the haunted bank account'; and on screen 3 'how I felt so bad the day my wife left me for a man with a six pack'. Imagining the worst, our minds making a living hell of the moment.

Successful living requires us to train our minds to walk along the path of positive possibility. So this week give yourself a break. Infuse your body with power. Orchestrate life to bring you goodness. Think positive, speak positive, act positive. It's only a choice away.

© Catherine M Glennie