5 tips to control your thoughts

By: Micheal O`Mahony
Edited date: October 4, 2022Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

change the way you perceive your life

In every second of every minute, we all experience thousands of thoughts in our mind. These thoughts can be positive. They can be negative. They can be wanted or unwanted. They can serve us or they can dis serve us. They can make us happy or unhappy. Ultimately the thoughts we are thinking can create our reality.

Many of us are unaware or unconscious of these thoughts that we are experiencing on a daily basis. Usually we are so busy with our lives, that we don’t have time to think and reflect about what is really going on in this mind of ours. We are bombarded by television, the internet, magazines, newspapers, the radio etc. in what to think. Our educational system as a whole teaches people WHAT to think however it fails in the greatest necessity in teaching people in HOW to think. If we have the power, the ability and the skill to change our thoughts, we can have mastery over ourselves, our lives and ultimately our destiny.

I can see in my life how certain circumstances have changed when I choose to change my thoughts about the situation. Sometimes it wasn’t easy however when I choose to do so, it brought me to a more brighter, more positive and empowered place which served me and those around me. At times in this life we can be given a set of events or circumstances in which we may not like or which we may not have any control over. This could be losing our job, becoming sick, a relationship ending etc. At the time we may feel we have no control over what is happening and experience despair and frustration. However if we choose to become aware, we can see that we have a choice in how to think about our situation.

In many of the self-help books today, they advise us that if you just start thinking positively that we will become more positive. However at times it is easier said than done. If for example you are in a place in your life, where you are experiencing more negative thoughts than positive ones, it may not be so easy to follow this advice. If we don’t learn how to change and control our thoughts, these thoughts can lead us in a direction in our lives that we may and may not want. These thoughts can create sickness or wellness, grow or destroy our relationships, effect our financial wellbeing, make us feel spiritually connected or disconnected and can have a positive or negative impact on our happiness and peace of mind.

In the times that we live in, it is of great necessity to have the skill to be able to control and change our thoughts.

Here are a few guidelines I have found useful as ways to control and change my thoughts;

1. Become an observer or a watcher of your thoughts – step back from the dialogue going on in your mind, don’t judge the thoughts – just accept them. Remember, that this is not about stopping the thoughts completely (which is largely impossible until we are very advanced meditators), but about directing the mind to work for us and not against us.

2. Don’t identify with the thoughts that you are experiencing – say “I am not these thoughts, these thoughts are not me.”

3. Ask yourself – Do I want what I am thinking today to become my reality tomorrow? 

4. Ask yourself – Is this thought really true?

5. Practice breathing exercises, meditation and yoga postures which can help to slow down your mind and bring you back to the here and now.

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