A Quiet Mind: From Ah To Aha

A quiet mind – sounds wonderful, doesn’t it? Noisy people, traffic, the electronic distractions of smartphones, headsets, computer screens, smart speakers, etc., added to your incessant inner chatter, make you long for peace and quiet.

Turns out, a quiet mind doesn’t just feel good – it’s good for you. The evidence is compelling. A restful state of mind reduces stress and anxiety, enhances brain function, promotes cardiac health, and improves your overall wellbeing. The research has been done primarily on reaching mental quiet through a technique or practice such as meditation or mindfulness. While these are very helpful strategies, what if you could find quiet without a technique or daily practice?

Rather than trying to coax an already busy mind into a quiet state, why not eliminate what un-quiets your mind in the first place?

A great deal of the thinking you do is unnecessary and unproductive. The reason for this is a pervasive misunderstanding about how your mind actually works. Your mind works only one way, crafting the reality you see from the inside – out. Only, it doesn’t look like it works this way.

It appears as if your stress, bother, upset, anxiety, frustration is coming from your circumstances, other people, your spouse/children, your boss, the traffic, the list goes on. Interestingly, you often attribute your positive feelings to external factors as well. But your mind can’t work this way. The only source of experience is your thinking in the moment. Without thought, there can be no experience. And there is nothing in the external world that can make you think about it in a certain way.

Something profound happens when you see the inside–out nature of reality for a fact. All the outside–in misunderstanding-thinking falls away. Why keep thinking something that is not true?

It is the outside–in illusion that robs you of your mental quiet.

When you realize in the moment what is happening inside your mind, your mind returns to quiet. We say returns to quiet because, in its most natural state, your mind is quiet, like a pond is quiet unless you disturb it.

Realizing something is different from knowing it intellectually. When realization or insight happens, you embody knowledge, allowing you to see life in an entirely new way. Sounds like a big deal, and it is. But your mind is designed to have insights, you have been having them your entire life.

To insightfully see in the moment, that your feelings and your experience is being created within your mind via thought, is an unconditional and immediate path to a quiet mind.