step away from your brain

I think therefore I am – Descartes

I am therefore I think – Me

 

I have been thinking about thinking

It has been suggested that we mostly exist in our heads

 

If a tree falls in a forest and there is no one to perceive it

Does it really fall?

Does it even exist at all?

 

Others suggest we exist only in the mind of God

because God “envisions” us, there we are

 

I am not quite in that place, but I have become impressed (?) lately

at how powerful our minds are

 

and I have decided that minds are terrible and wonderful things

and that a mind (as the old advertisement insisted)

is a terrible thing to waste

 

let me humbly make a few observations

 

ONE!

We have an amazing capacity to create our own reality

we can deny facts

twist facts

make up facts

and we can create a reality of our own making

 

doesn’t matter where we are on the ideological (idiot?) spectrum

we all do it to some degree or another

we use our minds to construct a world to our liking

it can be a world full of beauty and promise,

or it can be a world full of conspiracy and danger

 

of course which kind of world we create matters

one world causes us to live with hope, and joy, and generosity

the other causes us to live with fear and hate

 

so it matters, what kind of world we construct

 

it matters too what kind of God we construct

an angry retributive God is one thing

a loving compassionate, forgiving God is another

 

it has often been said we create God in our own image

sad

but all too true

the God we choose to embrace reveals a lot about us

who we are at the core

 

there’s that mind again

 

TWO

we have the capacity to use our mind, or let it sit idle or engage it

 

too many people don’t use their mind as anything more than a trash can

trash comes in, and they simple “receive” it

they don’t think about what has been see, posited, proclaimed

they simple accept it, and all too often pass it on!

 

It only takes a Facebook meme to get a lie going!

 

All we have to do is look at the myths passed on from person to person to person

about protective masks (in this time of Covid)

they rob you of air (they don’t)

they make you sick (they don’t)

on and on and on

 

garbage in, garbage stored, garbage out

 

we have to use our minds

they are amazing!  Incredible!

Facts are a thing!

Science is a thing!

We need to engage our minds

 

THREE

Sometimes our minds need to chill out

I have anxiety

My mind never shuts up

Its like I have 100 TV on at the same time

all on different channels, with the volume up

I am therefore I think, and think, and think

and I gnaw on all that stuff in my mind

 

and so sometimes its important to stop, and breathe

and not think… but just be

left foot, right foot, left foot, breathe

 

A FINAL NOTE

I happen to believe in Sacred

I call the Sacred God, although I dislike anthropomorphizing a power, a reality

that is way beyond my comprehension

 

but I believe in God/Love/Sacred

I believe that this reality was embodied in Jesus, who showed us what it looks like

when the Sacred runs our lives

and I believe in the Spirit, which is the Sacred, woven into the fabric of our being

 

so this means that I believe that the Sacred ought to be what/who shapes my mind

 

as we have seen, so clearly of late

it is quite possible to have an ideologically altered, ideologically impaired mind

a mind twisted and tortured by the voices of greed and hate

a mind shaped by voices we trust, but should not trust

a mind shaped by lies, and extremism

 

we need to have Spirit altered minds, which are never impaired

but always open to that fresh flow of love

and wisdom

that comes from God

 

to some degree it comes down to this

because we are we think

as we think, we are

as we fail to think, we are

 

and how we think, is who we are

so in the end it matters whose we are