Are you your thoughts?

[SimonSays]

a bubble of emotional detachment to the world around me.

I think I prefer the emotional detachment I can experience. Even though I understand that it keeps me separate in many ways, I find it far more comfortable to be in this detached space then when I find myself emotionally involved. I just can’t cope with the intensity of that experience, even though I am usually happy to step back into it if I can. Just to see what it’s like this time.

 

[Xonolatio.]

The reason I ask is because I don’t think we are.

I could ask where do our thoughts come from? But we know that we are influenced by so many things and in many ways that’s not the point of this question.

There are times when I realise that I am seeing my thoughts rather than being them. And in seeing them the space that I am in lets me recognise that they are thoughts. I am observing them. I no longer have to identify with them or accept them. This encourages them to quieten down.

So who are we then if we are not that which we think ourselves to be?

Who is observing all this? And if this observer is the real me, can this one also be seen?

Hey there, I think waht are you doing here is being critical with yourself (trying to understand the source, the reasons about your reactions, your feelings, etc), is a very healthy way to try to figure out some important things about your persona. It' what I thing at least.

 

[gaffaglow]

This topic makes me think of a research paper I read several years ago. The gist of it was that participants raised their hands before they made the decision to raise their hands. I think that's good evidence toward an argument that we are not our thoughts, but our thoughts are just layered over who we really are.

 

[WildCat]

HELL NO. If I were my thoughts, I'd have more to worry about than being on the spectrum. Good thoughts, I have those of course, but it's the bad thoughts that everyone flocks to like vultures on a carcass that would be more than troubling.

I think the same could be said for a lot of people, and good luck with trying to pry it out of them too because that's not going to happen.

 

[Finder]

I am my biology...

 

[SimonSays]

I am my biology...

Did you know that More than half your body is not human

 

[Jordy]

The reason I ask is because I don’t think we are.

I could ask where do our thoughts come from? But we know that we are influenced by so many things and in many ways that’s not the point of this question.

There are times when I realise that I am seeing my thoughts rather than being them. And in seeing them the space that I am in lets me recognise that they are thoughts. I am observing them. I no longer have to identify with them or accept them. This encourages them to quieten down.

So who are we then if we are not that which we think ourselves to be?

Who is observing all this? And if this observer is the real me, can this one also be seen?

I have always seen thoughts as events that just happen to you like anything else. Free will is kind of a weird concept, it implies we don't have to obey the rules of the universe.

 

[SimonSays]

I have always seen thoughts as events that just happen to you like anything else. Free will is kind of a weird concept, it implies we don't have to obey the rules of the universe.

There are no rules, but there are 5 universal truths...

1. You exist
2. All is one and the one is all
3. Everything is here and now
4. What you put out is what you get back
5. Everything changes (except these truths).

Free will is an interesting idea.
What if consciousness is like an onion. So that we see quite a small picture usually, but there is a much larger perspective, and to our small perspective, it would seem like it already knows, is further into the small perspective’s future, and we’re always just catching up?

 

[WolfSpirit]

The reason I ask is because I don’t think we are.

I could ask where do our thoughts come from? But we know that we are influenced by so many things and in many ways that’s not the point of this question.

There are times when I realise that I am seeing my thoughts rather than being them. And in seeing them the space that I am in lets me recognise that they are thoughts. I am observing them. I no longer have to identify with them or accept them. This encourages them to quieten down.

So who are we then if we are not that which we think ourselves to be?

Who is observing all this? And if this observer is the real me, can this one also be seen?

I see someone is into philosophy. And mindfulness. Both useful subjects for knowing oneself better, and coping with stress.

 

[Finder]

What if consciousness is like an onion.

It stinks and makes you cry?

 

[SimonSays]

It stinks and makes you cry?

Lol. Life does seem to stink sometimes and it definitely makes me cry. But crying is a good thing. It can wash away the stink.

 

[Wolfgangus Faldestolius]

I think of my thoughts as the "quantum foam" of my reality - both good stuff and bad stuff is constantly popping in and out out existence there.

I can choose to nurse the negative thoughts or reject them. Same with the positive. What I decide to do with those thoughts is what defines me.

I am not my thoughts. I am my decisions.

This sounds like Epicurus' swerving of atoms. Bubbly "personality". Fizz, even.

M A K Halliday recalled that Wheeler and Shannon both proposed that matter is a special case of meaning. ("Whose" meaning, probably doesn't "matter".)

We humans are beings for turning contingency into necessity. This corner or series of layers of universe, "where" we are, exhibits that Goldilock effect of Time's Arrow which is how life forms, and higher life forms, are supported.

The universe is like a cheese: austere near the edges, semi-soft towards the middle, everywhere intriguing cracks; and everywhere tasty.

These days, ideas come looking for me. They know where in the universe to find me. I write down their gifts on bits of paper.

 

[Wolfgangus Faldestolius]

This is one thing I've always been. Free of beliefs acquired from peers, parents, authority or religion.
I've always remained open to what others say or believe, each has their right, but, I make my own decisions on beliefs.
I started questioning what it's all about and how it works, this thing called life at age 9 and came to my own conclusions which I started deriving from science, logic and beliefs ...

There, I was expected to accept and believe what I was being told was true. I couldn’t. It just seemed wrong to have to do so, especially when any question I might ask was put down. As a result I rejected the indoctrination somehow

Susan, Simon, wonderful testimonies. Children have such a gift for logic, and real logic ("big" logic) means honesty. I was lucky to grow up among a lot of free thinkers of diverse beliefs of their own. In the "me" generation we genuinely meant individuality, even as some devious types were trying to subvert that.

 

[Wolfgangus Faldestolius]

... Reading Pythagorean Hyolozoics might be interesting ...

I'm convinced there is a non-superstitious equivalent to a lot of things, which people have given up on. My classmate used to yatter in the playground about astral planes: I've now found out that for the last 40 years he has been teaching complex numbers which are a kind of dimension or visible spectrum of calculation. Imagination is a most utterly wonderful faculty.

Einstein said there must be gravity waves and for years this was dismissed as one rambling too far by the mischievous old gent. Now the number crunchers are to their surprise homing in on that very thing. Indeed, we can time travel just by sitting still.

I sat up bolt upright one morning and said to myself, "Time is extrusion, and the known dimensions of space are intrusion (in a sense of reaching down to us)." (I inscribed that.) I picture us surfing before a squeezed toothpaste tube . . .

 

[Gracey]

I use what was mentioned in the opening post each day in order to function in the face of what was overwhelming anxiety.
(Couldn't get outdoors at one point)

Am I my thoughts?
Not entirely but they are a huge part of who I am.
Changing perspective can change outcomes and habits thus changing understanding, attitude, approach.

Metacognition during anxiety works for me
Being aware of thoughts and thinking about thinking means I'm not getting caught up in the drama of those thoughts thus not reacting.

 

[Skittlebisquit]

There are no rules, but there are 5 universal truths...

1. You exist
2. All is one and the one is all
3. Everything is here and now
4. What you put out is what you get back
5. Everything changes (except these truths).

Free will is an interesting idea.
What if consciousness is like an onion. So that we see quite a small picture usually, but there is a much larger perspective, and to our small perspective, it would seem like it already knows, is further into the small perspective’s future, and we’re always just catching up?

All is one. I am one. One is all.
This can be expressed in symbols. I think the " i am, one is, all is"
thought circle is a pathway to
"infinite buffudlement" and that infinity pondering leads somewhere .....
Are you sure about the 5 truths, could there be more?

 

[SimonSays]

Are you sure about the 5 truths, could there be more?

Can you think of anything else that is true in every situation no matter what?

 

[Skittlebisquit]

Im thinking about the passage of time. How about
This too shall pass

And perception

And negative entropy,but that doesnt apply to all things. Its a fun question!

 

[SimonSays]

Im thinking about the passage of time. How about
This too shall pass

Well, we know time is relative. When you’re asleep are you aware of passing time? Dream time is quite different to waking time. Passing time would come under truth 5 - everything changes.

This too shall pass is also truth 5.

And perception

Relative again. In deep sleep you are not aware of anything. Coma too usually. I suppose when awake there is always something to perceive. Perception is in the present. Truth 3 - everything is here and now.

Its a fun question!

Yes it is.

 

[Skittlebisquit]

You have obviously given this all a great deal of thought