How to Quieten Your Busy Mind

Q: Does this mean I will never get a quiet mind?

You will get quieter gaps, and more of them. What changes is not the number of thoughts. It is that you stop being carried off by every one that turns up.

Q: I cannot count to ten breaths without losing track. Am I doing it wrong?

No, and neither can I most days. Twenty minutes a day for a couple of months might get me to ten or fifteen without wandering. Losing count is the practice, not the failure.

Q: Should I stop judging things?

No. Healthy judgement keeps you alive and you need it. What meditation gives you is the ability to tell the useful kind from the kind that is just running you.

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meditation-how-to · overthinking · mindfulness

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In this week's episode, I want to talk about some of the myths about meditation. And about quieting the mind

and how we can have a quiet mind, even with a busy mind. And I think that's really important. Lots

of people come to me all the time and say, how do I quieten my mind? How do I shut

off some of those thoughts? So I'm going to tackle some of those things in this week's podcast. And I

think it's one of those things that stops so many people meditating. When really it shouldn't stop you meditating. Although

it did stop me for a very long time. But just before we do that, I want to thank a

couple of people that have given their donations this week. You are awesome. Sandy, Nancy and Audra You really keep

this podcast going. You keep my motivation going and same as many others that do donate. Yeah. You can head

over to thankyousteven.com. There's a link to. Joining my Weekly Calm newsletter. It comes out every single

Friday. I'm about to write it after I do this podcast. Because there's always a link to the new podcast.

What I've been up to behind the scenes an update on me writing my book, the gift of no choice.

It also helps hints and tips to help you find a little Stillness in the storms. A little bit of

weekly calm. Yeah. So let's get on with today's show. First of all, I want to debunk that the main

myth in meditation. And that is that. That we can quiet in the mind to a point where we can

stop our thoughts. You cannot. There is no off switch. It's impossible. Asking your mind

to stop is like asking your heart to stop beating. Or your liver to stop processing. Your blood. It's not

gonna happen And if it does happen, you're dead. So stop wishing for that to happen. But I get it.

You want that little bit of break from the thoughts you want that little bit of peace and quiet. Especially

when you put your head down at night and the thoughts come racing in. I had to put a guided

meditation on twice last night to help my mind fall asleep. Normally I can do a. Body scan. Normally

I can do a few breathing exercises. Count back from 107s things like that I can fall asleep quite easily,

not last night. I

was awake at one o'clock in the morning and My mind just kept going through one thing it It was

a desire and then it was something I didn't want. And then it was this. And then it was that.

And none of it was important. None of it was relevant to my life whatsoever. But boy did my

subconscious mind think that my conscious mind wanted to know all about it last night. And it stopped me from

sleeping because what stops you from sleeping? Is when you don't feel in a safe position to go sleep it

keeps the mind active. Trust me, my body was asleep. My body was fast asleep. Oh, just a little reminder

I'm also recording this. As a

video as well this time. So if you head over to my Youtube channel which you can get the link

on. thankyousteven.com. You'll see me talking. On a video not sure you want to do that, it's there anyway.

So I'm just trying to share this podcast to reach more people and. You just being here, listening to this

podcast does help. If you can leave a review, that'd be amazing. But let's get back to the myths of

meditation. So basically your mind. Has three minds, you have the instinctual mind. That is literally.

Taking everything in from the sounds to the feelings to. Emotions and everything taking them in. And

it's asking the question, is this going to kill me? Is it really dangerous? Do I need to panic? And

if no, it passed it to the Subconscious mind. And the subconscious mind looks for a fighting cabinet What did

I do last time? Do I recognise that sound? Do I know it? Do I recognise that word? Do I

recognise that road? And just ask that question. Do I know this already? Is it okay If it

doesn't at that point it'll pass it over to you. But what it's constantly doing as well? It's thinking stuff

up that it thinks you might like to know. It's what it's evolved to do exactly perfectly. So if

your mind is giving you thoughts, It's working perfectly fine. The problem is it's not the

fact that we want to shut off the thoughts. It's the fact that we want to choose which thoughts to

have. You don't want to get rid of the thoughts you enjoy. You don't want to get rid of the

thoughts that bring you pleasure when you fall in love or something like that? No, of course you don't. But

you want to get rid of the painful thoughts or the relentless thoughts or the thoughts when you're trying to

go sleep. Or when you're trying to make some kind of decisions or when you're trying to be getting on

and the mind is constantly, trying to distract you. You're not going to stop it, doing that. But what we

can do, and I will go on to that a little bit more in this podcast. Is, we can influence

those thoughts a lot this is where meditation comes in. Now then for a long time. I thought I

could not meditate. When I hit my rock bottom at 40 years old and went through the dark night of

the soul. And I say that so flippantly, it was pretty rough time. For

about two weeks. I never felt a thing. It was awful. I was just like a zombie in a body.

And. Yeah. You don't want no thinking. It's just I just had just awareness for

a long time. It was almost like day and night. I couldn't tell the difference And it wasn't nice. It

wasn't peaceful. Because there was no pleasure in it. There was no joy in quietness. In order to enjoy

quietness, you have to have. The ego's got to come online and enjoy the quietness. Oh, the irony. But

after two weeks, my pains and my thoughts started to come back and my mind was relentless and it was

reminding me of every single painful thought. That I could possibly have at the time. And it was all the

time, day, night. It wasn't, but it felt like that. It felt like there was no other thought apart from

those.

And I started reading books. And the books took So much concentration because I was dyslexic. That just reading a

sentence and a couple of sentences. And I read As a Man thinker Was enough to keep me occupied. And

I realised that like the Buddha says we are not what we think. Thinking is separate to. What the ego

is what we are. Which is even separate to the awareness, but that's a deeper story. What we think

isn't necessarily who we are and what we are. I was reading all these books one after the other, and

it was taking months to read them. And even the chapters. And they would all say to me, I need

to meditate. I need to do mindfulness and meditation.

And I would sit down and I would immediately try to silence my thoughts. And

I would sit down take a deep breath like focus on your breath, one. I

couldn't get to three before losing count. I I can barely get to five before losing count now. But I

couldn't get to three. I couldn't get to two without thinking about what I was going to do for tea

What I was going to do for lunch, what my friends were doing, what they were up to, all the

other things. How warm it is, how uncomfortable it is, why are you sat there, why are you doing this?

Are you really breathing properly? After all this time, the body then starts to question are you breathing properly.

When you've breathed how much in your life. And suddenly it's perfectly fine now, suddenly we're getting involved in that.

So it becomes complicated. It becomes this rush of all these different thoughts that just keep coming and coming.

And what you will realise with. Any kind of busy mind is when you sit down to meditate. The thoughts

come more and more.

It's not that you have more thoughts. It's the fact that you become more aware of them. So the first

thing you think is, oh, this doesn't work because. I've got loads of thoughts.

So you immediately start giving up on meditation? Like I did. Can't do it. Not for me. I need a

quiet mind. But if you need if you had a quiet mind, you wouldn't need meditation. And I've yet to

come across anybody that has a quiet mind that doesn't need meditation. And I also yet to come across anybody

that cannot meditate. Because meditation is not about quieting the mind. Do you get that

are you are you with me? So why meditate, if it's not about quieting the mind

well meditation gives us the ability to see what is. When we sit in meditation or sit in mindfulness

and we just observe our breath, we see the breath for what it is. When we just listen to sounds,

which is my favourite meditation. Just listen. Listen to the words. Listen to the

birds, listen to. Next door's lawnmower listen to the air conditioner. It doesn't matter what it is, whether it's favorable

or not just listen. And listen You hear it for what it is and you do not make it into

something else. Which is really important. When it comes to meditation, it's seeing life

for what it really is and not what we think it is. Not what our illusion makes out to be.

And that's where most of our pain and most of our suffering comes from. Is we're making life to be

something other than what it is. You take a deep breath in this moment, you can do it now with

me take a deep breath. And if we just relax. We'll see that this moment has very little wrong with

it. For us personally, we're doing all right Okay of course, there's loads going wrong in the world. Look at

the political systems at the moment. Look at the way religion is abused. Look at the way religion. Isn't. All

working out perfectly for everybody. Look at the way economies are going. There's rich and poor and there's people suffering

the fires and all that. I heard 36 people died in wildfires the other side of the world and all

that. Of course the world's burning. Everything's going wrong but right now, when you take a deep breath right now

in this moment, things are okay with us. And that's what meditation does. It gives us the ability to go.

Okay. My mind's bombarded me with thought

But it's actually okay. It's not too bad here right now.

And when we sit down to do that meditation.

We're distracted and we self-judge are we doing it right? Is it right at all The social pressures, the thinking

what we should, and shouldn't be doing all those things come into everybody's mind. If they didn't I would question,

there's something wrong with you. A lot of the spiritual world says about we shouldn't judge. Yes, we should. But

we should judge in a healthy way Is this person gonna hurt me right now? Is this person a danger

for me? Is this person a danger to them? So it keeps us alive. Healthy judgement is a good thing.

We have to judge, whether that bear running towards us is a danger or a friendly one. It's not about

getting rid of judgement. It's not about getting rid of all these things, but it's about seeing it clearly how

it works. So the more you meditate, the more you see aha There's unhealthy judgement

and There's unhealthy going with the feelings. Oh there's my mind. Again, jumping to social media. And when

you see these things clearly. You can then go with them or not go with them. And this is where

most of your pain will be reduced it's when you choose to go with them. Most of the pain and

this is what people really want to stop doing is it's not that they want to stop the thinking is

they want to stop the autopilot that's leading to more suffering and more pain and more thinking. They want to

just be able to go. Can I just have a gun Can I just have, can I stop the world

just for. 30 minutes just so I can just pause.

Take stock of my current situation. And then everybody else that would be a superpower I was talking to a

friend of mine the other day. And we were sitting in vittoria gardens with a lovely conversation and we're saying

about a super parent she mentioned it and I was like, yes, that's the one I want as well. Just

to be able to click our fingers And we have half an hour. Or 10 minutes. And we can only

use it sparingly. Otherwise we would end up using it all the time. Nobody else knows the world's paused And

you just get 20 minutes just to.

Okay. I can just take stock. What do I need to do? Can I do my to-do list And then

you start it again and one new Or maybe everybody does have that superpower, but me. Because you're

doing it anyway. Who knows. Message me head over to thankyousteven.com and there's a place where you can

message me. And let me know if you have that superpower and you're using it all the time and I'm

just unaware. No thinking about don't because I'll be upset and I'll think it's like, Why not mate

I want something. Anyway. I'm going off. Off of the topic of the podcast now. But

the the point is. You can meditate, even if you've got a noisy mind you're not going to quiet in

your mind. You're not going to turn off all those thoughts. That's perfectly fine. The mind is not broken something

like 30 to 40. Thoughts. Per minute. And that's about 40 000 thoughts a day.

That's a lot. It's no wonder we're trying to shut them off, but the point is we're trying to shut

off the ones we don't want. So what techniques can we use in order to quiet the mind a little

bit. So it becomes. A useful friend, as opposed to an overthinking hyperchimp one thing you

can do is say okay, look. You're relentless. What's your next thought? And just wait for it that's a

little neat little trick and you can do it now. So just while you're there just just ask yourself right

now, same time as I ask you is what's my next thought and wait for it.

Oh, how brilliant. You just had a peaceful mind for a moment. But you, weren't not thinking you were awareness

consider that from the other thing you can do. Is when you sit down to meditate. Reverse your breathing instead

of breathing in first breathe out first. Try that now breathe out first.

Instantly your mind goes quieter because it's got to focus on something. And this is the whole point.

Meditation is about giving your mind something to do. It's not about silencing the mind. I took

a little while to get there but that's the whole point is give your mind something to do. And if

you can give the mind something to focus on the breath, focus on the sound, the running water. The candle

burning. Whatever it is a body scan. They use mantra meditations. Yeah. Pick a word.

And I think I read somewhere that. Buddha come from this if you pick two words two syllables put them

together and you just repeat that. For 10 minutes. You'll be surprised how quickly your mind quietens

down. And it's harder than you think. Yeah, count in breath. See if you can get to 10. Just count

the out breath or just count the in breath and I'll challenge you. Can you get to 10? Message me

leave a review. Just say yes or no. Can you get to 10? It's harder than you think. And that's

for everybody. Even now when I sit in meditation, when I've really practiced for, I don't know 20 minutes, half

an hour. Every day. I might get to a couple of months and I might be able to hold it

for 10, 15. Without the mind wandering in with something. I do want to tackle one thing. You

don't have to meditate for 40 minutes a day to get the benefit. Yes, of course the more you do

it, the more benefit you will have. But you can have a massive impact on your life and a profound

effect on just doing five minutes, three or four times a day and literally just sit there and go, I'm

gonna listen And just listen. Without judgement without labeling it. I'm just gonna listen listen

and it will lead to deeper insights lead to more space in the mind for better decisions more energy. More

joy, more peace.

That's more my approach. If I tried to sit down for 40 minutes in the morning, it could be partly

a problem. I'm sat down 24 hours a day anyway, because I'm paralysed. 12 hours now I'm lying down the

other half I I tend to take five minutes out here and there. Nearly every hour, I'll take a good

minute or so out at least. And just breathe or just listen. Can I count to 10.

And those little timeouts reminds me when everything's going really wrong. The subconscious mind

says, okay, go to your breath and it starts doing it automatically that's what gives me more peace and more

inner peace. So when things are going really wrong or anything like that. Okay. Just breathe I don't I feel

like I don't have to fight them back. And that's my practice. My practice is. As much as possible during

the day, all the time. It's all running good having peace and quiet seven o'clock in the morning. Before the

kids get out of bed and you're locked in the bathroom and you've got your candles and you've got your

scents and all that it's all running good having peace and quiet there. What you're going to do when you're

out and your boss is stressing you or your family's getting on your nerves and you're in the car and

you're driving along and the kids are screaming. And suddenly you're going to go look kids stop a minute I'm

going to get my incense stick out. I'm going to get my candles. We need some peace and quiet. I

need you to lock the doors. I need you to go back to sleep. No. The idea is to. Do

that when you can. But the idea is to bring that to everyday life, find the peace and quiet in

everyday life in amongst the chaos. So this podcast is about, I don't tell you to avoid life. I don't

tell you to avoid negative people. I don't tell you to avoid thoughts. So avoid feelings. I want you to

feel everything. I want you to have thoughts. I want you to enjoy this wonderful, incredible experience of been alive.

And it is, trust me. It's It's an experience that you'll You won't repeat. Your one chance it's here.

What someone estimated 16 trillion to one, the chance of you've been alive right now. We

got to double that the chance of you listening to my podcast amid a life Come on. That's pretty awesome

right But

that's what this podcast was about today. I wanted you to know that even if you have a busy mind,

you can meditate. And you don't have to sit down. And try to silence your mind for 40 minutes. You

can literally take time out two minutes, 10 minutes here and there. Just on the way to work. Just listen,

rather than put the radio on. Just do different things like integrate it into your daily life. I'm going to

ask you now to head over to thankyousteven.com. You can either message me. Treat me to a coffee. That would

be absolutely awesome. And thank you to Sandy, Nancy and audrey For your donations this week.

Yeah, I just really appreciate you guys. And anybody that can leave a review or anything. thankyousteven.com.

You're all awesome. Love you all. Take care and hopefully. You stop trying to silence

your mind bye

How to Quieten Your Busy Mind

In this episode

With gratitude to

The question this answers

The heart of it

One small thing to try

Questions people ask

The transcript

One calm email.
Every Sunday.

How to Quieten Your Busy Mind

In this episode

With gratitude to

The question this answers

The heart of it

One small thing to try

Questions people ask

The transcript

More honest conversations

One calm email. Every Sunday.

One calm email.
Every Sunday.