2312: [Part 2] Your Two Minds by Mark Manson on The Thinking Mind & Meditative Practice

This is Optimal Living Daily, episode 2312, Your Two Minds, part 2, by Mark Manson of markmanson.net, and I'm Justin Molleck, the guy that reads to you every single day of the year. Today's episode is part 2 of a longer post. If you didn't catch part 1 yesterday, I recommend listening to that first. But if you're all caught up, then let's get right to it and continue optimizing your life.

Your Two Minds, part 2, by Mark Manson of markmanson.net. Emotions are not a choice, behavior is. People ask me all the time, how do you deal with being afraid of failure? Or how do you not worry about being rejected?

I deal with fear and worry by dealing with fear and worry. I know that's a really annoying answer. I feel the same fear and worry anyone else does. I just don't identify with it.

I accept it and move on despite it. I don't let my thinking mind control me. I diffuse from my emotions. When I feel fear, I consciously choose to act despite it.

When I feel worry, I consciously choose to act despite it. For instance, when I have to sit down and write a lot, like writing this, I often get nervous. I want to write something really great because I know thousands of people are going to read it. One result of this nervousness is procrastination.

When I was younger and I was in situations where I got nervous and procrastinated, e.g. a big term paper in school, I would decide, I can't do it because I'm too tired, or I can't focus like other people. I must have ADD or something. This was me being fused with my thinking mind.

There was no separation between my emotions and my identity. I felt nervous and had a thought of, I can't do it for X, Y, or Z reason, and I accepted it at face value. I was a slave to my thinking mind, tugged by its leash. These days, I'm often able to sit down and write 5,000 words or more in a single day.

I still feel the same anxiety. I still hear the same thoughts. I need to eat first. I should take a nap.

I'm not in a writing mood right now. But now, instead of identifying with these thoughts, I acknowledge them. I feel nervous about writing today. I have the thought that I need to eat first.

I have the thought that I need to take a nap first. And then I turn to my thinking mind and promptly tell him that he's full of s**t and that I don't need a thing except to sit my a** down and start writing. We all produce excuses and negative emotions involuntarily. Guess what?

That's never going to change. I don't care how many positive thoughts you conjure, what kind of therapies you do, or what kind of new-agey spiritual crap you come up with. Negative thoughts and emotions are natural products of the human brain. You can't get away from them.

None of us can. What you can do is accept them, defuse from them, and then act despite them. When people come to me asking how to stop feeling angry or stop getting nervous, this is their problem. As soon as you try to eliminate a thought or emotion, you make it stronger.

As the Buddha's saying goes, what you resist will persist. Or as Tony Robbins says, you feel what you focus. The more you focus on an emotion, the more powerful it becomes, thus negative emotions are like quicksand. The more you struggle to get out of them, the further into them you sink.

The trick is to accept them and then let go. This is a skill and it is a process, but it cannot be practiced until you recognize that there are two minds and you only control one of them. Here are some exercises you can do that will help you separate your two minds and therefore take more control of your behaviors despite your thoughts and emotions. Exercise 1.

Whenever you feel a strong emotion or thought, dis-identify with it and then take possession of it. For example, my boss is not an idiot, but I'm having the thought that my boss is an idiot. Or, I don't hate my ex-girlfriend, I'm feeling hatred toward my ex-girlfriend. Or, I am not lonely and depressed, I am feeling loneliness and depression.

Language is very powerful. Dis-identifying from these emotions and thoughts in this way does two things. One, it implies that they're temporary states and not permanent conditions. And two, it forces you to take responsibility for them.

They're nobody's fault, they just are. Exercise 2. Thank your thinking mind for negative thoughts and emotions. This is a technique from ACT and it is effective.

It may sound absolutely nuts, but it's effective because it forces you to accept your negative emotions instead of fighting them. For example, thank you thinking mind for feeling nervous before my date tonight. It'll keep me on my toes. Or, thank you thinking mind for being angry at my boss.

I really appreciate how much you care. This is going to feel really bizarre expressing gratitude towards negative emotions, but I think you'll find that it diminishes the power of the thoughts and emotions over time and actually impels you to take action despite them. And exercise 3. Finally, if you find yourself in the heat of the moment or if there's something that's really nagging at you, try this out.

Take something that's bothered you recently and hold it in your mind. Maybe it's your girlfriend nagging you. Maybe it's being terrified of talking to that cute girl in class next to you. Maybe it's quitting your job.

Distill it into a single sentence such as, I feel afraid of quitting my job, or I feel irritated with my girlfriend. Now close your eyes and imagine Bugs Bunny saying it while chewing a carrot. Then Mickey Mouse saying it while dancing and doing cartwheels. Pretend the chipmunks are singing it to you in the form of a Christmas carol.

Now turn it into an image. Maybe your angry girlfriend or your bro sitting on the curb. Put that image on a television screen. Make the colors funny.

Give yourself a polka-dotted suit. Make your girlfriend's hair into a bunch of candy canes. Make the thought look and sound absolutely ridiculous in your mind. Take your time and play with it.

Try to make yourself laugh. After you've done this for a minute or two, stop. How do you feel? Chances are you feel much better about it and the negative emotion isn't nearly as potent as it was before.

Separating your observing mind from your thinking mind is a habit that takes practice. But once you begin to do it, you'll feel yourself becoming less and less of a slave to your thoughts and your emotions. You'll take more control of your internal daily life and feel better about it. In my opinion, this is the single most important step to developing self-discipline and acting despite whatever neuroses or mental hangups you may suffer from.

Once you've differentiated your two minds, you can begin to evaluate your thoughts and feelings from an objective place and decide which ones are helpful and which ones are hurtful. You just listened to part 2 of the post titled, Your Two Minds, by Mark Manson of markmanson.net. There's more to life than finding the perfect car. But finding the perfect car can help you get the most out of life.

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Have a great rest of your weekend if you're listening in real time. And I'll catch you tomorrow for Minimalist Monday, where your optimal life awaits.