Welcome back.
Now, we are going to do the exercise with our eyes open. Previously, it didn’t matter whether our eyes were open or closed, though it is generally easier with closed eyes. Now, however, we will keep our eyes open. Whatever happens during this exercise, keep going, just keep going. Even if you get lost or distracted, just continue. Remember, the most important thing is the attempt itself—the number of times you try to use your attention is what strengthens your attention “muscles”.
Today, we will focus on directing our attention and trying to use our mind. This is not about thinking positively or negatively; it’s about choosing which thoughts you want to use and which ones you don’t.
We will work on dividing our attention from the vision. Most of the time, about 70% of our attention is spent on what we see. Colorful objects, attractive people, and other visual stimuli often capture our attention. So we not only lose our attention but lose ourselves.
It’s used in advertising, used in marketing, sales— it’s used everywhere. Everyone is vying for your attention. The moment you see a colorful object, your attention is drawn to it as much as possible.
The issue isn’t just that your attention is captured by something colorful, but also what you start thinking about at that moment.
This is how you are manipulated and controlled. This is how certain thoughts are planted in your mind, and then you live according to these thoughts, using them to determine whether you feel good or bad.
All right, let’s begin the exercise.
Yes, it was an unusual exercise, although you might say people often zone out, looking at an object while being lost in their thoughts. Exactly.
The key is to be aware of what you’re doing. In the previous exercise, you were trying to understand what was happening to you in the present moment. Instead of living on autopilot, you were fully experiencing what you were doing right now. That’s a significant difference.
This exercise is about separating our vision from our thoughts. You can command your mind not to use any thoughts related to a particular phenomenon. In this case, we used the phenomenon of sight—focusing our vision on objects. Similarly, you can look at someone and intentionally not think about that person. You can observe something without engaging in thoughts about it. Do you understand what I mean? For example, you can look at a person who triggers certain associations, whether good or bad, and choose not to engage with those thoughts. You can be free from these automatic associations and see, for example, your ex as if it’s happening for the first time.
It’s not just about this specific scenario; it’s about controlling your mind.
So, this exercise demonstrated how we can control our lives through attention, specifically how we can separate our vision from our thoughts using our attention. Hence, we can also control our emotions because emotions are a result of thoughts. We have a thought, then a thought about that thought, and depending on whether it’s good or bad, certain biochemical processes are triggered in our body. Hormones like dopamine and adrenaline are released, leading to specific emotions. The source of these emotions is the initial thought about the thought.
Now, consider how crucial it is to control your mind. You can choose not to think about things you don’t want to think about. This isn’t about escapism; it’s about developing a skill. It’s the skill of not engaging with certain thoughts. This isn’t the same as affirmations where you are thinking and thinking about something—this approach doesn’t work. It won’t work.
The goal is to use your mind, and to do that, you must understand what your mind and thoughts are. This exercise is a form of research. It’s truly your research. It allows you to explore what happens to you as you practice.
I won’t tell you how to do this exercise correctly or what you should feel. It’s up to you to explore and understand on your own what is happening to you. What happened to you during this exercise.
If you haven’t fully explored your experience yet, feel free to repeat the exercise. There’s no need for excessive repetition; simply doing it once can reveal some insights. Just notice your mind’s ability not to use certain thoughts. If you manage to maintain this state for even a second during a 15-minute session, then you have this skill.
To continue using this skill, you must cultivate it through your attention and your understanding of thoughts and the mind. I encourage you to explore this process for yourself and observe what happens when you do it.
Some concepts I share now might not resonate immediately, and that’s okay. You may come back to this information after 10, 20 sessions, discovering new insights over time. That’s okay.
The goal isn’t merely to look at something and avoid thinking about it; it’s about managing your attention. Through this skill, you can control your thoughts. Isn’t that cool?
I’ll repeat once again. About 70% of our attention is consumed by vision. However, the issue goes beyond this; it’s the associative chain of thoughts triggered by what we see. In other words, it is a set of certain thoughts, different thoughts, in which we get stuck and in which we lose ourselves. We lose what is happening to us now, we lose the “living” of our life, through our vision. So as you begin to control your attention, you will be able to control your thoughts. During any exercise that we will do, try to explore your mind as a space where these thoughts appear.
By learning to control your attention, you gain the ability to manage these thoughts. Each exercise we undertake concerning the mind and thoughts aims to explore the mind as the space where these thoughts arise.
Think of the mind like an airfield where thoughts constantly arrive and depart—some we like and use, some came and flew away, came and flew away. Others we don’t even notice. But there are some that we have taken and begun to use.
The mind can also be compared to a stage where each thought seeks our attention, or, say, it is programmed to do so. You may have heard the saying that thoughts are material—yes and no.
Has anyone ever caught thoughts in a jar? Has any scientist ever dissected a thought and said what it is made up of? No.
That’s the issue with thoughts. Everyone knows about their existence—ideas, desires, fears, expectations, and countless other variations of thoughts. Yet, not a single thought has ever been captured in a jar and dissected by the scientific community, at least officially. Maybe someone has conducted such experiments and chosen to remain silent about their findings.
In our sessions together, we are trying to explore the nature of thoughts. Each of you is trying to explore these thoughts independently because I’m sure that most, perhaps 99%, have never taken the time to do so. People study the brain, emotions, hormones, and neurons in the brain, but thoughts themselves are rarely researched. Yet, thoughts have an immense influence over our lives.
Indeed, if we allocate a certain amount of attention to a thought, it can materialize in various ways. For example, if I think about a chair, I can bring that thought to life through actions—whether by buying one if I have the money or building one if I don’t. The thought has materialized. Thus, thoughts can be materialized through our attention and the actions we choose to take.
Depending on our influence or position in society, we can realize different thoughts. For example, someone who wanted to host the Winter Olympics in the tropical country and succeeded. If I had the same idea, my influence wouldn’t be enough to make it happen. Do you understand how this works?
At the same time, identical thoughts can come to entirely different people. Consider many historical examples that happened before the invention of the internet, when scientists across the globe independently made groundbreaking discoveries. They each worked on their inventions, yet arrived at the same conclusions at the same time. You must be ready for such insights. If a thought about quantum physics appears in my mind, even if I understand the field of study a little, I will not be able to fully understand it and realize it. However, when a brilliant insight on quantum physics strikes a researcher who has devoted a decade to the subject, they would say “Oh, it’s genius!”. See what I mean?
By practicing it, we’re gradually building a solid foundation for understanding thoughts and our minds. We have tried to train our mind’s abilities, including the skill of not using certain thoughts.
In our next exercise, we’ll explore sensitivity and learn about its importance. See you later. Goodbye!