“It All Depends on How We Look at Things, and Not How They Are in Themselves”

Ah, Carl Jung.  So is it the thing I see or is it a lifetime of memories that I see?  I have often given much thought to the concept of thoughts. (Nuts, thinking about thinking).

I have often caught myself in the middle of a conversation and sometimes even an argument between someone else and me in my thoughts.  Have you?  I can quickly run through the dialogue speaking all parts, feeling totally justified by my all of my thoughts and emotions.  Only to look around the room and see… well, no one except me.  To whom was I speaking?  To what purpose was this conversation? All of this happened in my head or did any of that actually exist? To me it was a real as any conversation, but the person that I was speaking to was in no way here to  hear any of this. 

And so I wonder how have these thoughts changed or affected my opinions or actions toward this person.  Has this, visible only to me conversation, changed “how I look at things and not see how they are themselves?”  Has this conversation brought me closer or farther from the realness of the moments of time I share with them?

Thoughts have always been to me as real as an apple. For it was from my thoughts that everything else in my life moved.  Think about an apple. What do you see? Can you hear the sound when you bite into it? Can you taste the sweetness? Can you feel the juice running down your chin?

Stop, take a moment and really picture an apple. … 

So in short I picture a nice Red Delicious apple. Then my thoughts would wonder to: Apple = food = I like it.  The same comes from the darker thoughts: loss of someone = sadness/fear= I don’t like this. 

I have been able to see that my thoughts about something can have an equal or greater effect on me as does the actual event.  I have noticed how by thinking certain thoughts I would either run away or walk toward certain situation.  I would bring with me all of my past thoughts, feelings, and emotions to an event.  I could totally miss the event, being lost in thought. 

How many moments have depended on how I look at things through the prism of my mind and not how they really are? The real question is how many moments have I ever seen things as they truly are…

I have but just a few moments in my life, (however many years) and how many have I missed being distracts by thoughts?  They come at me, these thoughts of mine, millions per minute.  And I wonder why no peace? How can I slow down this process, quiet the constant drone? How can I simply just ..be.. without the need for a constant narration? (Notice more and more thoughts, sigh).