When I was pregnant with Charlotte, I often thought about all of the things I wanted to teach her about life, and how I could raise her to be a good person with a deep awareness for herself and others. What I didn’t anticipate was how much I could learn from her in the first 18 months of her life. It amazes me that we are all born with such knowledge but forget it as we get older.
It is said that we have around 60,000 thoughts a day, and about 80% of them are negative. Our negative thoughts cause our pain, and prevent us from enjoying life, and celebrating our successes. This is so obvious when observing a baby because they have little to no thought because they don’t have words yet.
When Charlotte was a newborn, it became so apparent to me, I couldn’t ignore it. As a Life coach, this is the most important lesson I can teach my clients and it can be applied to all areas of one’s life: without thoughts, humans don’t experience pain, other than physical pain or discomfort. When Charlotte wasn’t physically uncomfortable, she was content. She cried, when she was hungry, tired, gassy, or needed diaper change. Once those needs were met, she was happy again. She didn’t spend time after those needs were met, thinking about how upset she was that she was hungry earlier in the day, or that she was uncomfortable yesterday when her diaper was wet.
As we get older, we begin to have thoughts, and humans have the tendency to dwell on things. We think about circumstances in our lives, and our negative thoughts are what make us miserable. Just about every day I notice myself getting upset or feeling stressed about circumstances, that Charlotte isn’t phased by because she doesn’t think about them the way I do.
About a month ago, I took Charlotte to the Kids Club at my gym for the first time. It’s like a daycare at the gym, so parents can workout. They gave me a pager and told me they would page me if she cried for more than ten minutes. She was hysterical when I left, and it broke my heart. I stared at the pager during my whole workout. I kept thinking about how sad she was, and was I a bad parent for leaving her. I raced through my workout, barely enjoyed it, and when I went to get her, she was happily playing with one of the babysitters. For at least an hour after, I kept looking at her, wondering if she was mad at me, and whether or not she was traumatized. I made myself very sad by having these thoughts. And guess what? It was all for nothing! After I left her in the Kids Club, she cried for a few minutes, and then began to play, and enjoyed herself. She didn’t obsess about how I left her or think that I was a bad mom, because at this point she still has little ability to think. After we left the gym, she was totally back to her usual happy self, and for that time I spent wondering about what went on while I was working out, she was running around my apartment singing, and playing as if nothing had happened. Here I was dwelling in the past, worrying about something that was already done, and for her, once it was over, she only focused on what she was doing in the moment she was in. She was upset the moment I left, but once I was gone, she moved on, and didn’t obsess about the fact that I wasn’t there. I, on the other hand, punished myself by thinking about it, dwelling on whether or not I traumatized my daughter.
Most people don’t even realize that it’s their thoughts about circumstances in their lives, and not the circumstances themselves, that cause them pain and suffering. Pay attention to your thoughts. Noticing what you are thinking is the first step in bringing awareness into your life, which in itself is unbelievably powerful. We have the power to choose our thoughts, which means we have the power to choose how we want to feel, and how amazing is that?! I could have chosen to think no one is going to be interested in this blog post, and that makes me feel icky. That could have prevented me from posting this, which would have kept me in the same place that I had been for a long time, knowing who I am and what I have to teach, but not actually doing it, and staying in the same place in my life. Instead, I decided to think some people will really love reading this and actually learn something from it. This thought makes me feel giddy and excited, and lead me to posting this. The result of that is, I am doing what I am meant to be doing in this world, and that feels amazing!!
