One of the greatest tragedies of current culture is the disparaging of unconditional, loving thought.
There is a (seeded) mistrust in the idea of releasing negative thought patterns and replacing them with entirely positive ones.
(Something) We’ve been trained to think that focusing only on loving thoughts is somehow impossible, irresponsible, and/or not worth our time.
For myself, at least, I know this shift has been a hard one to make.
In fact, in certain ways, the negative thinking and self-criticism has felt necessary to my success.
I saw my results as being, in part, generated by the extraordinary levels of pressure that negative thinking put on me - my constant self-critiquing, a seemingly inexhaustible compulsion to plan and control, and a ceaseless sense of being behind schedule.
It felt as though these patterns kept me in line - they kept me focused, and ensured I was always in action towards the next thing.
They were such a large piece of my mental model in fact, that they felt inextricable from who I was, like they were part of my identity.
I felt scared to change them because I did not know who I would be without them.
These incentives for negative thinking were further strengthened by the communities I belonged to and the core narratives of the media I consumed.
It felt as though success was the only outcome that mattered, and the only way to become successful was to put yourself under these extraordinary levels of pressure.
In this way, the idea of changing or releasing my negative thought patterns felt like an abdication of my chance at success, fulfillment, and ultimately true, lasting happiness.
But thankfully, this is no longer true.
Through a lot of suffering, and through much trial and error, I’ve come to realize how backwards all of this thinking is.
What I’ve realized is that extraordinary results and “doing hard things” is our natural state as humans.
When we care deeply about what we’re working towards, and when we encourage our selves lovingly (like we would a young child), our ability to create exactly what we want, effortlessly and expeditiously, skyrockets.
In this way, unconditional, loving thought actually accelerates your ability to create what you want.
Integrating this understanding requires a surrendering and shifting of identity.
You must see yourself as separate from your patterns of thought, and capable of relating to yourself in a new way.
When you combine this with an understanding of your true priorities outside of the culture focus of “success-at-all-costs”, you create a scenario in which unconditional, loving thought becomes your persistent, resting state.
From this state, everything you want is achievable and comes about in exciting, delightful, and effortless ways.