get a “pure” or direct experience of the outside world. For example, some people looking out a window will see tree branches gently swaying in the wind. Others won’t be aware of trees or branches at all; they might see a truck going by. They are looking out the same window at the same stuff at the same moment but are having a different experience of what is out there. They are seeing a different “out there.”
Some people like the taste of broccoli; others don’t. Most people love the smell of roses; some don’t. Some people love rap music; others can’t stand it. Some people love the feel of velour because it reminds them of velvet; the feel of velour used to drive me up the wall. No matter what the sensory organ, it’s all how we think about it. It’s only how we think about it. Always! We can only know our own personal thinking of the outside world. That’s it. That’s all.
In other words, the mountain is not the problem. The mountain is the outside world. Our own thinking about the mountain is the problem. Lisa’s experience of the mountain differed from mine because we had different thinking about it and what it meant to us. That was the only difference! During the hike Lisa’s experience of the mountain changed numerous times. Sometimes it was drudgery, sometimes impossible, sometimes a challenge and fun. Why? Because along the way her thinking changed about it. The point is Lisa is the one who had to live with whatever experience she happened to think up at the time.
This is what happens in life. This is what our life is all about. This is our life, period. When we truly realize everything we experience— our perceptions, our feelings, our problems, whatever we call “reality” or “the way it is”—is really only a product of our own thinking, everything then changes for us. Our experience of life changes.
The outside world can never make us feel anything. Only our own thinking can make us feel things. Sometimes in the heat of battle or in a sport such as basketball or football we may not even notice we’ve been cut—until we notice we’re bleeding, and then we think about it. Only then does it hurt. We’re not experiencing the pain until we think about it. Our work isn’t what’s stressing us out; our own thinking about our work is what’s stressing us out. It’s not Johnny driving us nuts; our own thinking about Johnny is driving us nuts. It’s not our fear of speaking in front of a large audience; it’s our own thoughts about speaking in front of an audience. It’s not the mountain. Our thinking is the mountain. Our thinking is what the mountain is to us.
Our consciousness gives us an experience of whatever our thoughts create, and it makes that creation look real. That’s the job of consciousness: to make everything we believe look real to us. If someone cuts us off in a car nearly causing an accident and we get angry, it seems we really should be angry. But it is only our thinking. I’m not saying what the driver did wasn’t wrong or dangerous. I’m not saying we don’t sometimes have too much to do in too little time. I’m not saying Johnny doesn’t drive a lot of people nuts. I’m not saying there aren’t real people in the audience who judge us. I’m not denying the mountain is real. But what determines our experience of the mountain—whether we think we can climb it, whether we think we can make it, whether we think it’s too much for us, whether we think it’s overwhelming, whether we think it’s exciting or exhilarating—is all determined by our own thinking. Our thinking creates the mountain—for ourselves. Our experience of the mountain is determined by our own thinking. When our thinking changes, our experience of the mountain changes for us.
First there is a mountain,
Then there is no mountain,
Then there is.
-- Donovan
“There Is A Mountain”
I had no idea what this song meant until I understood this. Like the mountain, our experience of our entire lives is determined by our own thinking—every aspect of life and every situation we encounter. Of course we will encounter challenging times, challenging people, challenging relationships, challenging circumstances. Yet, how we experience these we make up with our own thinking—not on purpose, but that’s the result.
Our thinking is everything. Life would be nothing for us if it weren’t for our thinking. Without our thinking any experience that happens to us would be neutral. Thought provides the content, whether it is good or bad to us, happy or sad or mad to us. With this incredible power of Thought we get to create anything. We get to create the life we experience.
Whether we know it or not we are creating our lives constantly, continually. Whatever we happen to see of life changes with our next thought. Some thoughts seem to be more entrenched than others, but even these can change because they are only thought.
Suppose we realize that any experience we’re having can and will change with new thought. Wouldn’t that mean we don’t have to take whatever experience we are having now so seriously? After all, whatever we’re experiencing will eventually change. Sometimes her fear of the mountain looked real to Lisa; sometimes it didn’t. We may be angry at the driver who cut us off now, but a month from now we probably won’t be still carrying that around. So why take it so seriously now? We may be stressed because of too much to do at work, but sometimes we’re not stressed with the same amount of work. Sometimes Johnny bothers us less than at other times. What is going on? The only difference is our thinking has changed. We don’t need to take our momentary, passing feelings so seriously. Our feelings are fluid as our thinking; they are the river flowing by. Why get caught in it?* In other words, our relationship with our thinking can change—whether we take it seriously or not, whether or not we believe in it and trust it and follow it.
Thought continually flows within us. God knows where some of the thoughts come from that pop into our heads. We have no control over most of the thoughts that pop in. We can’t always decide what we think—that’s not our point of choice. Sometimes completely bizarre thoughts come up. If we get a thought of a pink elephant standing on the telephone wires, we may get a picture of it but we won’t take it seriously (unless perhaps we’re drunk); we will naturally dismiss it. But if we get a thought, “that person doesn’t like me” or “that person is ignoring me,” those kinds of thoughts we tend to take seriously, even when we have no idea what that person is really thinking.
Who decides what we take seriously?
Tammy feared needles. Because a medical condition required her to get shots from a doctor, this was not good. She avoided her shots because of her fear of needles; therefore, her health worsened. As we were talking by telephone about her fear I said something like, “It may hurt a little when you’re stuck by a needle, as it would if you were walking down a hallway and brushed against a pin sticking out of a couch, but whether someone sees it with fear or not, they decide.”
I don’t know what made this pop into my head at that moment, but I flashed upon a time back in 1965 when I took my then-future, nowex-wife, Judy, to her first visit to New York City. As we stood in her first subway station and the train screeched in Judy stiffened like a board. She clamped her hands over her ears, clenched her jaw, closed her eyes and stood cringing and rigid, while everyone else in the station went about their business as if nothing unusual happened. I asked her what the matter was and she said, “It’s too loud for my ears. I have very sensitive ears. I can’t stand it!” Every time a new train pulled in she did the same thing. Yet I remembered, over time, as we kept visiting the city she didn’t do that anymore. I told Tammy to hang on the phone a moment—she was thinking, “What in the world is he talking about?”—and I ran down the hallway to Judy’s office and poked my head in the door.
“Remember when you used to have this horrible reaction to the noise of subway trains coming into the station and now you don’t?” I asked. “What changed?”
Judy reflected a moment and said, “I decided not to think about it anymore.”
“Ha!” I ran back to the telephone and told Tammy.
“That is very cool!” said Tammy.
We ended the conversation shortly thereafter.
When I spoke with Tammy again a month later I learned she