Being responsible for our lives means taking responsibility for 4 things: every thought we think, every feeling we feel, every action we take (or don’t take) and every outcome we receive. Let’s start with the first one – every thought we think. The biggest lie that we tell ourselves is that we can’t control our thoughts. When I listen to others talk, I often hear “I just can’t help it, these thoughts enter my head and I can’t get them out.” As long as we believe this lie, we will be held captive by our thoughts and imprisoned in an unpleasant reality. Deepak Chopra, M.D. states “The average mind thinks 60,000 thoughts a day, 90% being the same thought as the day before. Our tormentor today is ourselves left over from yesterday. Protect your thinking; it’s all you have that is yours. Others cannot invade it without your permission. They can take away your possessions, your loved ones and your liberty, but they can never take away your thinking. You choose that.”

I remember reading a story once about a POW who survived imprisonment in Vietnam by mentally playing 18 holes of golf on his favorite golf course everyday. He would focus on every detail of the experience and in his mind walk every step of the course, select each club, feel the movement every shot, and enjoy the sun and the breeze on his body. While he had no control over his outer reality, he did take responsibility for his inner reality. He protected his thinking.

Protecting our thinking and taking responsibility for our thoughts does take effort. It requires consistent attention to what is floating through our mind and evaluation of whether or not each thought is helping us to be who we want to be or to get where we want to go. It involves training our minds – disciplining our thoughts. The best description of this comes from Jack Kornfield, a Buddhist monk. He compares training our minds to training a puppy. For those who have had the opportunity to train a puppy, you know that it can be a frustrating, push your patience to the limit experience. Just getting the puppy’s attention is often a challenge. Then once you have their attention if you tell them to sit and show them what to do, they will stay seated for approximately a nanosecond. Then they are off, running about and getting into all types of mischief. It takes patience and persistence to teach them “come”, “sit” and “stay”. It does not happen over night. If you stick with it, the rewards are huge.

So it is with training our minds. We must first recognize when we are thinking negative thoughts. This involves paying attention to what goes through our minds. Are the thoughts we are thinking in each moment supporting us or hindering us? As soon as we begin to think negative thoughts, we have to say “stop” and choose what we want to think about instead. Like the overactive puppy, our mind will remain on the positive thought momentarily and then quickly return to the negative thoughts. It is our responsibility to keep directing our thoughts back to where we want them to be. To where they best serve us and support us in being who we want to be and getting us where we want to go. It takes vigilance, patience and persistence. It does not happen over night. If you stick with it, the rewards are huge.