“No matter how you care to define it, I do not identify with the local group. Planet, species, race, nation, state, religion, party, union, club, association, neighborhood improvement committee; I  have no interest in any of it. I love and treasure the individuals as I meet them, I loathe and despise the groups they identify with and belong to.”

- George Carlin

“Experience is not what happens to you. It is what you do with what happens to you” - Aldous Huxley

Amen.

“Well-timed silence hath more eloquence than speech.” - Martin Fraquhar Tupper

The Roots of Thinking

Much of our thinking takes the form of self-talk—conversations we have with ourselves, inside our minds.

Clearly, the original root of this verbal thinking is speech. Speech gave humans the ability to communicate with each other, share experiences, learn from each other, and amass a collective body of knowledge. Using verbal language within our own minds brought many new abilities, including the abilities to rehearse what we might say to another, to recall past conversations, and to plan future actions.

This gave us a whole new way of meeting our needs. We can understand the world around us, how it works, and take steps to improve our circumstances. This is the present root of so much of our thinking.

Needs and Wants

If you look at your own thinking, you will find that a good proportion of it is concerned with meeting a need of some kind or another—the needs for security, approval, love, companionship, status, respect, control, stimulus, comfort, etc..

For many of us, such thinking is going on nearly all the time. Sometimes, it may just be in the background, but it is there, occupying our mental resources. Most of it is a complete waste of time and energy. As Mark Twain famously remarked, “My life has been full of disasters, most of which never happened”.

Looking more closely, you will find that many of these thoughts concern imagined needs—things we imagine we need in order to be happy. We imagine we need someone to regard us in a good light, or we need some new clothes, or we need to eat some gourmet food. These are not true needs; they are “wants” or desires, or in some cases simply preferences. But still they occupy our thoughts.

When we believe we need such things or situations in order to be happy, we become fixated upon getting them, and this leads to no end of thinking about how to get the world to be the way we believe it ought to be.

The Roots of Discontent

This, as so many spiritual teachers have pointed out, is the root of our much of our suffering. By telling ourselves that things need to be different, we create a sense of discontent, a dis-ease.

This is the sad joke about human beings. We all want to find greater contentment, but many of us are so busy worrying about whether or not we will be content sometime in the future, we never allow ourselves to be at ease in the present. Instead, our minds become preoccupied with planning and scheming, worry and anxiety, hopes and fantasies. And when things don’t turn out the way we think they should, we easily fall into anger, grievance, judgment, or depression.

When we do manage to get whatever it is we think we want, we may indeed feel better. But we feel better, not because that particular thing has made us feel better, but because we have, for the moment, stopped creating a sense of discontent. We are no longer disturbing ourselves. But before too long we find something else that is missing, and again fall into discontent. And again start thinking about what we might do to make things the way we want.

Return to Natural Mind

Careful observation of the mind reveals that focusing on a particular thought limits our perception. We become lost in thought, unaware of much is what going on around us. And also what is going on within us; a mind caught up in self-talk is less likely to notice how it is feeling, or how the body feels. Moreover, all this thinking results in a background mental tension. There is a sense of tightness in the mind, a constriction in our consciousness.

The world’s mystical traditions repeatedly affirm that the mind in its natural state—that is, before it is filled with thoughts, worries, plans, and regrets—is a mind that is at ease. In one way or another, through meditation, prayer, dance, ritual, or service, they seek to undo the damaging consequences or over-thinking and return us to the state of ease that is our spiritual birthright.

Peter Russell 2007

Here are your two motivational posters for the day. I hope they amuse and inspire you.

Thanks to fellow Brotogeris Sociey International member Moira Kelly for these posters of her canary wing broto Brody! 

Barry Nong left a comment asking if we dress up like Brotos for our birds club meetings. Well, actually, no, but we do eat these special Easter treats:

We have nicknamed these “Broto Peeps”!

Thanks to Moira Kelly for this photo. 

I was recently elected Membership Director of the Brotogeris Society International. We are a group of pet owners, breeders, and enthusiasts who love the Brotogeris parrot species. This species includes the Grey Cheek Parakeet, Orange Chinned Parakeet (both of whom you can see in the main mast photo above), the Canary Winged, White Winged, and Golden Winged Parakeets, and the Tui Parakeet. Our goal is to spread knowledge of the species and encourage the conservation of these little gems. We publish a quarterly journal with stories, photos, and articles written by our members.

If you are a Brotogeris enthusiast, please consider joining our club! We are always looking for articles and other content about your Brotos for our journal. You don’t have to be a professional writer; we can help you edit your stories.

Just go to www.brotosociety.org , click on the “application for membership” button and follow the instructions.

If you would like to see a free sample of our journal, leave a comment on this blog and I will email you a .pdf file of our colorful December issue.

Those wise ones who see that the consciousness within themselves is the same consciousness within all conscious beings, attain eternal peace.

The Upanishads