As a runner, I know full well the effects of conditioning and de-conditioning. Every spring, summer, and fall, when I am established in a consistent training schedule, I run farther and faster with less effort. Every winter, as I wind down and run much less, I get consistently slower and slower and slower....When I "use it" (my cardiovascular system), I grow stronger. When I don't, I "lose it" (my fitness level).
As a therapist, I understand the power of mental conditioning, or changing our thoughts. Do you know that every time we have a thought, an electrochemical process occurs in our brain? If you could look at the brain when the "thought" occurs, you would see chemicals being released and electrical impulses carrying those chemicals between the nerve synapses. And so, a neural "pathway" occurs in the brain and becomes established. How does that thought become stronger? You "use it"- repeat the thought over and over and over and strengthen the pathway in the brain. The more you "use it" (that pathway), the stronger it becomes. Many of our thoughts are automatic. We've been thinking them for years and years and decades and they become engrained in our sense of self and how we define the world.
WE CAN CHANGE OUR THOUGHTS. When we decide to think something new, we begin establishing a new neural pathway in our brain. In order for that thought to become more "natural" or second nature to us, we have to practice the thought - create it over and over. The more we "use" that pathway in the brain, the stronger it becomes. So, when we are trying to eliminate a negative thought and substitute a positive one, the old thought (which we think less and less often) starts to extinguish itself and the new thought, (which we practice over and over), becomes stronger and stronger.
I'm working on extinguishing certain negative thoughts. The thoughts are about the world and people and how it "should" be and how I wish people were. The new thoughts I am substituting are about how things ARE. What people DO. And I'm moving more toward objectivity and noticing how things are and what people do and not judging it so much. It FEELS very different. I am noticing less stress because I don't allow the world or people to determine the quality of my moment.
When I drive, I try to "notice" what other drivers do instead of determining that they are terrible drivers. The other day, A patient shared with me her experience of having a conversation with her mother and thinking to herself "That's just how she thinks, I think differently" and noticing she felt compassion toward her mother instead of the usual anger. I have patients with panic disorders who are gaining control over their symptoms when they think, "That's just my anxiety. I've felt it before, I'll feel it again. It doesn't feel good but it's just a feeling and it will pass" instead of "Oh my God....It's happening again...I can't handle this...This is terrible"..."
The choice is about which path you want to go down. You establish the neural pathway in your brain. If you don't like where that path is going, change the thought. Many times people feel so much more empowered when they say "I choose not to go down that road". They choose a new path and practice going down that path over and over.
Use it or lose it. What thoughts do you choose to use and wire your brain to continue to produce? And what thoughts do you abandon, and what wiring do you extinguish in your brain? I choose to go down the pathway of compassion and tolerance. It feels great.
