Have you ever assumed something about another person that made you angry with them – but then found out it wasn’t true?
On the 103rd floor of the Sears Tower in Chicago, there’s a balcony you can walk out and stand on.
It has a glass floor.
They say it’s safe, but you’re looking straight down at the street below.
Would you do it?
On the 70th floor of the U.S Bank building in Los Angeles, you can step out of the building onto a 45-foot long glass slide that takes you to the 69th floor. The glass is one inch thick.
How about that one?
Even if you weren’t afraid of heights, I think it would at least get your attention. It might be exciting, but it would definitely have the scent of danger. That glass is supposed to be stronger than the average floor, but somehow it seems different.
It’s all about how we think.
A couple of years ago, I was meeting in an executive boardroom on the top floor of a skyscraper. When it was time to leave, I started to step into the elevator – something I’ve done thousands of times, without ever giving it a thought.
But as I started to step inside, I glanced down. I caught a shaft of light shining up in the crack between the metal strip on the elevator floor and the one on the building floor.
The lights had been left on in the elevator shaft.
Through that thin opening, I was able to see the open shaft going down 70 stories below me. Near the bottom, it was dark – which made it seem like an eternal dungeon.
I realized that I was stepping into a metal box over that shaft which was held up by a single cable. Once inside, that cable would be lowering me down that shaft toward the darkness.
I stepped in and pushed the “lobby” button.
The doors closed, just like always.
The familiar beige music played, just like always.
I felt the drop – the same as always.
But it wasn’t the same. I had seen the light and knew what was below.
All those thousands of times before, I never questioned what I was doing. And nothing had changed in the actual experience.
The difference happened in my head.
All those other times, I never considered danger. This time, I was focused on it.
It’s amazing, isn’t it? The things we think about have a way of determining our emotions. The reality doesn’t change, but our thoughts do. When our thoughts change (for good or for bad), it changes how we feel.
We’re usually told that changing our lives involves changing our actions. There’s some truth to that, but it’s not the main issue.
Changing our lives happens when we learn to think differently.
Shakespeare wrote, “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”
- Your teenager agreed to be home by 11:00 PM, but now it’s 1:00 AM and he hasn’t called. You really don’t know what’s happening, but your mind goes to the worst case scenario – right?
- You’ve heard rumors at work that downsizing is coming. You don’t know if the rumors are true, but they can take over your thoughts. It doesn’t take long for you to imagine losing your home because you can’t make the payments.
- You feel a pain you haven’t felt before, and it worries you. You haven’t seen a doctor, but you’re imagining a debilitating disease. Soon you’re not imagining it; you’re believing it to be true.
- A friend passes by you at church without saying anything to you. In reality, they probably were lost in thought and didn’t see you. But you spend days wondering what you did to offend them.
How can we take control of our thoughts instead of letting our thoughts control us?
By noticing them, and challenging them.
Psychologist Daniel Amen calls them ANTS: Automatic Negative Thoughts. That’s his name for the thoughts that come into our minds automatically and ruin our day. He suggests that whenever we feel sad, mad, nervous or out of control, we should do two things:
- Write down the negative thoughts (which gets them out of our head).
- Ask ourselves if they’re true.
We need to take notice of our negative thoughts and talk back to them. “If you can correct negative thoughts,” Amen says, “you take away their power over you.”
Max Lucado wrote a great book called “Anxious for Nothing: Finding Calm in a Chaotic World
You can be the air traffic controller of your mental airport. You occupy the control tower and can direct the mental traffic of your world. Thoughts circle above, coming and going. If one of them lands, it is because you gave it permission. If it leaves, it is because you directed it to do so. You can select your thought pattern.
Your problem is not your problem; it’s the way you think about it.
Pay attention to your feelings for the next few days, and notice when you’re feeling strong emotion. Use that as a trigger examine your thoughts and challenge them.
I’ve found it to be a surprisingly effective tool for breaking the power our thoughts have over us.
It won’t solve every problem in our lives, but it can get us thinking in new directions – and it’s that simple.
Want to try it for a few days? Give it a shot, and tell us how it goes in the comments below.
Maybe we can take back that control after all . . .