Commentor h0tm0mma gave me some inspiration for a post that… so, thanks, girl!
How do you react to yourself when you notice yourself thinking contradicting things? Is it run of the mill for you and no biggie? Does it ever make you feel like a hypocrite or just a jerk?
Hotmomma brought up the topic of believing in one thing (fat acceptance) and having thoughts pop up that don’t seem consistent with it… like, a thought about fat people being undisciplined or about thin people being somehow superior. Would experiencing this kinda thing make you a “bad” size acceptance advocate? Not necessarily. 🙂
The brain is a complex thing. One can feel two different ways about the same thing. Contradictory thoughts happen. The most important bit, in my experience, is how one deals with them when they happen. Beating yourself up is pretty pointless. It won’t change the fact that the contradictory thoughts exist… it will just wear you down and make you feel bad. Over the weekend, in my perusing of self-esteem articles, I read something (can’t remember where) that talked about neither condemning or condoning thoughts. There’s no need to judge. It is possible to simply see what thoughts pop up and then choose where to go from there. It is possible to choose to challenge the thoughts that aren’t productive and further validate the thoughts that are. For example, I could remind myself that fat people simply cannot be painted with one brush like that. They are a diverse group. Besides, thin people aren’t superior. They are just people… they are just part of the body diversity that is a part of the humanity we were born into. So… when the unhelpful thoughts come up, it is possible to challenge them… and I’ve noticed that if I keep this up that in time, the thoughts I challenge come up less and less… or when they do come up, they are far less forceful.
Years ago, when I had first started reading Buddhist books, I remember reading about the brain being described as just a thought maker…. or sometimes, just this talker. It just says stuff. You don’t have to believe it. You don’t have to argue with it. You don’t even have to LISTEN to it. I mean really listen… as in give the chatter credibility. It’s pretty impossible not to hear ones own thoughts, but it’s not necessary to LISTEN all the time. From my experience, this was a lot about what meditation was for… learning not to listen to the brains babbling, even if it can still be noticed… or “heard.”
I also remember reading a quote from the Dalai Lama about learning to view the brain’s babble as this silly child. Sometimes it says inappropriate things. Sometimes it says funny things. Sometimes it says things that are helpful. I took from this that I couldn’t help some of the crazy things my brain said to me… all I can ever help is how I react to those things. I can choose to beat myself up (not the best choice, of course). I can choose to challenge unhelpful thoughts. I can choose to treat myself gently and not blame myself for the weird stuff my brain cranks out sometimes. Often, I find myself talking to myself like I am talking to a little kid… explaining to some part of my brain that doesn’t seem to get it why fat isn’t “immoral” or why just cuz someone cut me off in traffic doesn’t make them necessarily a jerk… maybe they are having a really bad day… a fight with the spouse or something. I’ve learned that a bit part of my conscious functioning is to explain things to the myriad parts of my brain that seem to still live in the stone age. 😉
How do you all deal with your own babbling noggins? Sometimes I swear mine babbles more than anyone elses’… am I the only one who feels this way? Heh.
–AngryGrayRainbows
Angry Gray Rainbows 
It’s hard to shut up thoughts that have been drummed into your head for decades by people you know, society in general, the media, doctors… All you can do is try to ask yourself why you thought that particular thing in that particular instance, I guess. I find myself doing that a lot, and I think it helps to pull the judgmental portion of my brain to a full stop, which then helps me to consider more angles than that original snap judgment.
For me, I think I fall into the trap that if I’m thinking it, it must be important or there for a reason.
(Speaking of thoughts — I love your last three posts and wish I had more time to comment on them.)
This perspective you offer is so so so helpful. It’s helpful for my own thoughts, and for other people’s thoughts as well. Their thoughts are just thoughts, too. And while they might be troublesome when so many people have the same thoughts that are negative (ie racism) that’s when it’s helpful to look at what systems support those thoughts — just as it’s possible to do the same thing internally.
Trying to sort through the contradictory thoughts or the unhelpful ones — I find this trying.
When it comes to my faith/religion/relationship to god — this is where I feel the most “mature” in being able to tolerate contradictory thoughts, to feel I don’t have to have my rational and spiritual thoughts in complete synch in order to function. I think that as we mature, ideally we are able to see that contraditictions can coexist without inherantly being hypocritical.
[…] And, ya know… my using the “do not press the green button” photo on my Thought Contradictions post brought all this to mind and how it might make a neat post. So, thanks again to commentor […]