Coffee With Hilary and Les from State of Mind Hypnosis and Training Centre
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Coffee With Hilary and Les from State of Mind Hypnosis and Training Centre
How To Feed Your Mind: Joy Is Your Natural State
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We follow a listener’s prompt on feeding the mind and trace how fear, habit, and culture shape our thoughts. We share a simple reframe, practical resets, and ways to turn negative triggers into cues for better thinking and calmer feeling.
• fear and social conditioning forming thought habits
• I am not my thoughts reframe
• using negative thoughts as triggers for opposites
• safety and aloneness at the core of many fears
• emotions amplifying inner speech and beliefs
• dialoguing with emotions for messages and causes
• replacing habits and breaking thought trains
• resets through movement, laughter, and immersive focus
• choosing action and asking for help to clear interference
We hope this helps a little as you go through your day.
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All right, we are on the line.
SPEAKER_00:Morning. Kind of an overcast day over the lake, but it's cold. Everything's frozen. Frozen right across. It usually takes mid-February to get there.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, that's true. That's true. It wasn't as bad yesterday. I thought it was gonna be a nose hair frozen day, crunchy day, but it wasn't that bad.
SPEAKER_00:It did take a while for me to clean off my car, but well, in this part of the world, it's suddenly winter.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:We're doing something different today, aren't we?
SPEAKER_01:We are, we're just winging it. We're always winging it. It's kind of like we asked our audience. Yes, our live audience, what they would like to hear about. And we heard back someone who is feeding the birds and about feeding the mind.
SPEAKER_00:How do you feed the mind? And that's you know, there's a million little things we can do, but I think what we do always flows um from our beliefs about things. And I think that what a lot of people believe about their mind is that it's pretty limited, or uncontrollable. Yeah, yeah. Out of control. Does what it wants to do.
SPEAKER_01:This is what I'm stuck with.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:And I think that probably, you know, and just my humble opinion, that one of the biggest problems in the world today is that people have become mindless.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:There's not a lot of use of our minds. And that part of that happens naturally from the state of forgetting that we come here in. But I think that it has become a cultural thing. We're almost, you know, that that Marianne Williamson quote. We're afraid of ourselves. We're afraid of what we're capable of. We're afraid of what the mind might be.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:We get afraid of our dreams at night. We get afraid to think outside the box. We get afraid to be wrong. That's a that's an incredible kind of limiting training that we all go through when we're young, is being trained to be afraid of being wrong. We're afraid to take chances. Within that, the mind has obviously been convinced that something awful is going to happen. So I suppose as a as a first response to the question, I would say the process of feeding your mind begins with knowing that it's bigger than you think it is, that a lot of what's in it is erroneous, it's not helpful. And the great news is all of that's changeable.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Someone said it's our deepest fears. Yeah, I, you know, a lot to go down to dreamland, down the path of dreamland, that's for another day. But yeah, the last couple nights I've been having like my deepest fears come out in dreams. And I wake up and I wonder, why did I think of that? Or you know, why did that come up? What am I going through that is bringing all this up? Very odd. But yeah, the you know, even sometimes thinking the mind is huge, right? Is a little scary. It's like taking it from a little box to a warehouse suddenly.
SPEAKER_00:That is an interesting meditation that I've heard before of yes, seeing your mind as a box and expanding it as big as you possibly can. I think we experience our minds in these chaotic ways, and that causes us to prefer to go inward. I think you know, I've heard this before, and I've thought it myself, and I've thought I'm sure glad people can't read my thoughts. What a mess, what a spectrum of thoughts that in moments feel like I'm enlightened. I've got it, I figured it out. Holy cow, I'm I I'm I'm there.
SPEAKER_01:And then start rising off the floor.
SPEAKER_00:Crazy, ugly things going through my head that you know just cause me to just curl in and just like, oh, where did that come from, Les? Why are you thinking about that? Yeah, I think that being honest with yourself about your mind's activities is a really great way to begin the process of feeding your mind.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. In the chat, it said, how do we feed it the good stuff instead of the negative stuff? I sort of have a little blood prayer for that. I was thinking beforehand after the topic came up. We tend to look externally. When we talk about feeding the mind, it's usually external. You know, don't watch the news or listen to nice music or listen to meditations. But I think on top of all that, it's um creating the habit, like we mentioned the other day, creating the habit of thinking some good thoughts towards yourself, creating the habit of, you know, waking up and I don't know, my habit now is sort of talking to my body, to my soul, thank you for another day, that kind of stuff. And it feels nice, right? And it sort of sort of sticks with me for throughout the day. Of course, it's not perfect or anything. I don't know if it's even possible for that. But just creating those those habits of saying nice things to yourself or thinking nice things. Not always possible, but starting the habit is is a good good way of doing that.
SPEAKER_00:Well, we went to the Canadian Hypnosis Conference. I took a course with Luke. I've forgotten Luke's last name. Luke Howard. Luke Howard. And Luke is a mentalist, he's a performer, he's a he's a stage hypnotist, but he's also a hypnotherapist. And he he taught a technique that he uses, which is a really simple way to become less concerned about your thoughts. And it's it's really simple. And, you know, when we talk about reframing, one of the most important aspects of reframing, I think, is remembering that your thoughts are habits. What goes on in your mind is habitual. We are habit-making beings. That's how we get efficient, that's how we get effective. We like habits, we try to build good habits, and we built, we've built the ability to think negatively, to anticipate the negative. Right? These are habits. We anticipate the worst, we plan on things going wrong, we think of these ideas, worrying and such, as actually helpful because we're anticipating negative things. And it I think for me, always, you know, I'm always trying to understand. And as hypnotists, I think it's fundamental to understand where the thought pattern come from, right? You go back to the origins of the thought pattern and you try to change it, you try to reframe it. That's that's really in so many ways just the repetitive nature of our work. What makes it interesting, what makes it so difficult is that everyone's mind is unique to them. But there are things in everyone's mind as a result of our social environment, our societies that we grow up in. Our societies train us to fit in. And how do you get someone to go to work every day? How do you get them to get up when they don't want to, in the dark, in the winter, in the cold, get in their car, drive through a snowstorm to go to a place where they generally feel kind of abused, kind of mistreated. Like that kind of training is amazing when you think about the millions of people getting up every morning and going to work. This is the society we live in. The vast majority of those people are being driven by fear, right? Fear that they won't have enough, fear that they need to fit in, fear that they're not good people if they don't. These kinds of fears in us, you know, are trained in us from the instant we can walk. When mom, as soon as we could walk, you know, I joke and I say to my friends at the gym, you know, we spend the first year trying to get them to walk and talk. And then after that, we're busy telling them to sit down and shut up. And that's the kind of thing that human beings are. We are moving, interacting beings. And from the instant we start doing that, our parents start to train us with fear. So if I'm living in a world that I fear, it's really smart to think and anticipate negative. And that becomes my habit. So when you say I want to feed it the good stuff and not the bad stuff, what we're really saying is, how do I get out of my cycles of fear? That's the way I interpret it. And I think the first thing is to just say you came upon that honestly. That came to you through a natural process of living around the people that you lived in, and your mind got created. And in that creation, you have habits, thought habits. And that stuff is going on all the time, right? It's just going on. Negative reactions to things all around you all the time, happens naturally. You've been trained, you're well practiced. It comes even to the point where we don't want those thoughts anymore. Having those thoughts, you start to recognize that they're bothersome, that they're not helping, that they're getting you in an emotional state that you don't want to be in. So then we go back to that first reframe, right? I think that's so huge. It changes everything. It's the first one, basically, all the time with my clients. We start there. I am not my thoughts. I am the thinker. And for many people, just that, just that alone, that idea alone, is food for their mind. It's the beginning of changing their mind. It's the beginning of saying, I've had enough of this. I want to do something different. So let's go on to what Luke taught. Luke, you know, what'll happen is clients will come in and they'll say, I have these constant thoughts about, you know, being poor. I have these constant thoughts about losing my job. I have these constant thoughts. And when we understand that that's where they come from, they come from an honest place where somebody loved you and was teaching you to be careful and cautious and afraid out of their love for you. You ask yourself, you know, do did I create this thought? And you have a conversation and you get to the place where the the person acknowledges that the thought just comes upon them. We have, you know, 90,000 thoughts a day. The science is really clear, and 80% of that is what you thought yesterday, and 90% of that is negative, right? So these thoughts just come upon you. When you're aware of them, when you when they come upon you and you can grab a hold of them and be aware of them, you can change them. You can say, I don't want to think about this, I want to think about this. But they're just thoughts. And that's what's critical. My habitual thoughts are just thoughts. They come and they go. They come without invitation, they go when a new one replaces it. They're just thoughts. And he asked a wonderful question. I liked it a lot. Which weighs more? The thought of 50,000 pounds or the thought of a feather? And in truth, they're both just thoughts. So, what is the weight of a thought? Well, a thought that something bad might happen, or a thought that something good might happen. They're both just thoughts. They come about habitually, without any effort on your part. They just arrived. You didn't invite them. They're just there. Now, what if we took that negative thought that just flies up in our face, that one that comes up, the one that's often repeated, one of those, you know, 50,000 that we just don't want in a day. And what if that thought became the reminder that I am not my thoughts? I am the thinker. I can choose what I think.
SPEAKER_01:Negative thought would be like an anchor to the other thought.
SPEAKER_00:It can, yeah, exactly. It can be the the trigger that you use. Now, this is a habit, right? You got you're going to want to create a habit. You're going to ask yourself, and this is, I think, so important. There's a great book up called Atomic Habits. And it's important to know that it doesn't take that long to change a habit. You know, it's a matter of weeks. In a in a matter of months, you can change a habit if you deliberately do it. Now, I've always believed, I've always experienced, I've always said, the easiest way to get rid of a bad habit is to replace it with a good one. That's the easiest way because you are a habitual being. You want habits. And so using a negative thought to trigger and provoke and evoke a positive thought. You know, the Buddhists talk about observing their mind. And I think that's that's really what I'm driving at. You can learn a lot about yourself by observing your mind. But what you're really learning is your history and your habits. And when you observe your mind, you start to see how innocently you've acquired this habit of thinking this negative thought. Now, what does it weigh? It doesn't weigh anything. It's just a thought. It weighs no more than any other thought. But the truth is, some thoughts are preferable. So what would be a preferable thought? What would be the opposite of this thought? So whenever it comes to worry or negative anticipation of a negative outcome, you know, I think that you can always go to the opposite, right? And the opposite is always I am safe. And part of I am safe, and what I've discovered through working with people and their fears, is an element of every fear that people don't articulate, but is there when you examine the fear is I am alone. I am alone in this. This is up to me. Yeah, I am alone. So a fear comes. Yeah, and fears are a wide spectrum of possibilities and a wide spectrum of degrees. And you can have a little bit of anxiety or you can have a downright panic attack. And the point is that your fears are across a large spectrum, and they can take all kinds of shapes, but that negative thought is uninvited, and you allow that. Well, I didn't create this thought, I didn't want this thought, I didn't ask for this thought. This thought just came upon me like 50,000 others in a day. Now I'm going to use that thought to remind myself I am not my thoughts. I am the thinker. I can change what I think. And then I can take that thought and I can try to find what's the opposite of this thought. What would the opposite be? And I am safe. I am not alone. I am never alone is the beginning. And then that can lead you to the positive anticipation of what good might be sitting there waiting to happen. What good things. I mean, we put a lot of effort to keep negative stuff away, but keeping negative stuff away almost always has a really positive side to it. As, you know, something good's gonna happen, right? Something wonderful is gonna take place, you know. You're holding a dinner party and you're not sure you got enough cookies, right? And and you think, oh my God, should I have gotten bar cookies? I need more cookies. You know, I am safe. I'm not alone. This party's gonna go really, really well because it's filled with wonderful people. We're going to enjoy whatever food we have, and it's gonna be a lot of fun. I can hardly wait to see, you know, Mary Joe again. And Mary Jo is gonna be so much fun, and we're gonna have such a great conversation, and she's always funny, and you know, Billy Bob's always got a joke. Isn't that funny? Billy Bob's always brings a new joke to every party, is gonna be so much fun. And so what happens then is that idea that, you know, which weighs more? A thought of 50,000 pounds or a thought of a feather? Neither weighs more, they're just thoughts. They come and they go, and I can use them to trigger new, better thoughts that move my emotions in the opposite direction. And so, you know, feeding your mind, I think starts with observing it, starts with forgiving yourself for how these mental habits came about, and then using techniques to start to create new habits. There you go.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Sorry for talking so much.
SPEAKER_01:No, that's I get sucked in. I'm like, oh yeah. So that's it, folks. No, I'm just kidding. I have uh I've worked with many clients that feel sort of the same way, but they express it in different ways. This idea that when they're alone with their emotions, or sometimes in someone else in the room, but they feel like they don't have the capability or what it takes to move through that emotion, and it's just overwhelming. And afterwards, after the sessions or a session, they're like, Well, yeah, I that you know, I I didn't think I had that capability, I I didn't think I could move through that, but now I can. And they think that I did something to to make it so that they could move through that. And what I like to say to them is like I didn't I didn't install the capability during the session. You know, I didn't program to use those words sort of loosely, but we we know what I think I'm talking about. But I didn't I didn't say specific things so that you could be able to move through those emotions. We just removed the barriers, right? The thought patterns, the the the stuck emotions. We we worked on releasing those. The capability is always there. It's just sometimes when we get that, you know, that weighted thought of 50,000 pounds and we feel it along with emotions and and feelings. Yeah, we can sometimes get caught up in this thought that I can't deal with this. I I need to hide under covers, I need to just shut down for the day. And I think that for the most part, we're all born with that capacity, right? We're all born with the ability. It's just to deal with our thoughts and emotions and think positive. But it just it's clouded. It's clouded. And I I've and there's barriers, and I've sort of given this metaphor before, where you're standing at the end of your driveway, and let's say your house represents you, your your abilities, your you as a whole. And often people feel like they they've lost themselves. So imagine this house now is just covered in fog. Well, you don't think that the house is gone just because there's fog there, right? So we remove, we work together, we remove the fog, metaphorically speaking, and and then all your natural talents and abilities and and capacities, and they all rise to the top. And there's so much more openness to understanding, oh, that's what I need to do, or or this idea just came to me now, or it just gives you so much more breathing room once you unlock those emotions and release most of it or all of it, just lets you think again, right? There's no more fog, no more barriers.
SPEAKER_00:Anyway, that's my uh I think that idea is is huge. I think the idea, and it's in a lot of places in spiritual texts. I think that embracing that idea is maybe a great way to feed your mind. My natural state is joy and love. That is my natural state. However, I envision the creator, creator made me that way. We talk about we talk about having hobbies that make us happy, and I love that idea that there's things we can do that makes us happy. You know, for me, music does that. Just gotta turn on some music, and it will immediately shift my mood. Immediately. Right? This is not something that makes me happy. This is something that is distracting me, taking me away from the thoughts that made me unhappy. And that's just the process of comforting, right? We all do that. Let's get a blanket, I'll feel better. Let's have some potato chips, that'll feel better. Let's put on some music, I'll feel better. Let's watch Ted Lasso, I'll feel better. Right? These are all attempts to comfort our otherwise systematic, repetitive, habitual, out of control, not even ours, negative thoughts. And so to think about something making you happy, I think is a confusion. It's better to think of it as this removes that which is blocking my natural state. Like you say, the fog or the clouds in the sky. The sun's always there, but the clouds in the sky get in the way. To think of it in those terms, my natural state is joy. My natural state is excitement and curiosity. My natural processes are creativity and active choice. And what I have instead is a very elaborate, systematic training filled with reasons why I should be afraid. And that is keeping me away. That is blocking, that is interfering with my natural state of joy. And that's okay. Because what you can do is remove the clouds, blow the fog away, recognize that you can do something that eliminates those thoughts. So to me, I think one of the incredible new thoughts, an incredible new reframe you can look at is to remember when you're at your worst, when you're feeling the most upset. You know, I get there, and this is the new technique I've been using for about eight months now, and it's why it's right top of mind. And why when you started talking about the fog, I just thought that was beautiful. Joy is my natural state. What's going on here? Joy is my natural state. What's going on in my mind here that's interfering with that? And then maybe I need to choose differently. Maybe I need to start choosing my thing. That's when I can kick in, you know. I'm not my thoughts, I'm the thinker. I can think whatever I want. But joy is my natural state. So what's going on here is something's interfering with that rather than how do I make myself joyful? How do I make myself happy? Right? It's something is interfering. Sometimes those thoughts are very present and they're very real, and there's real conditions that need to be addressed. And one of the worst things we do is we don't address them. We spend our time in the feeling, the negative feeling, and then we don't address the thing that would actually alleviate the feeling because we maybe don't feel we can, or we feel alone, or we're not sure how to do it. This is where I think help comes in. This is the importance of help. This is the importance of turning to somebody close and saying, I need some help with this. I'm caught up in these thoughts. I'm afraid of this. I need some help with that. But sometimes we can come up with the answer ourselves. And the only response then is to do it. Do it as quickly as you can. Get it done, right? Just get on with it. Just say, yeah, this is the thing that's interfering with my happiness. This is the thing that's inhibiting my joy. I want to address it. And I want to address it now. Now, I think that asking for help and being with others is an important part of that. But I think it's important to see that my natural state of is joy, and the thing interfering with that is the way I'm using my mind, the way I am interpreting the situation in front of me. And I think it's important to take ownership of that. Otherwise, you're just going to use this technique to go around blaming everybody.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:I didn't think of that yet. I'm going to go around and blame everything and everybody and all the situations and my whole life is all to blame why I'm unhappy. Um, joy is our natural state, there are things that we can do to bring that forward.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Also, too, something that I've started to use in sessions, and it's it's bringing up right away the the core of what's going on. So normally, or in the past, let's say I would take people through, you know, the stream technique, and then, you know, can you feel that emotion in the body anymore? Yes, okay, let's stream it out. Like let's get it out into the stream or pluck it out of the body. Just imagine it coming out. And then once we're down to the little bits that are left, usually what I'll say is, okay, imagine that's a marble and just pluck that out of the body, right? Like pull it out in front of you. It floats in the air there. And what message does it have for you? And nine times out of 10, the message is lovely. And I'm thinking, wow, isn't that fascinating that an emotion can have a good message for you? Right. And so I started thinking though, well, what why is it hurting then? Like what's going on? What's the other side to this? What if it has such a nice message? What's the other part of it? And so I've started asking people. I've started asking the them to ask the emotion, why does this hurt so much then? If that's if that's your message, what's going on, right? Why is this paining me? And they're answering. The emotion is answering and giving. the ultimate belief that they're holding on to. It's quite fascinating. So next time you pluck out of emotion, ask what's your message? And why is this causing me grief or pain or hurt? Like, you know, why is my my stomach all feeling terrible? Or why do I have this pressure in my chest or throat or whatever? If it's such a nice message, you know what's going on deeper here?
SPEAKER_00:So yeah, how do I feed my mind? Well I think first I understand it a little bit better. Right? It's just like any kind of nutrition, right? It's you know you you goats eat anything, right? But you shouldn't. And it's understanding what nutrition is that causes you to choose to take care of yourself with good food. It's in understanding where our negative thoughts come from and deciding that we want something different and picking the things that feed our mind knowing that what we're really trying to do is stop a flow of thoughts that are interfering with your natural state of joy. And that's why you know we could have answered this I think we we could have answered this topic quickly with oh I'll listen to music, read a book, watch TV, right? But that's not that's not understanding the situation at all. That's not recognizing how the mind comes about and how it's shaped and what its habits are. And that's more important because then we can choose the nutrition that we want for the mind. We can be more deliberate and we can be more specific. I think one last point I would make is that you know thoughts are like trains. They attach on to thoughts like them and then they start going really fast. They're really hard to steer they're really hard to slow down they're really hard to stop. And I think it's important to see that habitual continuous nature of thoughts and do things that literally break that process. Right? There's a there's some loose science out there that suggests if you hold a thought for 15 to 17 seconds, it will be joined by a thought of very similar meaning and vibration. And that when you spend 64 seconds on a thought you're now absolutely shifting your mind and your body right and so these these negative thought trains that come upon us, we have to I think it's good to see them that way. This is a train right it's on a track it's going for me to just say stop right now is probably pretty tough. Right. But there are methods that you can use to slow that train down to change what's on that train but I think it starts with understanding that this is that this is a this is a train this is a collection of thoughts that have momentum that are duplicating themselves and feeding themselves with the emotional state that they are creating. It's hard to feel in a negative state and have a positive thought. In fact we can often you know be in a negative state and think of something positive and turn that positive thing negative that's the power of the train. So to me what's really important is to find a way to reset. And resets can be sleep resets can be music but some of the absolute best resets are physical activity. Physical activity engages the deep unconscious mind as well as the subconscious mind. So for people who have hobbies for people who have sports and gyms to go to for people who have projects that they want to engage oftentimes they will put a stop to the train and begin to build a new train. Watching a movie you know this is why I think you know we are obsessed with TV TV grabs all your senses and takes it in the direction of a story. And I really believe that sometimes like I do it when my mind is just sort of lost in its mess yeah I'll turn on the TV and I'll watch a comedian talk or I'll watch a funny movie, right? I really think there's value in that you know we've said for for for millennia, you know, laughter is the best medicine and I believe in the truth of that so sometimes when that train is just going and you're not able to stop it, yeah, you can turn to some of these comforting mechanisms and just with the idea, with the intention of breaking the thought train, thinking being so absorbed in something else and physical is really helpful.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Because it involves all parts of your mind and gets you fully focused on something else. So you know if you're feeding your mind and your mind is in it one of its negative habits and you're finding it really hard because the train has a lot of momentum, these are some of the more extreme things you can do exercise, immersive experiences some for some people just go outside, right? To go from inside to outside is sort of that all sensory shift that breaks the train and creates the opportunity for something else.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah before we log off today something came to me while we were speaking the other day we were talking about how we think you and I think right the differences and stuff. And I thought this was kind of interesting and probably crosses into everybody's thought patterns. So I'm very visual right I I don't I don't want to say like I don't have a lot of thought going on up there. But I have thoughts in half half made sentences and I think okay well if I say this sentence maybe some you know I'll I'll continue talking something will come out I'm sure I guess is good for channeling at the moment but what I noticed while we were talking and I was thinking about my thoughts is I am very able to create sentences in my mind when I am highly emotional. So like you know anger sadness frustration even happiness right joy. So when there's emotion attached suddenly it's like things get really loud in there right and so anyway just something to ponder what is that you know it's could be a whole other podcast but why does the emotion make suddenly everything really real right oh I must I'm I have this deep thought over and over and over again it must be real you know especially when we get caught up in those like anger cycles or you know sad cycles or hurt you know it just all becomes so real but anyway that's was just an interesting thought I noticed.
SPEAKER_00:Sometimes I think the best work that we do is simply making people aware that they have a mind that there's commonalities to it but it's pretty much unique to them that it's functioning largely by habit and that can change. And getting in the habit of observing your mind observing your thoughts observing your moods questioning yourself these are you know this is a discovery of your mind and it's a beautiful thing and it's a useful thing and it's it's probably once you search it and spend time with it and examine it and you know the Buddha spent a lifetime doing that you're gonna discover who you really are and that makes it a really worthwhile endeavor.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. All righty so thank you for joining us everybody and have a lovely day and we'll see you later
