What Are You Thinking About?

"You need to get used to winnowing your thoughts, so that if someone says, 'What are you thinking about?' you can respond at once (and truthfully) that you are thinking this or thinking that." - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

I love this quote.

Everyone is susceptible to 'zoning out' or not paying attention to the current moment and thinking of something completely separate from what is occurring. Yet, think of situations in which you, yourself, have zoned out. A vast majority of those times, you will typically find that if someone asked you what you were thinking about while you were not in a present mental state, you would more likely than not respond with 'nothing', afraid to share where your mind was just at.

Unfortunately, we all know that that specific response is untrue, and rather you are likely thinking of something possibly self-important or malicious. Something that you would be ashamed to tell someone that you are currently thinking about.

This is natural, and Aurelius even writes that 'nothing natural is evil.' However, although it is not evil, these thoughts are not serving anyone — they do not serve the greater good, and they do not serve you.

So when Aurelius writes that you need to get used to winnowing your thoughts, he is stating and reminding himself that he needs to remove from his mind the irrelevant, or useless thoughts, that do not serve anyone.

I think about times when I have reminded myself to indulge in this process and winnow my thoughts. Every time I have told myself to do so, I look back and realize that those thoughts were always useless, even at that moment, and that there was never any reason to be so obsessed with them in the first place. For that obsession leads to a pernicious feedback loop that takes over and absorbs your very own train of thought — leaving you unable to focus at all on your purpose or the next steps that you should take to live a more fulfilling and purposeful life.

I encourage you to be more mindful of the thoughts that you have, and ask yourself whether you would be able to straightforwardly answer the question, "What are you thinking about?".

For if you cannot, and you find the process of winnowing your thoughts to be quite difficult, remember the Arabic proverb, "Write the good things that happen to you in stone, and the bad things in sand”.

Acknowledge that the thoughts are there, but be mindful as to which thoughts serve you, and do not become caught up on the ones that do not.

-Shane, Founders Class