Making friends with my mind

You really have to like yourself to enjoy being alone. I am fortunate enough to like myself a lot. This has not always been the case but after years of work, I am in a really good place, at least most of the time. There is always a choice, to be friends or enemies with your mind. I wrote about this already but it is one that could always use repetition.

You must make friends with your mind. In yoga and many other spiritual traditions, it is believed that we are not our mind or our thoughts. Our mind is simply a tool that helps us navigate this complicated world. This tool, that we can’t exactly escape, although we often try, is always going to be with us.

If I can’t escape it, the next best thing would be to make friends with it. In the Bhagavad Gita, a yogic spiritual text, it says, “for the self (the mind) is the friend of oneself, and it (the deluded mind) is also the enemy.” BG 6.5. I know my mind has absolutely been both in my lifetime but I’m finding it has become such a gentle friend lately and that is a gift.

It seems that our outer world is a direct reflection of our inner world. The kinder my mind has become, the kinder the world around me has become as well. The better friend I am to myself, the better friend I become to everyone around me.

Lately, I have spent a lot of time with friends as I’ve traveled around the states. It is so soothing to my soul to have people in my life that make me feel safe and loved. This feeling, that I find so easily in my friendships, is exactly what I want from my own mind.

Because I cannot escape my mind, I want it to be the best travel companion possible. The work of yoga is to make your mind into that one friend who you always want to be around. Imagine if your mind was as supportive, loving and enjoyable to be with as your best friend. Wouldn’t life be grand?!

We also have those people in our lives that aren’t the easiest to travel with. The ones that wear on us after a certain amount of time. A day or maybe even a weekend is okay but after a week, your whole being needs a reset. This is where my mind lived for so much of the time in the past. Being with myself was like being with my most annoying and pessimistic friend. I still catch my mind being my foe from time to time and it is never fun.

When I get into a state where every situation is dire and nothing is going as planned. When all my mind wants to do is think up worst case scenarios and fall into a pessimistic mindset. These are the moments I catch myself trying to escape my own thoughts. I distract myself with whatever I can to avoid listening to my nagging brain that is being anything but a friend.

Lately, I’ve been practicing zooming out in these moments. Realizing that no matter how hard I try, I can’t get away from my own mind. The more I want to escape, the more I need to lean in with compassion. I don’t want to hang out with my pessimistic brain any more than that pessimistic friend. I can’t always change a friend, but I definitely can change my mind.

But to change something, we must be aware first. I have to notice when my mind is acting as the enemy in my life quickly or else it feels impossible to wiggle out of its grasp. When our mind goes into enemy mode, it is an incredible story teller. The trick is to listen to the story but not believe it. When we quit expecting our pessimistic friend to be positive, we can just let them be without as much frustration. This oddly works with our mind too.

When we acknowledge that our mind is just sharing a story about how bad something could be but we don't have to take it seriously, it becomes easier to let it go. Even the most frustrating friend just wants to be heard. The trick is to find compassion for the reaction without feeding it more fuel. There is not a right or wrong way to respond to a situation but there is a helpful and a hurtful way. Finding ways to cultivate a loving and compassionate relationship with your thinking mind will always be the helpful way.

Being alone, as I said before, comes naturally to me. But as I have been traveling and spending significant chunks of time alone, I am learning more and more about how important it is to have a loving and kind relationship with my own mind. It is my forever travel companion and I do not want to be stuck with the annoying and pessimistic side kick for my entire life. I want to appreciate every moment, even the mundane ones, just like I do when I am with my best friends.

Even if you are in a season of life where you do not get much alone time, pay attention to the short stretches of time you do get. Do you have a friend or an enemy within your own mind? Or do you not even know because you distract yourself any chance you get? Our mind will always fluctuate, that is life. But making friends with my mind has been the greatest gift to myself I’ve ever received.