Negative Thoughts and Hearing Voices

Many people struggle with negative thoughts and sexual thoughts.

Perhaps it will help you to know that such thoughts assail just about everyone. It is important that you know where they originate and how to deal with them.

It may also help you to know that these thoughts are not your very own thoughts. At one point you may have  agreed with them, but now they are bothering, troubling, or tormenting you.

Understand this: if they were your thoughts you could control them at will.

Mostly they come in from outside -- things you saw or heard, such as some image you happened to notice or something someone said. Many of our negative thoughts are programming from the past. One child had a mother who kept telling him he would grow up to be worthless like his dad. Another young lady was constantly told that she was stupid. They struggled with these prognostications for decades until they realized the source of the programming, let go of the resentment, and then went on to a productive and happy life.

We make the mistake of struggling with negative and nasty thoughts--and our struggle gives them energy. That energy keeps them alive. It also powers our compensations and rebellions.

After we grow weary of the struggle, there is a tendency to then give in to them for peace or to get what benefit we can from the thoughts or images.

Down in the subconscious and operating through the imagination, the spirit of doubt which has plagued humankind ever since the Garden of Eden uses what you saw or heard to mislead you. It presents naughty thoughts and images to you, or subtle clever ideas, and we make the mistake of either welcoming them and using them for some ego value, or else we struggle with them, which only makes them stronger.

The secret is to stand back and observe them from the neutral zone, neither struggling (resentfully) or willfully, nor giving in to them. Just observing them. The meditations we offer at the Center for Common Sense Counseling have helped some people learn how to mentally stand back  and get recentered instead of floundering in the thought stream.

Many people will see something naughty somewhere. You can't help seeing something inappropriate nowadays. Even the grocery stores have magazine covers that are often suggestive and indecent. It is not a sin to see or hear something improper. Such things are everywhere nowadays. It is not a sin to hear a bad word. It is not a sin to see something naughty. It is not a sin to have a bad thought or image pop into your mind.

If the image comes to your mind later, just notice it and let it pass. It is only if you attempt to use it or struggle with it, that it grows stronger.

It is not a sin to have a naughty thought pop into your mind. Who knows where it came from? The fact that it is there is no more a sin than accidentally seeing a naughty magazine cover in the grocery store.

So don't feel artificial guilty for having the thought or image.  Such guilt just leads to struggle and usually defeat and even despair. Just notice it without using it, indulging it or struggling with it.

You sin when you indulge the thought, when you faithlessly struggle with it, or when you make excuses and rationalize some wrong act. Sin is like bedbugs. It's not wrong to get bedbugs, but it is wrong to make a home for them.

Where we get in trouble is when we struggle with wrong thoughts or give in to them. Worse yet is indulging the thought. Indulging it is accepting it and allowing it to cohabit.  This can lead to more and more, and lower and lower thoughts, along with a need for relief and doing something wrong.

Don't let this happen. Pull back. Meditate for objectivity. observe what is improper. When you observe it from the neutral zone, you are separate from the thought. Your soul is not stained.

We also tend to try to save ourselves, which is also a sin. So we resent having had a negative thought or naughty thought and then we try to deal with it egotistically and angrily. We try to compensate or we cry crocodile tears and make emotional affirmations.

Then when these ineffectual remedies don't work and the thoughts grow stronger, we feel like giving in and wallowing in the sensual for relief. There is also a tendency to think that we are a hopeless case and abandon ourselves to sin. Of course, this is just what the negative thoughts or the devil himself want you to do.

The negative voices will say that "you are no good, that you are worthless, God hates you, that you have committed the unforgivable sin and so on."

Remember: these thoughts are not your thoughts either. The same agency that tempted you with something wrong in the first place, and encouraged you to struggle with it in the second place, then tempted you to wallow in it and now it tells you that God can't forgive you. Don't believe it. Follow it no more. Pull back. Understand that each step was just another variety of temptation.

Sometimes when a person starts to wake up and has some resolve to make some positive changes in their life, the enemy will step up the attack--increasing its inner cruelty. It wants you to pull back and retreat into a comfort zone where it remains in charge. Don't let this happen.

There is a tendency to think that it is now there because of what you are now doing. This is what it wants you to think. It wants you to stop getting better. Understand that it was always there, if you are becoming aware of it, you are just becoming aware of what was always there.

It can also play a trick of laying low, so that you think it is gone, and then become falsely confident. The antidote to all these tricks is the proper meditation exercise, so that you can stand back mentally and observe all its tricks without reacting. 


Many meditations teach an unhealthy involvement with images, such as visualizations, and perhaps you can see that this is just the opposite of what the sincere soul wants to do. The art of separating from thought is what you need so that you can observe it objectively. Trying to blank thought is not the answer either because even if such a person managed to blank thought, then he would be under the illusion that all is well, but what was there is still there, just underground and unconscious, and it will come back.

Learn the simple are of observing thoughts. We have meditation to assist with this process at www.commonsensecounseling.org. Proper meditation is the antidote. It is the simple, effortless way to properly deal misleading thoughts and images.
  

The problem of hearing voices.


Hearing voices is becoming a bigger issue nowadays. It seems to be affecting more young people too. The spirit of doubt has always been around ever since the Garden of Eden, always up to no good.

There is an amusing anecdote which is also illuminating. For years a man was struggling with voices in his head that were telling him all manner of foolish and negative things. He looked awful and was all disheveled and was having a rough go of it.

One day someone observed him walking in the financial district on his way to work, impeccably attired in a nice suit and carrying a brief case.The observer went up to him and said, "Wow you look completely different."

"Yes, I'm fine now," the man said.

"What happened?" asked the observer.

"I found God," the man said.

"That's great," the observer said, "but how did you know it was God?"

The man replied: "He's the only one that didn't talk to me."

The story illustrates an important point. God rarely talks to us. Mostly He shines a light on things, making things clear, so that we can intuitively find our way.

But the guy with the horns and his minions talk to people, and always it is to mislead, confuse and harm. But he masquerades as our thinking. He starts off telling us what we want to hear. He is the master of pipe dreams, excuses and rationale.

So we tend to follow, thinking that it is our very own thoughts, first what we want to hear and later when he has totally corrupted us--negative thoughts, bizarre torments and accusations.

Here is another story that is illustrative. In an old book on exorcism, the author recounts the true story of a nun who was tormented with guilts over things she supposedly thought or did, fears of losing her salvation, and doubts about God and everything good.

This went on for years and years, and she struggled with the tormenting doubts as if they were her own until one day she finally realized that they were not her thoughts. She confronted the source of all the negative thoughts, and the devil appeared.

"Why have you been tormenting me so grievously all these years." she asked.

With an air of callous disregard and contempt, the devil answered by asking: "But why did you believe me?"

The devil, you see, has no power other than what we give him through our faithless struggle. He gains entrance through our lack of commitment to what is right. He preys upon our vanities, and of course, our lack of calling upon God. 

We do not realize that when our ego digs down into the intellect for an answer, a malevolent spirit provides an answer, and it is always a wrong one. Down in the imagination is the no man's land where temptation approaches the soul. Evil spirits talk to us and dress up as seductive images and familiar spirits. It can even sound like your very own voice talking to you. They (or it) can take on frightening imaginal forms or they can even pretend to be angels of light. There is no end to their tricks.

They want you to doubt yourself and disregard conscience (what you wordlessly know in your heart). Of course they always leads people into error.


It can be very subtle. It starts off with little things, like telling you that you forgot to lock the door (even though you know that you did). You go back and check and the door is locked. Then a few minutes later it is there saying that you didn't lock the door.

It tells someone that if they don't count to ten or touch the wall 20 times something "really bad will happen."

It is a scoundrel and will do anything that works. It will say to you that if you don't turn around 8 times something really bad will happen to your mother. It will take advantage of either the fact that you love your mom or that you are guilty for having resented her. It knows how to prey upon our guilts and our insecurities.

When there is a chance to do something wrong, it is always there whispering excuses and rationales. 

It is even there whispering to someone (who is tempted to do something wrong) "this is your once in a lifetime chance to do this." Of course it's always something wrong, foolish, dangerous, or ambitious where you have to set aside what you know in your heart for some false value.


We tend to follow it because we think it is our very own thinking, so it can lead a person into doing really wrong or foolish things.

Then once things start to go worse and worse (under its direction), it is there now telling you that you are "worthless, that the world would be better off without you" and urging you to do away with yourself.

The permissive voice wants to lead you into error, and then it is there telling you that God hates you and that you committed the unforgivable sin. It is a liar.

The truth is that God wants to save you. 


The faceless "it" that talks to you in your mind  wants you to doubt God and His goodness.

It takes advantage of the fact that you think that it is your very own thinking. But the thoughts that come to mind during a moment of temptation are not yours at all. The are from "it" masquerading as your thinking.

The solution to all this foolishness, confusion and error is to learn how to mentally stand back and observe it instead of struggling with it or following it.

This does not mean pretending it does not exist on the one hand or struggling with it on the other. It means standing back and watching it dispassionately from the neutral zone.

The art of mentally standing back instead of getting involved in error is a great skill to have and it will help you not only with foolish thoughts but also in not getting pulled into foolish arguments or actions. If you wish to know more about this art, check out the meditations we offer to help people deal with stress.

Fortunately the art of standing back mentally is easy to learn. You can learn it in 5 minutes. Just get my 5 minute meditation.

You need to do three things.

1. Get my 5 minute meditation (or the 4 part classic meditation) and practice it.

2. You need to realize that the voices and the negative thoughts in your head are not really your thinking. These negative thoughts want to convince you that they are your very own thinking but they are not. They are from the spirit of error that got in from the outside. It speaks to you in your mind and it does not want to be observed for what it is. For once you see it for what it is, the game is up. It is exposed.

3. With the help of the meditation and the above realization, just stand back mentally and observe from the neutral place. Don't struggle with it. Don't try to suppress it. Don't argue with what appears to be your very own thinking. Just observe it.  Neither believe it nor disbelieve it. Just watch it.

Don't struggle with it--that's what you have always done in the past, and it never worked. Instead just meditate for objectivity and quietly observe it until it goes away. Struggling with it can also lead to giving in to it and floating away in rosy resignation. Don't let this happen. Pull back.

Remember, it is not your thinking. If it were, you could control it at will.

Do not be alarmed, just realize that this unholy spirit is misleading people all around the world. Follow it no more. It is not credible, just like a bad B movie on the television at the other end of the room blaring away.

Don't fall into excessive thought. When you catch yourself being lost in thinking or worry, snap out of it. Just keep snapping out and coming back to the present moment whenever you catch yourself lost in thinking. The meditation will help with this.

And of course, don't forget my grandma's advice: don't worry, forget self, get busy, do something, get involved, help someone else.