3 States of Mind
3 States of Mind
Is your mind full of worry thoughts about the future, regrets about the past, projects you must get done, or things that are not within your control? Which figure, in the picture below, can you relate to more? The person on the left, with a mind full of stressful things to do and to consider, or the dog on the right who is focusing on his present moment and observing the trees and sun (photo credit goes to https://uhs.umich.edu/mindfulness)?
In my experience most people tend to identify more closely with the person on the left, which can be rather stressful and stress, as we know, can lead to all kinds of mental, emotional, physical, and relationship challenges. In this blog I am going to share with you a concept and associated life skill from Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) to help you identify which State of Mind you are in moment to moment and the positive and negative results of each mind state. In order to do this, you need to have a general understanding of what mindfulness is and what it is not.
Mindfulness vs. Mindful Meditation
Mindfulness is the act of paying attention, noticing and being present with whatever you are doing without judgment. This means you are noticing and observing things around you in your environment and you are noticing what is also going on inside of you in terms of your thoughts, feelings, behavior, urges, and movements. You are noticing how you are being affected by others and how you are affecting them. Mindfulness can be practiced anytime and anywhere by being fully engaged in the present moment, the now. When you are mindful you are engaged with your 5 senses. You notice when you have been taken away from the present moment and you are able to bring yourself back to the conversation you were having or to the task or activity you were doing rather getting swept up and lost in the distraction. The practice of mindfulness is available to you all the time. It is a simple as “noticing”.
Meditation, on the other hand, is something that is typcially practiced for a specific amount of time, often in a specific way, in a specific posture. There are many types of meditations such as breath awareness, mantra meditations, guided meditations, visualizations, and loving-kindness meditations. The goal of meditation is to increase concentration, awareness, emotional balance, and calmness. We often use meditation to help with our daily practice of being more mindful. According to a Harvard study, most people spend about 46.9% of their waking hours focused on the what ifs of the future or the should haves of the past (https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2010/11/wandering-mind-not-a-happy-mind/).
3 States of Mind
In my last blog, I challenged you to begin noticing and labeling your emotions. This is one of the first steps in learning to be more mindful. Remember, emotions are one word (happy, angry, sad, proud, fearful, anxious, lonely, excited). Another step is to notice the thoughts you are having, label them, and notice the urges you have to act, based on these thoughts.
Now, let’s talk about the 3 States of Mind, which comes from Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) created by Marsha Linehan. The mind states are Emotion Mind, Reasonable Mind, and Wise Mind. When we are in Emotion Mind we are ruled by our moods, feelings, and urges to do or say things. Facts, reason, and logic go out the door and are deemed as unimportant. What takes priority is feeling better NOW, regardless of the consequences. Can you relate to this? Most likely everyone can relate to reacting out of emotion mind from time to time. Some may find that they struggle with this on a rather consistent basis. If this has happened to you, what was the outcome of acting out of emotion? How did you feel afterwards? Did you get what you wanted? Did you feel another uncomfortable emotion (called a secondary emotion)? Sometimes it can feel relieving at first to get that emotion out or shut down and disconnect, but afterwards we may feel shame or guilt and find it was not worth it.
When we are in Reasonable Mind our behaviors are ruled by facts, reason, logic, and pragmatics. We ignore feelings and we ignore our values. Some highly emotional people will say, “I want to be like that. My emotions get me into trouble.” However, what would it be like or is it like to be in a relationship with someone (family, friend, co-worker, boss, romantic) who suppresses emotions or does not apply merit to emotions. Some of you may have relationships like this and some of you may be like this yourself. How does that work out? Are there consequences of acting out of straight reasonable mind?
So, what do we do? We try to find our Wise Mind. Reacting out of Emotion Mind has consequences, as does acting out of Reasonable Mind, so we try to integrate the two states and find our Wise Mind. Wise Mind is the gentle balance between Emotion Mind and Reasonable Mind. It is like intuition or to the gut feeling that tells us “this is right”. It may have a quality like how hindsight feels where we look back at a situation and can see how we wish we had handled it. The goal is to find that feeling, that “ah ha” moment, BEFORE responding.
When in Wise Mind, we are seeing the value in both emotions and reason. We are bringing both the left and right brain together and we are finding, what Linehan calls, the Middle Path. It will feel like the right choice, the most effective choice. It does not mean there is an absence of emotion, but rather a balanced emotional state coupled with logic and reasoning. The goal is to be mindfully aware of when we are not in Wise Mind and work to find it before responding.
If we are not mindful and have no awareness of our thoughts, emotions, urges, then we cannot identify which state of mind we are in. If we cannot identify if we are in Emotion, Reasonable, or Wise Mind then we will mindlessly respond to our experiences and relationships with no awareness, which can create problems.
My Personal Experience with 3 States of Mind
Like you, I am just a human being. Just because I am a therapist and have specialty training it does not mean I am in Wise Mind all the time. I still have a past, I have experienced trauma, I have experienced hardship, and I have day to day stressors and worries, just like you. Finding the balance, the Middle Path, or Wise Mind is an ongoing job, for all of us, including me. I am very in touch with my emotions and I am rather comfortable feeling them and talking about them. This is a result of both my training as well as my time spent “doing my own work.” Therefore, I am not someone that struggles with responding from reasonable mind only. There are times when I need to focus on facts, logic, and data, but I do not shut out my emotions, which is a characteristic of being in Reasonable Mind. I tend to find myself in either Emotion Mind or Wise Mind.
When I fall victim to Emotion Mind and react out of emotion it is usually due to vulnerable parts from my past having been triggered and that I was unaware of in that moment. This usually happens when my chronic pain condition is flared up, I am overly tired, or I have pushed myself too much and I feel overwhelmed and slack off on my mindfulness practice. We can get triggered by other people, by events, or by our own internal thoughts. It is important that we notice that we have been triggered and use skills to emotionally balance ourselves so that we can respond from our Wise Mind. Even though we may not be responsible for the triggering person or event, we are still responsible for how we respond to being triggered. It is important for each of us to know what things trigger us, be mindful of when it has happened, do the work to heal old wounds, and practice healthy coping skills so we can try to respond from our Wise Mind as often as possible.
If you find that you have responded from a place of emotion or a place of shut down and disconnection from feelings, it is ok. Take a moment to recognize what got “kicked up” (this is mindfulness) or “triggered” in you. Notice how you responded and see if you can identify “what” got triggered (again, mindfulness). Ask yourself if the intensity of your response fits the situation. If you responded at a level 7 out of 10, but the situation really warranted a 3 of 10, then ask yourself if the event or person kicked up something from your past. Often, if the reaction is over a 5 out of 10, then it is very possible that your reaction is being influenced by not only the current event, but also from something old in your past. Not always but consider it. This takes a lot of mindful awareness and is a skill you will need to practice.
Lastly, try to forgive yourself so that you may ask for forgiveness from the person with whom you reacted. Take responsibility and try to repair any damage that may have been done to another person or to the relationship. If you try to repair the hurt or the fracture in the relationship from Wise Mind you will have much better success. However, if the other person is stuck in Emotion Mind or is shut off from emotion, then the repair may be challenging.
If the other person can find their own Wise Mind, repair is more likely to be possible. Sadly, in our society, we have become intolerant of others when they are going through hard times and find themselves struggling with high emotions. Far too often we end relationships at the first sign of conflict and discomfort. I see it all the time in working with my clients and in my own life. We are all far more alike than we are different, and we all have struggles. If we can learn to have compassion and tolerance when someone acts in a way we do not like, then we may be able to preserve a relationship worth keeping. If we have no awareness of what is going on for us and we are not willing to be curious about what might be going on for the other person then we are going to get stuck.
Tying it Together
Remember, mindfulness is something you can practice at any time. It is the skill of noticing, the skill of being aware, the skill of focusing on your present moment experience (not focusing on the past and future) without judging the experience or yourself. In the last blog we discussed mindfulness of your emotions, noticing them, and labeling them. Now I am encouraging you to be mindful of your thoughts and state of mind. As you increase your awareness of these things you should begin to see subtle shifts in your behaviors/reactions, in your relationships, and your ability to tolerate distress or discomfort. Without mindfulness we may go through life mindlessly worried about things we cannot control, the should haves of our past, and the what ifs of the future.
Things to Consider or Try this Week
Begin to increase your awareness of which mind state you are in BEFORE responding to someone in person, via text, via email, or via social media.
If you are not in Wise Mind, ask yourself what you are feeling, what you are thinking, and what you have the urge to do or say.
See if you can take some steps towards finding the Middle Path and find your Wise Mind. Try not to respond until you are in Wise Mind.
Notice the difference in the outcome of your interactions both with others and with yourself due to responding from Wise Mind. How would the interaction have gone if you had responded from Emotion or Reasonable Mind?
Share with Me!
I would love to hear from you regarding your experiences with all 3 states of mind. Let me know your challenges and successes as well as any questions you may have. As always, you can comment anonymously or by first name only. Lastly, I now have the subscribe function working so you can subscribe and be notified whenever I post a new blog. Thanks for reading!
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