Increasing the Speed of Thought
Increasing the Speed of Thought by Alan Tutt
http://www.KeysToPower.com
You've probably heard the joke that it's okay to talk to
yourself as long as you don't answer yourself. Many times, in
our culture, we find it strange to see someone sitting alone and
apparently carrying on a conversation. But in actual fact, the
only real difference between this person and ourselves is that
we speak to ourselves without saying anything out loud.
A lot of people feel that it's perfectly natural to hear your
own voice speaking words inside your mind. In fact, everyone
that I have ever asked has responded that this is exactly how
they think. Psychology tells us that the human mind operates
with pictures, and that every thought is conveyed inside the
mind as a picture or a series of pictures. Yet most of us think
out our thoughts using words and language.
Many ancient systems of philosophy have taught that this
"chattering monkey" limits your thinking, and restricts you from
ever finding "enlightenment". Zen and other forms of Buddhism
strive to eliminate the flow of thoughts in the mind in order to
allow the mind to perceive "satori", or the ultimate state of
existence.
Sometimes, when I am particularly focused on my thinking, I
notice that a complete thought flashes through my mind, and then
the chattering monkey starts up to describe the thought that
just went through. One thought after another flash through my
mind, and all of them get described with words, as if I had to
explain to myself what I had just thought. And each time a
thought goes through this process of being described, the next
thought is put on hold until the words stop.
It is at this time that I wonder "What would happen if I could
stop the words and let the thoughts play themselves out in my
mind?" After spending several minutes on this effort to stop the
words, I realize that the time between thoughts is reduced to
virtually nothing, and more and more thoughts speed their way
through my mind. And the more I'm able to stop the words, the
quicker my mind operates. Even in a state of wordless thinking,
my mind clearly understands everything that takes place.
I've actually tried to stop the words entirely. While it does
speed up the process of thinking tremendously, it does have an
unpleasant side-effect. I lose the ability to hold an
intelligent conversation with another person. Here's what
usually happens: I'm sitting somewhere letting my mind run
freely and unrestricted. The level of my thinking is taking on
enormous proportions, such as analyzing the ultimate nature of
Life, or the intricate similarities between atoms and galaxies.
Then someone approaches me and asks a simple question. My mind
immediately presents a dozen different ideas relating to the
question, and there is a very intricately detailed picture of
the whole subject. And I'm stumped as to where to begin in order
to respond to the question.
Although I believe that it's possible to achieve a state of
quiet mind while retaining the ability to communicate
effectively, I have not felt it was ever a good time to go
through the process. Mostly because of ego, as I never wanted to
appear to be less intelligent than I was. What I have done,
however, is to set aside time periods where I work to turn off
the chattering monkey in order to focus my mental energies more
effectively on a specific task. Although not as ideal, it seems
to be a good compromise. And over the years, I believe that I am
moving towards the ideal.
Each session where I eliminate a fair portion of the chattering
monkey, I gain sharper insights into the world around me, and
the subject that I focus my attention upon at the time. Over
time, this has given me a deeper understanding of many subjects,
which in turn has increased my level of intelligence. I
recognize which pathways of thought are effective since I have
had the opportunity to let my mind travel a greater number of
pathways. This results in quicker thinking, even when I'm not
working on quieting the chattering monkey.
In many situations, this has proven to be of great use, as I am
now able to learn a subject in about half the time it used to
take, and I am also able to quickly analyze a situation and find
the similarities between this new situation and one I've studied
previously. Only in the last couple of months have I started to
learn about setting up websites and working with server scripts,
cgi's, and MySQL databases. I may not be an expert yet, but that
will only take a little more time. Not only can I work with all
these things, but I can customize many aspects of the things I'm
working with.
There is a quote from Abraham Lincoln that sums up the
importance of learning to speed up your thinking. The quote is
"If I only had 6 hours to chop down a tree, I'd spend 4 hours
sharpening the axe." You're going to spend the rest of your life
learning and analyzing situations. Be smart and spend some time
sharpening your mind. Set aside specific times where you quiet
your chattering monkey. Give your mind the freedom it needs to
quickly move from one thought to another. You'll be amazed at
what you can accomplish.