Driver Not The Car

"Thinking happens to you."  Eckhart Tolle in A New Earth:  Awakening to Your Life's Purpose.

YOU are not your thoughts.  YOU are the one who hears, notices and/or observes the thoughts. 

Over the years I read about this concept in numerous books, written in different ways.  However, I never fully “got it.”  This is one of those whoo-hooey concepts that I really struggled to fully understand.  Since I know how this concept has the ability to change everything, I will attempt to explain this concept in a different, more concrete way…. by using a “SAT question” type analysis.  YOU are to your thoughts as a driver is to a car…..…

YOU (the big YOU) is the driver of a car and your thoughts are the car.  As a driver of a car, you have total control over the car; you can turn left, speed up or slow down.  However, you are not the car.  YOU and your thoughts do and should have an identical relationship.  YOU are not your thoughts and as such, you have control of your thoughts.  

If you are like I was, and still often am, no such relationship exists.  My thoughts and my “self” had become so intertwined that I had forgotten that I was in control (i.e. the driver) of my thoughts.  My thoughts and SELF had become so enmeshed that I had lost sight of the fact that I could get out of my head (i.e. the car).  I had forgotten that I (big I) was separate from my thoughts…. Just like if a driver forgot that he was not the actual car.  

In Michael’s Singer’s book, the “untethered Soul,” he explains that YOU are the subject while your thoughts are just another object you can be aware of.  You are driving down the street and see a tree and think “tree.”  Are YOU the tree?  Of course not; you are the one who thought “tree.”  You are the “subject” and the thought of the tree is the “object.”

An exercise hopefully helps provide a bit more clarification.  First think of a red truck… then picture a green tree… and then think of a white cloud.  YOU are the one thinks/pictures the red truck, green tree and white cloud.  YOU are not the truck, the tree or the cloud.  Those thoughts are the object and YOU are subject, i.e. the one who is thinking.  Just like the car analysis, YOU “drive” your thoughts and should always be aware of the separation between YOU and your thoughts (i.e. the car).

Thoughts were like breathing to me; constant.  However, identical to breath, we can easily obtain perspective (i.e. get out of the car) of the separateness of thoughts and SELF by focusing on your thoughts.  I found writing down my thoughts immediately provided understanding of the subject/object roles.  For example, yesterday I tried on some jeans.  Because I have put on some weight, the jeans were tighter than the last time I had tried them on.  As soon as I started jumping from one foot to the other wiggling to get them over my “larger than before” thighs, the thoughts immediately ramped up.   I knew I need to “get out of” the rushing flow of negative commentary so I grabbed a pen and began writing down the stream of thoughts.  “You can’t wear those; you have totally let yourself go, you are a failure; you are fat, you are loser; you lack discipline.  (And this is just in the first 10 seconds….).  When I paused and read the words back, I understood I had a choice… a choice whether to get sucked into the drama or not; whether to believe the thoughts and let them make me feel like crap…or not.  In the past, I would have simply believed my critical thoughts to be me and true and would have reacted accordingly (i.e. I would have felt like crap all day and ruminated on the size of my thighs.)  Instead, with the understanding that my thoughts are separate, I was able to look at them less emotionally… and then was able to either accept them or disregard them.  In this case, I agreed with the fact that I had gained weight… however, I disregarded the rest… and with that clarity I was able to make a better decision about what to do.

Michael Singer labels thought as arising from your “inner roommate.”  When I started this journey, I labeled the voice in my head as “Mr. Whackadoo” because of the absolute looney toon nature of a lot of things the voice said.   For 40 years I had allowed Mr. Whackadoo to guide my life and a lot of times make me feel absolutely crappy.  Mr. Whackadoo always had a problem and could obsess about things that happened years ago.  Mr. Whackadoo was never happy and since I believed he and I were the same, I (the big I) was never happy. 

“There is nothing more important to true growth than realizing that you are not the voice in the mind – you are the one who hears it.”  Michael Singer from The Untethered Soul.