Disruptive, Negative and Damaging Thoughts

I have been meaning to write about this for a while now and every time I encounter an incidence where I see these thoughts in action, I say to myself, “Why are we so unable to see the negative effects of these thoughts labelled DND?” This stands true for myself as well. I am not free from these thoughts either and I do recognize them as a potential threat to my true happiness. It is a humbling realization.

Let me briefly give a definition for these thoughts and tell me if something sounds familiar.

Eliana was browsing the internet one day and she saw yet another extremely opulent post from one of the YouTube influencers she follows and her immediate reaction was that of disgust, critique and utter annoyance. For some reason, she could not bear the amount of money this woman was spending on expensive things, she could not bear the lifestyle that woman had achieved for herself, she could not stand how poised and elegant she looked and she certainly could not tolerate the promotion of sponsored content/products. While Eliana did not want any of these things for herself, she still felt disturbed by what she was seeing and hurriedly moved on from that post – while at the same time not unsubscribing to that channel. These feelings and reactions stemmed from what she later realized as just envy, jealousy or even just contempt. Why? – because she had seen that influencer grow, she had seen her dedication and her hard work and she had seen the long hours that woman put in (while all that may seem might not be entirely true) and Eliana knew that even though the influencer and she did not belong to the same line of work, she would never be able to be this disciplined to achieve all that she wanted to achieve because she could simply never see herself putting in all that hard work.  The realization made her see the self-sabotage contained therein.

In another part of the world, Jed was spending some time with her friends in her native city. One of her friends was planning how she and her person of interest had decided to get married. And while Jed was not at that stage of life herself, her envy did not allow her to fully feel happy for her friend – with whom she was really close. Despite seemingly being in a festive mood to rejoice with her friend, she internally wished her friend would not go on with her plans. Being the same age, it was difficult for her to accept that her friend had found someone while she hadn’t. It was pure jealousy and it was in bad taste. Jed was ashamed of herself.

Zyla was browsing Facebook when she saw that one of her acquaintances on Facebook had uploaded another one of her really gaudy, extremely tacky looking photo and she was shocked. She immediately took a screenshot of the photo and sent it in a Watsapp message to her friend with the caption, “Why does she always have to look so trashy?” Realizing how mean that sounded, Zyla immediately deleted her message and wondered to herself, mortified; “How can I be so mean to a person whom I do not even know?” She was quite literally astonished and her self-worth stooped to a significantly low level.

Zakwan was going through some Watsapp conversations when he came across his friends post in a group. They were a few lines from an interview the guy had heard and the lines he was sharing meant something to him and spoke to him on a level that was unique to him. Zakwan, whose opinions were strictly opposite to the ones shared by his friend, immediately posted a response filled with ideological superiority, condemning the guy for sharing his views and belittling the thought process involved. Looking back at the argument that ensued, Zakwan was frankly quite shocked as he read his insensitive words. His embarrassment led him to reflect upon the kind of mindset that allows for a human being to become subservient to his own views and his own views alone. It was a moment of reflection.

All these are instances of Disruptive, Negative and Damaging thought processes. And quite similarly, there are so many other men and women that go through much of the same reactions to everyday social media posts as well as real life instances. These feelings of envy, jealousy and contempt are not just characteristic of a select few people. This is us as humans. We are born with a little bit of everything inside of us and there really would be no difference between us – considered the superior most of all living things – and animals.

Reading these instances, did you reflect upon any of such instances in your life where you had been subject to such a reaction or where you were in fact the person caught in such an outburst? Personally I feel like there is nothing to be ashamed off as long as you realize what is going on.

DND thoughts, have a natural tendency to lead you off the path of contentment and happiness. This is a general observation on my part. Every single time I have found myself experiencing any form of envy, jealousy or contempt, it has made me uncomfortable – it has made me question who I am as a person.

I am writing this post just to share that we need to be acutely aware of what kind of vibes we are giving off in our everyday lives. Irrespective of whether one is a believer in the stars, or the spirits, or energies or religion; what projects out of us will surely be projected back onto us.

I am not saying that this post will make you magically turn off all such reactions housed within you, because no it will not! We will not be humans if we do not err. But every time I face such a dilemma – where my own reaction stuns me – I offer a sincere apology straight out of my heart – to the One who listens to everything. And I apologize for having thought in a certain negative way; I apologize for having been unnecessarily critical of something or someone; I apologize for the jealousy that might have crept into the way I looked at something or maybe even the envy that I might have felt – even if it was for a microsecond.  I apologize for all that and then I offer a prayer in favor of the person in question (be it a post I read, a woman, a man, an online influencer, whatever – whoever) one I might have caused pain (whether they know it or not) because who does not need prayers right?

It’s said that sometimes what someone might need is a prayer from a stranger so yes, my solution is offering a sincere prayer filled with good wishes and positive vibes and I do send that out to the universe for every negative action, any damaging remarks or any disruptive thoughts (Yes! For my thoughts especially).

I do not believe negativity is only in our actions, it is primarily in our thoughts and that is why I labelled this post DND thoughts. We have to watch what our brain thinks. So this is what I do and other people can do different things just so long as we are all doing something to promote positivity and acceptability. Everyone is living a life of their own. How they live it, what they think of the things that surround them, what they believe in, what inspires them, how they dress – we should not concern ourselves with these isolated decisions of other people to the point of judging them. That truly is none of our business.

When we start to monitor our thought processes, we start to live more consciously. We are aware how we are treating others around us and what kind of a life we are living. By rethinking our mental attitude towards strangers and friends, we learn a new sense of self and can thus steer clear of every thought that clouds our inner peace.

The following words have a deep meaning for those who are willing to reflect:

If someone tells me that the sky is green I simply say “okay”. I don’t need to agree with them, and I certainly don’t need to prove them wrong or to show them “proof” that I am right and that the sky is in fact blue… I simply go on with my life with this newfound understanding that to some people the sky most certainly looks green. And I’m okay with that. It keeps external conflicts from disturbing my inner peace. And isn’t that where world peace begins- with each of us being peaceful?