I am wading my way through a fascinating book, which belonged to my grandfather. It was written in 1931 and is entitled, “A New Model of the Universe”. Written by P.D. Ouspensky, it covers a wide range of topics, many of which I struggle to follow! But I could relate to the following passage on page 256: “Unnecessary thinking is one of the chief evils of our of inner life. How often it happens that some thought gets into our mind and the mind, having no power to throw it out, turns the thought over and over endlessly…And people do not realise what an enormous amount of energy is spent on this unnecessary turning over in the mind of the same thoughts, of the same words…”

That was very insightful of him. It made me more determined than ever to try to replace unnecessary thoughts with a particular thought that could be beneficial to my spiritual growth. As Ouspensky pointed out, we need to think of what we want to think of and not waste time on anything that just pops into our heads.

So, I asked for guidance and opened A Course in Miracles at random, hoping to find a positive affirmation to use whenever I notice meaningless thoughts enter my head. I was led to Lesson 230: “Now will I seek and find the peace of God.” So that is my regular mantra for the time being.

Spiritual teacher, Eckhart Tolle, in his book Stillness Speaks, remarks: “The thinking mind is a useful and powerful tool, but it is also very limiting when it takes over your life completely, when you don’t realize that it is only a small aspect of the consciousness that you are.” p.15.

That is why it makes sense to focus on what we want to think about and not waste time on intrusive thoughts caused by a grievance, an unpleasant event or remark by another.