Your thoughts about yourself do not and can not encompass the totality of what you are as a human being. No matter how thorough you believe your self assessment to be, your thoughts will always miss the mark.
While a map of New York may be thorough, it is always still a representation of New York, not the city itself. The experience of New York, the actuality of New York, could never really be contained in a map, no matter how accurate it might be. The actuality of something can never be contained in the thought of it.
As Joseph Goldstein points out, "your thought of your mother is not your mother". You are no different.
One of the useful things that meditation can provide over time is a sort of distance from our thoughts. We become less of a slave to them. We recognize that just because we think a thing, this does not necessarily make that thing true and also recognize that our thoughts have some inherent limitations in their ability to assess the world accurately. We don't rely on our descriptions as heavily and are more willing to consider letting them go in the face of new evidence.
Very often, because we don't actively examine the validity or nature of our thoughts, we operate under the unconscious assumption that our thoughts are true, or that they are an accurate representation of reality. True or not however, our thoughts do determine the content of our experience, so unquestionably believing whatever pops into our head means that we're just along for the ride with whatever we happen to think at any given moment.
One day we look at ourselves and think "wow, I'm a pretty good guy. I at least do as well as others" and our experience feels okay. The next day our circumstances change and we think "geez, I really suck. I lie, I'm judgmental, and I'm just horrible" and our experience is misery. Our sense of who we are and the quality of our life experience are tied like a horse to a cart.
Which of these perspectives is true? Am I horrible or doing fine? Neither. They're just perspectives. I understand that they certainly feel true in the moment, much as your current assessment of yourself seems very true and valid right now, but they're just thoughts, and they're just doing what thoughts do. You aren't your thoughts and you aren't your thoughts about yourself.
One example of this might be to examine the way you are reacting to these recent thoughts. Maybe your thoughts about how horrible you are make you miserable. Ask yourself why that should be. Why should it follow that because you've done some horrible actions that you should feel bad about it? What does feeling bad about it do for you? Why not just practice making changes in the kinds of actions you do? You were operating before under the assumption that you were doing okay and now you have new information, so simply change the behaviors. Why all the drama about it?
For the most part, everyone lies. Everyone's thoughts are ridiculously all over the map. Our self assessments are inaccurate and emotional. If you see behaviors that you want to change, simply change them. If you don't want to change them then don't. Either way, know that you aren't so unique in your self assessment as your thoughts might have you believe.
While a map of New York may be thorough, it is always still a representation of New York, not the city itself. The experience of New York, the actuality of New York, could never really be contained in a map, no matter how accurate it might be. The actuality of something can never be contained in the thought of it.
As Joseph Goldstein points out, "your thought of your mother is not your mother". You are no different.
One of the useful things that meditation can provide over time is a sort of distance from our thoughts. We become less of a slave to them. We recognize that just because we think a thing, this does not necessarily make that thing true and also recognize that our thoughts have some inherent limitations in their ability to assess the world accurately. We don't rely on our descriptions as heavily and are more willing to consider letting them go in the face of new evidence.
Very often, because we don't actively examine the validity or nature of our thoughts, we operate under the unconscious assumption that our thoughts are true, or that they are an accurate representation of reality. True or not however, our thoughts do determine the content of our experience, so unquestionably believing whatever pops into our head means that we're just along for the ride with whatever we happen to think at any given moment.
One day we look at ourselves and think "wow, I'm a pretty good guy. I at least do as well as others" and our experience feels okay. The next day our circumstances change and we think "geez, I really suck. I lie, I'm judgmental, and I'm just horrible" and our experience is misery. Our sense of who we are and the quality of our life experience are tied like a horse to a cart.
Which of these perspectives is true? Am I horrible or doing fine? Neither. They're just perspectives. I understand that they certainly feel true in the moment, much as your current assessment of yourself seems very true and valid right now, but they're just thoughts, and they're just doing what thoughts do. You aren't your thoughts and you aren't your thoughts about yourself.
One example of this might be to examine the way you are reacting to these recent thoughts. Maybe your thoughts about how horrible you are make you miserable. Ask yourself why that should be. Why should it follow that because you've done some horrible actions that you should feel bad about it? What does feeling bad about it do for you? Why not just practice making changes in the kinds of actions you do? You were operating before under the assumption that you were doing okay and now you have new information, so simply change the behaviors. Why all the drama about it?
For the most part, everyone lies. Everyone's thoughts are ridiculously all over the map. Our self assessments are inaccurate and emotional. If you see behaviors that you want to change, simply change them. If you don't want to change them then don't. Either way, know that you aren't so unique in your self assessment as your thoughts might have you believe.
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