Mind spam anyone?

Christine Kane has done it again! Inspired and impressed me. Made me laugh and given me a practical tool for life.

For those who don’t know Christine, she’s a great songwriter too! Her blog offers inspiration and tools for living a more present, sane, creative, and rewarding life. Today’s post is titled What spam can teach you about inner peace. From the title, I thought it would be funny, interesting, practical. I was not prepared for the clever and insightful lesson it offered. (I should have known better!)

Comparing our thoughts to spam mail, Christine gives a simple tool for presence and for not getting carried away by our monkey minds. It’s the classic returning-to-the-breath or becoming-aware-of-the-body, but with a modern and fun twist that may make it easier to remember and apply. I’ll let you read it directly from Christine, since she’s such a master of words, but I’ll quote her ending here (sorry for the spoiler!):

No matter what the thought, it’s just that: a thought. You can believe it. Or not.

Should you bombard your mind spam with affirmations? Should you try to smile and pretend your mind doesn’t do this kind of thing? Should you try to clean up all of your thoughts so that they don’t happen ever again?

Well, you can work on that stuff, sure. But the mind will keep churning it out. And my advice is this:

When mind spam happens, do exactly what you do when email spam happens.

See it as the spam it is. Roll your eyes. Click “delete.”

Beautiful! I’ll just add my own little caution to those of you who haven’t played at exercises like this before. The point is not to growl angrily at the profusion of spam (thoughts) before clicking delete. They’re as much a part of the mind as spam’s a part of cyberspace. Just click delete… with a roll of your eyes, perhaps, and a smile on your face if you can muster it.