What Do You Think About?
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“What we think, we become.”
Buddha
We live in a culture that prizes action and achievement. A world in which the first question is often, too often, one about doing.
What do you do?
We do many things, don’t we? We work. We play. We parent. We stray.
And we must keep track of all of the things we do and the things we hope to do. And so. We make lists. To do lists. Endless tallies of items to tackle, of boxes to check. The more we do, the more we move our bodies, the better we think we feel. There is satisfaction in sustaining motion, in movement, in mania.
And so. We run around. Between Here and There. Then and When. Now and Later. We breathe hard, huffing and puffing, heart thumping proudly, limbs soon stretched and exquisitely sore. We stop only to sleep, but do we even stop then?
But what about thought? About ideas? What is life without these things? Can it be good? If we do not think, can we truly become?
Sometimes, in the hustle and bustle that is life, we forget to think (big). We forget to stand still and open, to let ideas come and grow. We forget to dream. We forget to ask. We forget to imagine.
Maybe it’s time to remember. That a life of buzzing and clicking and going is not the best life. That a life lived according to endless lists and ceaseless charts is not a full one. That we are creatures with minds.
Maybe we should ask a different question from time to time. At the cocktail party with the pretty people. At the grocery store with the cart full of things. In the coziness of our covers before goodnight.
What do you think about?
Who? Me? I think about the tangle of life and love, of secrets and silence. I think about the joy in chubby cheeks and the snow on mountain peaks. I think about how fear is the best professor I’ve ever had, how grief is a rough cut gem. I think of that gumball machine I had as a girl and the sweetness of some kinds of struggle. I think about the power of pink potties and the folly of certainty. I think about loss and laughter, about holes and wholes, about the importance of night. I think about time and where it takes me, up and down, home and away and here, about the brilliance of stains and scars and sour candy. I think about identity and oceans, about flaws and straws. I think about family and freedom, about happiness and home, about body and mind and belly. I think about wilderness and words and wisdom and windows. I think about thinking, about its impeccable and impossible essence, about the cruel and compelling shadow it casts, the light it brings. These are just some of the things.
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What do you think about? Do you agree that what we think, we become? In this society of go-go-go and do-do-do, do you think many of us forget to think?
Everyone struggles and...
Definitely – rather than thinking, I mostly worry… not the same thing!
A very poetic and thoughtful post from you this morning – far beyond most Monday morning mortals.
Worrying does not equal Thinking– Good point! I need to think about that…
I wish I could forget to think sometimes. I think all the time. I think about love and loss and fear and the future, about people and places I’ve left behind and miss, about celebrity news and Mary Oliver poetry, about my parents and my children, about why it keeps snowing All The Time this winter, about the days are inifinitessimally longer every day now as we move towards the solstice.
And I think that your paragraph about what you think about is one of my favorite paragraphs you’ve ever written.
xox
I agree with Lindsey. Your final paragraph was exquisite.
Since you admitted Bachelor watching, I’ll admit to Oprah watching. I was struck when Nicole Kidman (talking about Australia) said “in the US your life is filled with work and in Australia it’s about enjoying your time, about living.” I can’t help but think we have things a little bit off. I love to stop and think during a run or in the bath and was “thinking” (yesterday!) that it’s important that people have these times in their day to let their thoughts go. I am thinking about climate change a lot (scared by it) and thinking about parenting (Tiger Mother) and thinking about making sure I don’t look back and realize I spent too much time working and stressing and list-making.
I also am an obsessive thinker and think about thinking! But more eerie than not thinking or thinking about thinking, is the fact that most people don’t feel. It’s interesting if you think about it.
In my classes they’ve taught us how to differentiate processes and most people, despite how emotional they think to be hardly feel. Most our guided by how we think we feel.
Lovely post to wake up to!
My mom and I were just talking yesterday about how sad it is that so many people don’t stop to think about their value system, what it is that is important to them. It doesn’t have to be the same thing for everyone, naturally, but so many people just *go* without ever stopping to consider what it is they value, without thinking.
Of course, my mom is a philosopher and a theologian, so she thinks more than most people!
Thinking is good. Haven’t we always been told since children to think before we speak, and look before we leap? Same principle. Before doing, stop to consider.
Lovely post! I think that I *think* too much and often don’t *do* enough, at least when it comes to the big picture (I do lots of little things, like chores – probably too often!) Sometimes I spend my time doing chores and thinking instead of taking action on those big thoughts and realizing my goals. It’s definitely something I want to work on. Getting out of my head a little and becoming a DO-er! But it’s harder (for me) than it looks.
I think about everything. The past, the present, the possibilities of the future. Sometimes without articulating the thoughts, but a tangle and overlay of visuals, frequently more significant and from which precise words may emerge and shape the thoughts into priorities, action plans, or leave them at musings.
Worries are a different animal and always part of parenthood; they change their shape as children grow, but they do not disappear.
Thinking is doing, in so far as it leads us to action and inaction – both frequently being choices. Worry is both productive and not, in helping us shape preventative measures and safety nets, part and parcel of parenthood.
no way! i was just doing some thinking about thinking myself this morning. i wrote a post about it and how time affects thought.
i took a class once where the professor challenged us to ask different questions. the challenge posed was to stop asking questions that seem meaningful while being actually empty, such as “what’s your name?” there is significance in a name, certainly, but it’s not communicated in the simple answer of stating your name. her list went on, including “what do you do?” in the end the challenge was to try to figure out ways to engage with people that were about their internal person more than their external output. it was surprisingly difficult and uncomfortable.
anyway, you’ve got me thinking about how we engage, how we find connection and why it so often doesn’t feel fulfilling. thanks!
I work from a home office so when the children are in school I am alone. The dog is my sole living companion and then there are my online friends who I interact with somewhat.
So I find plenty of time to think, but even when people are around I am thinking. I think about life and how to take control of the beast so that it does what I want it to do. I don’t want to live to work, I work to live so I focus on that.
I think about how I am in transition and that in the not so distant future my life is going to change again. I sometimes imagine hearing the rumble of a train in distance. I hear the noises that accompany it and am just waiting for it to arrive.
When it does I’ll get on and we’ll see where it takes me. It is part of the great adventure that I think and wonder about.
I think about my husband, family and friends. I think about work, presentations and studying. I think about laundry, and cleaning. I think about all the things that make my life function. I’m so busy thinking about the little things that I often forget about the big picture. I rarely think about the beauty of the world, or special moments that will quickly pass us by. I rarely sit and contemplate life – what it all means and why we’re all here. So, yes – I think we forget to really think. We think about the get through the day (life) things, but in general, most of us don’t think about the things that truly matter.
Today I think about my son turning 25 and how the years flew by. Everyday I think about everything, the past ,the present, the future. I worry about my family and about important issues in the world.
P.S I love the last paragraph about the things you think about
Great post. There’s thinking which I agree with you as something that may fall by the wayside when we’re rushing through our days on auto-pilot. Then there’s over-thinking or thinking but hardly critically — both of which I fall prey to more often than I’d like to admit. Currently, I’m thinking about how thinking healthier thoughts is sometimes a slog though slippery, gray sludge…barefoot.
And now I’m thinking that since you are about to have your third baby girl, that I should recommend to you a fantastic documentary called Miss Representation that I recently saw at Sundance. It’s coming your way at the Athena Film Festival next month I believe.
Hope you’re feeling well and getting decent sleep…
I think about what to have for supper. I think about how to be better at friendships. I think about how I will possibly love a second child as much as I love my first. I think about why I sometimes feel so disenfranchised from the world when I am a person for whom the “system” has worked so well. I think about how I carve my life out of the hours in a day and whether the life I’m carving is the right one. I think about faith and insecurity and confidence and trust. I think about frailty and mortality and eternity. I think about what makes me feel empty and what makes me feel full. And I think that all of my thinking must be a step toward something, though I don’t know what.
I started my day with your post – in my bed, via my ipad, before the patter (or rather thumping) of six little feet hit my bedroom floor. And now that everyone is tucked into bed for the night, I’m back to your post. It struck a chord with me, and having found your blog only a couple weeks ago, I must tell you that I appreciate you putting your sincere and well, thoughtful thoughts into words for us all to read. I currently am thinking about a friendship lost, and it’s been really hard for me to get that out of my head…when someone turns out to be a person very different than you thought and hoped they were. I am trying to re-learn how to fill my head with happier thoughts and move on, to think about all those other thoughts that once filled my head on a daily basis. And so I consciously remind myself of those six little healthy, happy feet that I love and am lucky to have, and of those two other big feet that I get to tangle mine up with every night!
I think a lot…too much. But I do notice I get a little obsessed with reading email and twitter on my iPhone and actually stop to think less than I used to. I hope to change this and am actually really looking forward to a new baby and breastfeeding for an awesome excuse to sit, hours a day and stare at a beautiful baby and think!
I think about EVERYTHING! My thoughts today seemed to be focused around my daughter who has been sick, ideas for a book that is in the very early stages of coming together in my mind (yay! I finally have an idea!) and of course, my most thought of thought…quitting our jobs and moving somewhere tropical where life is slow and the weather is warm and we all have time to be together and think!
You know, I think a lot. But I’ve realized over the last year that before, I thought about a lot of minutiae. Things that needed some thought, yes, but instead of giving thought and moving on, I’d mire and thrash and spin and spin on reckless thoughts, energy-zapping thoughts.
Now, I try to give energy to the kind of thinking you beautifully articulate here. The slowing, the dreaming, the sometimes just stopping.
I think about loving, living, running, writing, breathing, worrying. I worry I think too much, about loss, dying, goodness and sadness. I think about how in any given instant the pendulum can swing the other way.