If we make a strong resolution does the mind’s power ensure that we keep it?

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
So, is it that if we decide to do something, this power of the mind allows us? I would say that different habits serve different needs for us. So, for somebody, they might just be a social smoker. That means, just like to hang out with people who are smoking and then if you get a different social group who doesn’t smoke, then you don’t need to smoke.
So, for somebody else, smoking might be a relief from boredom. I just feel a little stimulated when I smoke. Then, it’s not just willpower.
You’ll have to find some other way to relieve that boredom. Sometimes some people, smoking may be a relief mechanism for life’s problems. So, that means, whenever I feel down, whenever I feel distressed, then I smoke.
So then, in this case, we will have to find an alternative relief mechanism also. So, I would not make it a categorical statement that it is only a matter of willpower. I know many people, in giving up habits, it’s called as going cold turkey.
I did that. For some habits, it just works. For many of us also, just let me complete this point.
Some habits, which say like smoking or taking meat or whatever, these sort of things, our normal life can go on without it. It is difficult initially, but we can do it. So, going cold turkey for that, it works very well.
But he was talking about waking up in the morning. Now, that is something which is not always in our control. Sometimes we may have to sleep late.
So, it is situations change for us. So, I would say, it’s always good to take a strong resolution that will give the motivation to continue. But if the resolution fails, we don’t have to make it simply a lack of willpower issue.
The mind shapes the reality a lot. But I won’t say that there is a tendency in post-modern thought to make the mind omnipotent. If you decide to do something, you will do it.
There are books like The Secret or others, they make the mind into omnipotent. The mind is very powerful and reductionistic science. Law of attraction.
Now, what had happened was, if we think positive, it does change things for the positive. But it is not that our thoughts are omnipotent. Thoughts are very powerful and we need to tap the power of thoughts.
Suppose my hand is fractured, it’s not that by thinking my hand is going to recover. I have to follow a process also. if we think that our thoughts are omnipotent and then what we think of doesn’t work, we will actually end up feeling more worse.
Oh, that means I don’t have stable power, I am not thinking properly. What can I do? So, my problem was that my thoughts were negative and my attempt to think positive makes my thoughts further negative because that attempt didn’t succeed. So, what we should do is recognize the power of thoughts but we also recognize the physical reality which may or may not change.
Law of attraction is just a channeling of mental energy. So, it definitely helps. See, it’s a we respond, like I told in the class, we don’t respond to physical reality, we respond to the mental perception of physical reality.
If I am in a desert and I see a mirage, there is no mirage, there is no water over there but still I go towards it thinking that there is water. So, I am not responding to the physical reality, I am responding to the mental perception of the physical reality. So, what the law of attraction does is, it changes the mental perception to more positive.
Now, that is very important but the mental perception alone does not determine the physical reality. The physical reality is also a fact in itself. So, for example, if I think that I am such a great pain surgeon that even if I drink a lot of alcohol, still I can do pain surgery very well.
Well, I may think my power of intention is so strong, I can do it. Well, that is a dangerous thought to have. So, the physical reality, I want to do pain surgery very well, I have to be alert and that means I have to avoid substances that will deter my consciousness.
So, physical reality also matters. Those who reject the law of attraction, they make the physical reality itself supreme and they deprive themselves of all agency, thinking I can’t do anything. But those who make the mind itself supreme, they think that the physical reality doesn’t matter at all.
But in some situations, the physical reality matters. So, we have to acknowledge both. And by the law of attraction, we can change our mental perception of physical reality to more positive and thus we can create a better future for ourselves.