Have you ever been with a person like this?

Have you ever been with a person, who is talking all the time?

Talking about the clothes of others, about the shoes of others, about how others behave,

Talking about the weather, or their opinion about everything…etc.

Have you ever been with this kind of person?

Yes, almost everyone has.

With this person, sooner or later, or even immediately we feel tired.

I’m not talking about your kid, your husband or wife, neither your boss.

This person I’m talking about right now, is your mind.

Your mind is constantly talking t

o you. Non-stop.

The mind is like the wheel of water mill. Turning and turning.

Or the thoughts are like our saliva, because our mind continuously create the thoughts, like our mouth continuously create saliva. It is

just a process.

So it is not abnormal that we have so many thoughts.

The moment it becomes a problem is when we take them as reality, when we take it as truth.

Our mind is constantly telling us stories, or just babbling.

"The moment it becomes a problem is

when we take them as REALITY."

For example, this morning, when I walk in the office, there were 3 colleagues chatting but they didn’t look at me. At this moment, my mind started to tell me story: they don’t like me? Or they are silly people. Or they are talking about me … etc.

Sometimes, my mind tells me that I’m adorable.

Sometimes my mind tells me: I’m useless.

Sometimes my mind tells me: No one loves me.

Or sometimes my mind tells me: Everyone loves me.

So there is reality, and there is stories.

Our problem is not that we have thoughts.

Our problem is we take the thoughts as reality.

The real work is not to throw them out, to eliminate the thoughts.

The real work is to TAKE A STEP BACK.

Sometimes the thoughts are so many, they are like waterfalls.

Have you ever been under a waterfall?

Your thoughts, your stories, so strong, so powerful, even overwhelming, fall onto you…

The work is just to take a step back.

This is the purpose of practising meditation or mindfulness:

To create this space between the thoughts and the reality.

To cultivate this inner force to be able to take a step back when we need.

Thanks to this inner force, we can take a step back and we won’t be swept away by the waterfall of stories that our mind tells us.

There is one of my favourite quote of Viktor E. Frankl:

“Between stimulus and response there is a space.

In that space is our power to choose our response.

In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”

Tomorrow is Chinese New Year. Wish you all a beautiful "Water Tiger Year":

To start something new, like the energy of tiger.

To be in the flow, and include others, like the water.

If you want to start meditation, we'll do weekly meditation session for free.

Welcome:

https://www.juliannliu.com/event.