"Birth of a Mood"

     Moods. Attitudes. Everyone has them. They characterize a day or a portion of a day. Sometimes they can have little to do with the circumstances. In other words, the day can be exactly like the previous day. Nothing has changed. Nothing, that is, EXCEPT your mood. And, it could have gone in any direction, Up/Positive or Down/Negative. Is there something that triggers that mood change?

     Yes. Thoughts are connected to each other. Thoughts act much like a math problem. (2 + 2 = 4) One thought leads to another thought, leads to another thought, and so forth, until a "line of thinking" is in place.

As rain creates gullies and rivets through a mound of dirt, so thoughts have a "pattern". All it takes is one thought (positive or negative) to create an upward accent into a positive attitude or a downward spiral into negatively. Why? Because thoughts are learned in patterns, like a mathematical equation.

     If you are walking through the forest. Suddenly, you hear what sounds like a rattle coming from the ground.Your first thought is important because it will led to other important thoughts. Something along these lines....(1) That is a rattle sound  (2) rattle snake? (3) where? (4) bite! (5) die! (6) %$#@(&!!!! (7) Jump (8) Run.If those thoughts are close to what you would think if you heard a rattle while walking in the forest, it is safe to say that you learned to think that way from others, from reading, from watching movies or from personal experience. We learn how to think. Our thinking is often logical and reasonable.

     But, not always. Sometimes, yes quite often, our thinking is simply there. No reason. No logic. Just a thought that leads to another thought, to another thought, that creates a mood, either positive or negative. How is it that some individuals seem to be negative every moment of the day, no matter what the circumstances? How is it that some individuals seem to have happiness, more positive energy, no matter what the circumstances of the day. "I have learned in whatever state that I am in therein to be content." (Paul in the New Testament). Fairly positive, I would say.

     Mood is emotion. Emotion is a result of thinking. Thinking is learned. (see Paul quite above). So, one positive thought tends to led to another one of the same gender. Likewise, a negative thought tends to look for other negative thoughts. The goal? A mood. Either positive or negative. Remember, you create your world because you create your thoughts. If you are a positive or negative person, give yourself responsibility for that personality trait. If you are in a positive mood, that's right....it's your creation.

     Positive and negative moods carry a lot of energy. Energy is used to move things around.  A mood inventory will generally reveal which mood is our dominant mood and why. It always has to do with our education, i.e. the way we were taught to think AND which mood seems to work best for us in terms of getting things moved around the way we want them. Example: Some children have learned if they throw a temper tantrum they can usually get what they want. See what I mean? NEXT: "Your Dominant Mood and Why"

"What is that Imagination of Yours Seeing?"

                                  "Imagine if You Will"
     Your brain is a theater. You are the writer and director of all that happens on that stage in your brain. Is the brain and mind the same thing. No. The brain is an organ of the body. The stage upon which everything mental occurs.The mind is the image factory. The thinker. The consciousness. The emotive (feelings). The locomotive of the body. Your mind is the result of a functional brain. In other words, your brain produces your mind.
      Imagination is the brain forming mental images, conceptions, perceptions and sensations when the lights are out in the brain. Huh? The lights are out? Meaning there is not perception through the five senses. Close you eyes and imagine. In fact, you don't have to close your eyes in order to imagine anything. A writer, a storyteller, and yes, a liar is a fabricator of imagined reality.


     Your imagination can run wild with any kind of images ranging from sublime to horrific and everything in-between.  Albert Einstein said,  “Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere.” When I was a child my playmates and I discovered the truth of Einstein's words. We would often engage in an entire afternoon of "Make Believe". We sometimes called our game "Let's Pretend". I can recall the "vivid" world we created, complete with emotion and behaviors.
                                                             
      "OK, it's your turn to get killed. I will shoot you three times." I said. "OK, you shoot me three times and I will limp back to my horse and ride back to the hideout." My buddy said. "OK, you ride back to the hideout, but just as you ride up, I will jump out of that tree (pointing to the Mamosa tree that he was supposed to ride under on his make-believe horse) onto you and your horse." I replied. Then he said, and I said, and this went on for hours. By the time evening and dinner came, I had died 14 times, been run over by trains and stage coaches, found millions of dollars in gold, and got the girl 39 times.

     Someone asked me if I thought children's imagination today has been shortchanged by visual and auditory overload. No. The imaginations of contemporary children have been stimulated beyond anything my generation of chidren ever thought possible. We certainly had to use our imagination more simply because we did not have the visual or auditory imput that children have today. That is not to say that our imaginations were better, we just used them more.

     Imagination is a great gift. The content of those mental stories being played out on the stage of the brain is incredibly important. It determines the emotions and behaviors that will follow. A morbid imagination can be a curse. "Imagining the worse" is also a curse, robbing one of potential joy and serenity. Imagination is like faith in that it can move mountains that could not be budged with logic and reason. Train your imagination. Manage your imagination. Use it to motivate yourself to higher achievement. Imagine wonderful and positive worlds. Imagine yourself being happy, succeeding, getting the things you want and need in life. Imagination is yours to use as a healing balm. Positive imagination is one of your greatest gift to yourself. Nepoleon Hill said, "What the mind of man can conceive (imagine) and believe it can achieve."    

Imagination is like faith in that it can move mountains that could never be budged with logic and reason.





 
 
 
“Conversation about the weather is the last refuge of the unimaginative.”


Oscar Wilde