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Comment by alistproducer2 | Hacker News Reader

I grew up an only child and so in absence of anyone else, I learned to talk to myself instead. I naturally have a busy mind and over the years I've found that getting a thought out of my head is the quickest way to get it out of the way.

I've had anxiety issues over the years. One day I was feeling a bit anxious and suddenly the idea came over me to just try to shut off my inner voice - completely. I focused on trying to silence it and suddenly, once it was quiet, my nerves completely melted away. It was amazing. For the next few days I tried to continue my "quiet mind" exercises. It got to the point where I began to wonder if something was wrong with me. The silence became deafening. Scared I might've broken something in my mind I gave up quiet mind but it was incredibly effective against my anxiety.

Now I try and be more balanced in how much I talk to myself and how much I let the voice in my head narrate the world.

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When I started meditating more often, I kept getting distracted by miscellaneous thoughts. At first I fought it to get back to the "quiet mind" but that was frustrating. And I would angrily judge myself for the distraction. I got tired of beating myself up and then I recognized that these distractions were the short and long term problems such as conflicts at work within the last few days, or deep seated trauma, like experiencing ongoing racism and violence as a kid during school.

I stopped resisting the distractions and just allowed myself to think about them while at the same time trying to focus on my breath. As the distraction faded my focus on my breath returned.

I've gotten better at this and I feel like I've rewired my mind into being able to maintain a "quiet mind" and self-awareness, at the same as talking to myself either in my mind or out loud. And so when I get anxiety I can stay grounded and now I just think about what is giving me anxiety instead of letting it go or forgetting it. It's helped me to get rid of generalized anxiety that I've been stuck with for a long time.

That is sort of the Zen of meditating, achieving quiet while the brain is still making noise. I have seen it put like this -- the brain and its inner dialogue is a raging river, swim against it and you will drown. Stop resisting, float along the river, relax, and join the river.

That is how intrusive thoughts are, especially when learning to meditate. It is very hard for most people to silence them directly. It seems to work a lot better to acknowledge you had a thought, and return to meditating.

> I stopped resisting the distractions

I echo this and many others here. Fighting back to "cure" yourself is almost always counterproductive and very, very painful. Think long-term instead, and think management; let it happen but guide it with the aim of having ultimate control over it.

Curious, after reaching the point where you had significantly higher level of self-awareness, have you noticed any alterations in the way you talk to yourself internally, i.e. the tone of your inner voice?

That's an interesting question! I've fallen off the meditation/mindfulness wagon and my anxiety-issues have gotten slightly worse (as a result, I think), but while I was meditating regularly and even as a residual effect now, I do notice that my inner voice has changed.

It feels less serious, often even 'funny' or 'silly', I'm quicker to notice when it goes nowhere or drags me down somehow, and ever so slightly better at either guiding it in a different direction or putting a stop to it (and do something useful instead).

Really quite amazing to see how even a little bit of mindfulness caused a noticeable change after at least a decade of fully indulging in that inner voice and taking it too seriously. Good reminder to pick it up again.

How did you shut off your inner voice? I went on a multi-day, complete-silence (no talking, reading, etc.) retreat to meditate and found I wasn't much closer to shutting off the internal voice or flood of random thoughts.

Not the person you asked, but I do have practice at this skill.

And it is a skill. I also have a highly-active internal thoughtstream, and it can cause me significant stress if I don't control it. In my case, it isn't a verbal dialogue, but rather the thoughts that swim around one level below. Busy nonetheless.

The only thing that works for me is to not fight it. If I attempt to resist the flow, it only amplifies the pressure, akin to pressing your thumb over the garden hose. Much of the stress of these thoughts comes not from the thoughts themselves, but the urge that feels like you must hold and analyze them all before moving on.

Rather, concentrate on letting it pass by, acknowledging it as it flows downstream, without reaching out to hold on. Visualizing yourself sitting calmly near a rapidly flowing creek. Imagine the strength of the flow slowing over time. Let go of the worry of the uncompleted thought- tell yourself that if it is truly worth considering, it will flow back around again in time. Smile to yourself as the thoughts wash through you, appreciating their fleeting nature. After a short amount of time, minutes at most, you will find the strength of the torrent ebbing. It will not cease, but the trickle that remains is much easier to cope with. Ten minutes of this, and you will find yourself mentally refreshed, and ready to get on with things.

This, of course, is not a cure-all, and if you expect it to work every time, you will be disappointed. But it does become easier with practice, and in my case, at least, it genuinely helps.

There are two schools of thought in meditation that kinda apply to this. Some people focus on their breath or a mantra or hum and try to keep thoughts from getting in. If a though appears, just label it and let it pass.

Others do what you're describing, let the thoughts come but see them as just passing clouds in the sky. Eventually you distance yourself from that stream of consciousness and can focus just on your breath.

The two are not mutually exclusive either.

Indeed. There are many ways to the same goal. Much of practice is simply discovering what works best for you.

Fantastic meditation synopsis! Another similar one that I like is visualizing the thoughts scrolling by like the text at the beginning of Star Wars movies :-)

Agreed. Sometimes fighting it, is like trying to stop a bull stampede. I find useful the strategy of simply engaging the mind in something else. Preferably something innovative or meaningful to you.

This may be a frustrating answer, but it's the truest I've found: you just do it. It's an ability you have that no one ever talks about and you can think about it endlessly and do various practices, but really it's an active thing. You might not think you know how to do it, but the muscle is there. You may not have used it very much, but I think you can find it if you look for it. I learned how when I was a teenager and was looking for answers while closely examining my own mind.

My understanding is that you can dissociate from its content which "quiets" its affect on your being. The best advice I've read is to simply become a scientist of your thoughts. Observe your thoughts objectively like a scientist would.

It's primarily a question of attachment. Those who are "best" at meditating have the capacity to observe without getting caught up in the thought stream.

I think it boils down to karma, some people come into this life completely ready to take the inward journey; others, not so ready, need to break a mountain of karmic rocks before the mind begins to truly settle.

Having sat a number of retreats when I was younger (as in over a hundred days across various traditions) it's pretty clear that I was in the breaking rocks phase. Of course, I'm still in the breaking rocks phase (or even regressed to pre-breaking rocks) as I gave up formal meditation practice several years ago.

Effective solution (but unpopular sentiment): Lots of alcohol.

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