Henry Ford once said, “Whether you think you can, or you think you can’t — you’re right.” And William Shakespeare said, “There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.” I was introduced to those quotes years ago, and I’ve always thought I knew exactly what they meant. However, I’ve just finished reading Don’t Believe Everything You Think by Joseph Nguyen, and I have new insight into my own thinking about thinking.

In meditation practice, we are taught that thoughts will occur and that it is never possible to have an “empty” mind. However, we are also taught not to think about our thoughts; we are to acknowledge them and let them go. The thoughts are not to become the focus of our practice. In Nguyen’s book, he says more forcefully, “Thinking is the root of all suffering.” He makes a very solid case for such a thought and has led me to question my own thinking about thoughts and thinking.

I look at my writing practice as an example of what Nguyen says. Let’s say I have some characters and a storyline, and a thought comes to me about what should next happen to those characters. I don’t know where the thought comes from, but it does, and I try to follow it. More frequently than not, I think about the thought too much, in search of the perfect words to express the thought, and before I know it, the thought is gone, and I sit and stare at a blank page.

On the other hand, if I follow the thought and simply write whatever my intuition tells me to write (knowing I can edit it all later) and follow my heart, I frequently end up with something worthy of my characters and the dilemma I’ve placed them in. Expanded from the writing world to the rest of the Universe, and the truth about the differences between thoughts and thinking still applies. “A tree is in my yard.” That is a thought. I may think the tree is beautiful, or I may think the tree is ugly. However, thinking those things does not make the tree either beautiful or ugly. The tree simply IS, and my thinking is the source of positive or negative feelings about the tree.

Nguyen says at one point in his book, “Instead of looking for right or wrong, good or bad in the world, look for truth. Instead of trying to prove we are right or wrong, or how they’re better and we’re worse, look for the truth in what’s in front of you. . . If it is “true” for one person but not for another, then it is not a universal truth. Look for what is universally true for every conscious human being on the planet, no matter who they are, where they’re from, and their background. That is the truth, and where you’ll find everything you’ve been searching for. Remember that the only place you can find this is deep within your being, so don’t try to look for it outside of you.”

And now I’d better stop writing about thinking before I get accused of overthinking thoughts and thinking. I think that’s a thought I’ll act upon.