Thoughts are not facts -- great thing to keep in mind

Over on my other blog, HinesSight, yesterday I wrote "Covid reality: thoughts are not facts." It starts this way:

Driving into Salem today, listening to a news channel on satellite radio, I heard a public health expert say something that made me grab a piece of paper and write it down as soon as I came to a stop:

Thoughts are not facts. 

She was referring to wearing masks in schools as they reopen after a summer break. Like when a student or parent says, "But I thought that wasn't going to be necessary since Covid cases were declining so much a few months ago."

OK. You thought that. But thoughts aren't facts, they're just thoughts. The only way a thought can be a fact is -- no big surprise -- if the thought is factual.

This isn't an astounding new notion, that thoughts are not facts. I just hadn't heard those particular four words before. Now that I have, I really like them. 

I've started saying to myself, "Thoughts are not facts," when I catch myself worrying about something that might happen, but so far hasn't. Where's the facts that match up to my worry? Usually nowhere, because my worrying isn't connected to factual reality.

Often it isn't a big deal if people mistake a thought for a fact. But sometimes it is. 

Trump actually won the election, not Biden. 
Vaccines and mask-wearing aren't effective in preventing COVID-19.
Global warming isn't happening. 

These thoughts are in the heads of many millions of Americans. They aren't facts. They're false. Yet because those people mistake their thoughts for facts, tremendous harm is being done. 

So ask yourself: what thoughts do I have that are being mistaken for facts? Probably quite a few, if you're like me. I suspect that you'll be happier if you're able to do a better job of telling the difference between thoughts and facts. I'm finding that's true for me.

You might be thinking, "Aren't all facts expressed as thoughts?"

Yes, of course. But facts are grounded in our shared, observable, external reality. They refer to something objectively true that transcends the thought of any particular person. Other sorts of thoughts, by contrast, are subjective, even if they're shared by millions of people. 

Thus it is a fact that I enjoyed the taste of a bowl of popcorn I just shared with our dog -- a nightly human/canine ritual. However, this isn't a fact capable of being held by others, since I'm the only one able to experience how popcorn tastes to me.

If you want to believe that Brian Hines enjoys the taste of popcorn, great. But it isn't a fact that can be confirmed in any way other than believing the words I just wrote. Objective facts can be confirmed by others, which is why we can be so confident that Biden won the election, vaccines and mask-wearing are effective against Covid, and global warming is happening.

Comments

[🌺🌺. -- BE Glorious; there is no other way -- 🌺🌺]

Correct

Charan confirmed that Thoughts don't produce karma
If it was; . . . nobody could avoid hell . . .

But the same kind of thought 500 times repeated can produce an act

After all I think this is what Iswhar had in mind when he said that thoughts produce karma (S told me)

Anyway: it's somewhat dangerous to have such 'statements' strongly fixed in the mind
because they also might become reality like so many other convictions did and do,
producing horrors

RS
777

[albert]

Hi RS 777 and thanks for the post. May I please ask you what the "777" means after your RS? Does it correlate to the the three grand divisions of creation as outlined in Sant Mat?

I think I posted the following factoid in a prior post on Brian's blog: Average number of thoughts generated by a normal human mind is about 3600 per hour...or 60 thoughts per minute...or one thought per second, approximately. That's a heck of a lot of thinking!

No one believes that every thought is "factual" or "true", yet every person I know has a certain set of fixed opinions (an agglomeration of thoughts which form a strong belief) and sacred cows (hardset conditioning) which cannot be violated under any circumstances. If one's beliefs are challenged there could be trouble...separation or even furious altercation. This phenomenon of disagreement and conflicting beliefs is the proximate cause of all destruction and wars!

So, thoughts are powerful when they coalesce to form a "belief", whether such a belief is factual, universally provable or not. Most thoughts are fleeting, capricious and whimsical. 64,000 thoughts per day generated by every human being! Conflict, contention, argument and conflagration are inevitable.

[Spence Tepper]

Thoughts arise from impressions. The impressions are there. Sometimes memory, sometimes conditioning, habit, education, even biology (impressions built in).

But their source may deserve some scrutiny. If we can bedbugs aware of it.

The example is great. What we thought was factual information, even grounded in science, may actually be a biased memory, biased to hear what we want to hear, if we are so inclined.

Not all things make an impression on us. And that means stuff may be right in front of us we can't see.

No impression.

Stuff that triggers our impressions may be more memorable, grab our attention, and create a deeper impression.

It is the impressions we are left with that drive who we are. You can call that Karma, you can just call that the way w are wired to attend according to our impressions.

Thoughts do not make Karma. But impressions are karma.

[Spence Tepper]

"if we can BECOME aware..."

[Tendzin]

I thought children were at grave risk of dying from Covid and needed to wear masks.

But then I looked up the CDC report on how many American children died of the flu in 2019. It was over 180. From just the flu.

Then I did some more research and saw that nowhere near that amount of children have died from Covid. I also saw that those who did die invariably had serious co-morbidities. That's when I realized that my thoughts about children needing to wear masks were factually incorrect.

Then I thought that the people who want children to wear masks want them to wear them forever. Until evidence arises to the contrary, it's looking like it's a thought that also matches with reality.

[um]

@ Tendzin

It is an persistent misunderstanding that wearing a mask, is to prevent the wearer ... that is only correct for using particular medical masks.

Mask helps to prevent the SPREAD of infections ...many are infected without knowing it. Wearing a mask prevents the spread of the virus when these infected people frequent the community.

[um]

@ Tendzin

Children can be easily infected in schools etc, have little symptoms if infected and as such are "big spreaders" ... reason for the governments to advise children to use masks.

NOT for them selves but to protect those, mostly the elderly, to get infected and fall ill.

[Sonia]

Well, we certainly are learning the Greek alphabet… alpha, beta, gamma, delta, epsilon, zeta, eta, theta, iota, kappa, lambda

How did we get to lambda already???

Sad.

I really don’t want to know it by heart. At this rate we’re going to reach omega by Christmas.

For the love of God, just 😷 & 💉 or else stay at home alone and get friendly with Amazon. Wouldn’t be surprised if the U.S. mandates Covid vaccinations once the FDA finally gives its official seal of approval. This situation is getting apocalyptic.

[777]

@Sonia
Aocalyptiv; . . . no
In1917 in % of victims was over 100 times more incl deaths
In France under 65 there was no over_morbility and over 65 it was 3%
Nobel prise winner on Aids HIV Prof. Luc Montagnier said immediately
NOT to vaxinate at all because evolution comes in action then with differenciation

@Albert
I tool an anonymoud rmai address [email protected]
I think before my first comment
because my first name is G my last name has 7 letters and i lived half my life & N° 7
Jim here said there is a strange occult cult somewhere using it too

I said it often
Try NOT to think 10 seconds and you meditate, if not it is contemplating
2 seconds is already impossible but so nice in relation with Sant Mat
is that LOVE does this Job flawlessly without any effort
Ask pubering boys & gurls
They fix their mind on ONE thing ONLY

So, . . . try The Love, . . . it s lovely . . . . hence my Goose Bumps idea

777

@Sonia
You found me more acceptable with the non c q All = GIHF idea
I said : as always : God does what SHe wants
I m still convinced that HE ( The Master ) does the Big Bang with a little variant for a loving disciple
if needed

[Spence Tepper]

Love is a fact.

[Sonia]

777,

I find you totally acceptable. Nothing has changed.

However, regarding Covid vaccines, I would like to add that non-vaccinated people are like petri dishes for variants (scientific fact). That’s how viruses evolve. We call it a mutation because it harms us even more, but to the virus these mutations are part of their evolution to make the stronger so that they can survive. Covid virus survival is not helpful to humanity… not in the very least.

I agree with you about GSD not being GIHF anymore than the rest of us.

I also agree with GSD’s stance on vaccination. I’m not a tribalist. I agree with things on a case by case basis. :)

[Manoj]

Thoughts are not facts. 

So true many a people follow blindly after false fake god men baba like Gurinder Singh Dhillion, who think, oh he's so Godly.

What makes a person think that?
it's all the false thoughts and impression from being in a Cult like Radha Soami where the individual loses his sense of perspective and goes on a wild goose chase trying to achieve the impossible, where it never existed anyway.

Eventually the bubble bursts and leaves a broken soul who has nothing to show for but regret and remorse.

Never trust a baba (Gurinder Singh Dhillion) who says one thing, but himself does another.
The never ending lies fed to all on that perched up stage, oh so egotistical hey

Thoughts are never facts.

Facts are real and they show a very ugly picture in Gurinder Singh Dhillions case!

[umami]

GSD was in NYC for satsang on Saturday. He didn't give a discourse, only Q&A. A young man, not yet initiated, thanked him for posting on YouTube. Baba Ji: "You don't need my Q&A's. You need meditation." However, he advised him not to jump into meditation without guidance.