If You Can See It, You Aren’t It

Imagine someone sets a bowl of fruit on the table in front of you and asks, “Is this fruit you?”

You’d laugh. Of course not. The fruit is over there. You’re over here, looking at it.

Now ask the same question about your thoughts.

That’s the idea at the heart of the book "The Untethered Soul". You can watch your thoughts the same way you watch anything else. You can see yourself thinking. And if you can see something, you can’t be that thing.

Written down, it sounds obvious. Living it, it isn’t. Most of the time we’re so caught up in our thoughts that we never notice there’s any distance between us and them. The worry feels like me. The irritation feels like me. The harsh voice in my head feels like the truth.

It isn’t. It’s fruit on the table.

So I’ve started doing something small. When a negative thought shows up, I pause. I watch it arrive, I watch the feeling it brings, and then I let it go.

That’s all. No fight, no analysis. Just a reminder that I’m the one watching, not the thing being watched.

I’m halfway through the book, and it’s already the best thing that has happened to me this year. I’m grateful I picked it up.