Freeing Yourself From The Hardest Prison To Escape: Your Emotional Mind

''A mind is like a puzzle; you must unlock it to read its hidden secrets.''

The human mind.
One fascinating work of art.
Breaking out from the prison of our own mind is a real challenge.
We each possess the key to free ourselves from the tricks it tries to play on us, and so the final step we have to do consists in unlocking ourselves correctly.

I find that no matter how much I think I know someone, I really don’t.
We can share our daily lives with our loved ones, and know them by heart, but we will never know what goes on in their own minds.
How their mind operates 24/7.
The thoughts that they believe.
The story they tell themselves.
The deepest secrets they burry deep inside of them.

Change is really hard.
Changing our unhealthy habits, our thoughts, our behaviors, our responses to external events…. require us to reinvent ourselves in a way.
Changing what we’ve been living with for so long, such as our most ingrained mind patterns, is one hell of a ride.
Every time we repeat something, whether it’s a thought in our mind, or a habit, it reinforces the circuits in our brain. And so, if you’ve been a certain way for long enough, it will take a while to reprogram your brain to a new way of thinking and being.

To create a new outcome, we have to do something differently.
I’ve recently felt what it was like to change the way my mind operates.
It is a constant work.
I carry with me different types of journals that each have a different function.
And so I keep track of the progress that I make from month to month, how my mind reacts to different life situations, how I can reframe my thoughts if necessary, etc.
Recently, I added a new category which consists in keeping track of the times where '' my ego tries to win'‘. My ultimate goal would be to eliminate this desire as much as one human being possibly can.

The supreme challenge is that we are constantly in battle between the two independent systems that rule our brain: the Rational Side VS the Emotional Side.
And who finds itself wining most of the time? 😈 😇
I’ll let you answer for that one 😉

We know damn well that our goal is to lose weight, but when we see that Oreo cheesecake, we can’t help ourselves but jump right in.
Ever heard the saying ''I eat my emotions? ''
When you are at the mercy of your emotions, it is extremely hard to be rational.
Do you remember a time during which you reacted impulsively during a fight and said some hurtful words to someone close to you, which you found yourself to regret afterwards?
Hence why I’ve always told myself to never take a decision based on the emotion you are feeling at the moment.

When you are in a happy state of mind, you can take a decision or a big risk that you could find yourself to regret later on, when your feeling will be different.
Just like when you’re in a middle of a fight with your boyfriend, it is not a good idea to bring up the usual ''We’re so over'' , as when the pressure will have cooled down, and you will no longer be angry, you might find yourself regretting the decision you have made. (Unless he was a complete douche right from the get go, then keep on walking fast 😉 )

This picture always makes me laugh quite a bit, as a couple of years ago, I was madly in love with a guy, and as an helpless love-addict, I was waiting for him to ''love me back''.
And so, one day, on Facebook, he uploaded this picture, and if you’re a girl reading this, you know how much overthinking that can lead to.
The saying ''Love Is Blind'' really holds its name for a reason.

The more I read on psychology and the science of the brain, the mind, the subconscious mind, and so on, the more I realize that it’s an infinite pool of knowledge, and that I don’t know shit. (Excuse my language here folks)

As a recovered love addict (I don’t know if it is a word, but I will use it anyway, as it is a type of addiction), the thing that I came to understand is that you cannot completely recover from an addiction. In the sense that you can be 100% sober or addiction-free, but most of the time, it still will be an ongoing inner battle in the sense that you simply have to learn to fill your life with positive things, and find healthy ways that replace the addiction that was once there.
That is a real challenge between the rational and the emotional mind.
The thing you were once addicted to will always remain in a way in the back of your mind, but every day, you have to remind yourself and push yourself to silence that voice.