What we think just does not mean anything. Yet, what we think is the Operant Factor[1]. How come “nothing” is what catalyzes everything? The answer is: “Because it gets activated.”
A thought is inert. It means nothing[2] until it gets activated. How we activate it may include the meaning we give to it, how we focus on it, whether we act upon it or react to it, etc. All this takes place, most of the time, outside of our awareness. This means we are activating our thoughts all the time, without being aware of it.
Now, thoughts being the Operant Factor, we can appreciate how they have been activated by looking at their ultimate outcome. And this ultimate outcome takes a number of forms, including our feelings, our behaviors, our habits, the different results in our life, our identity, and our belief system that gets strengthened and consolidated.
In other words, while we’ve been activating our thoughts unconsciously, the results, the ripple effect, and the consequences of that activation, eventually become obvious and palpable, confirming how thought is, indeed, the Operant Factor, regardless of whether we know, understand, or accept it, or not. But there is more to this. Our life is not simply an accumulation of the ripple effect of the unconscious activation of our thoughts. This is a small piece of a much bigger puzzle. For life follows the Neutrality Principle, the Opportunity Principle, the Best Interest Principle, the Mirror Principle, and the Reflection Principle.
These principles, however, ought to be understood and properly used. Otherwise, we will have an accumulation of the ripple effect of the unconscious activation of our thoughts. In other words, we ought to desire, want, decide, commit, and be determined to understand and use these principles; and this is a crucial caveat and entails a conscious decision. For as Einstein reminded us, “The most important decision we make is whether we live in a friendly or in a hostile universe.[3]”
Said in other ways:
- Everything follows the Neutrality Principle
- This means nothing is either good or bad
- Everything follows the Opportunity Principle
- This means everything is simply an opportunity
- This is because everything follows the Best Interest Principle
- This means everything is happening for the purpose of your evolution, the evolution of life, of which you are actively participating
- The mechanism of the Opportunity Principle takes place through the Mirror Principle and the Reflection Principle
- This means everything we have in our life is simply telling us about how we are using our mind, our cognitive faculty, our cognitive functions, or our thoughts
- This also means no mirror can ever show us anything other than ourselves whenever we are looking at it
- This also means nothing else can ever be reflected other than that which is being projected by us, from within, though without us being aware
- This means going forward we are being invited to start taking steps to understand and use at least the Opportunity Principle
- This means the moment we get to use the opportunity principle, everything else is expected to fall into place.
This all means that while this is how life works, it does not mean that we all automatically benefit from it. Why not? Because we interfere; and that’s the catch. We interfere. We interfere a lot and, we often are unaware that we are interfering. We then unconsciously activate our thought, directing it from a set of limiting beliefs, leaving us with a very limiting life – a life of confusion, disempowerment, and suffering; and a life where none of us are even close to living our potential.
Yet, despite our interference, these Principles keep running, just like the sun, the moon, and the stars; just like the movement of the planets, the cycle of the seasons, the river running into the sea, and the sea into the ocean. It all mimics how the principles work, as they are all of the same nature. Further, just like the sun shines everywhere, the principles operate everywhere. They do not work any better for some and less so for others. They are impartial, just like nature is. They just operate, and it is up to us to know how to understand and use them; just like we learned to understand and use gravity, electricity, radio, the internet, and so forth.
What to Do:
If you belong to the SWEET community, you are part of a very selective and elite group. This is not because of your socio-economic status. This is not because we have made SWEET an exclusive clinician club. Rather, it is because you have access to a system that helps you understand and use these principles that most are unaware of. This system combines Consciousness-Based Intervention (CBI), which many of you have spent one-year learning, and Unconscious-Based Interventions (UBI), for which many of you have been enrolled in to learn, for 6 months.
CBI provides us with an intellectual understanding of the principles, while UBI provides us with an experiential understanding by having direct access to our unconscious mind. With these two interventions combined, you have access to a complete, innovative, and life-altering intervention that is based on the 5 major systems of Thought Formulation. In other words, this intervention is one that is based on what is constant whether one tries to understand through science, through philosophy, through metaphysics, spirituality, or religion. This is what makes this intervention life-altering, complete, and innovative. This is what makes you, who belongs to the SWEET Community, considered part of a selective elite group. This is why we know you will implement it and help make it available for others. One place you can start is to use the Opportunity Inquiry as often as possible; and start helping others do the same.
For it is time for people to leave suffering behind, and become empowered, have a life of satisfaction, become fulfilled, self-actualize, and then self-transcend, as it was the hope of Abraham Maslow[4] and of the many great clinicians who have come behind us.
[1] Sidor, M., & Dubin, K. (2021, June 10). Understanding the 3 fundamentals that govern all human beings. SWEET INSTITUTE – Continuing Education for Mental Health Professionals. Retrieved October 2, 2022, from https://sweetinstitute.com/understanding-the-3-fundamentals-that-govern-all-human-beings/
[2] Stein, M. (2019, August 21). Thoughts are just thoughts: How to stop worshiping your anxious mind. Anxiety and Depression Association of America, ADAA. Retrieved October 2, 2022, from https://adaa.org/learn-from-us/from-the-experts/blog-posts/consumer/thoughts-are-just-thoughts
[3] Sterling, L. (2012, August 17). Is it a friendly universe? HuffPost. Retrieved October 2, 2022, from https://www.huffpost.com/entry/positive-thinking_b_1590903
[4] Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. “Abraham Maslow”. Encyclopedia Britannica, 23 Jun. 2022, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Abraham-H-Maslow. Accessed 2 October 2022.