You might feel a profound sense of freedom when you know that your mind cannot solve any of your problems. This stems from the fact that you have no real control over what happens around you.

I’ve been reading a very interesting book called “The Untethered Soul.” The book’s main message is: we end our suffering the moment we stop thinking about ourselves.

When I first read this, I felt confused. Those who – like me – started a journey of self-growth and self-love, will probably understand why I felt this way.

In books, social media, courses, etc., we’re always told that we need to prioritise our wellbeing and we need to self-reflect and think about our behaviours. This close inner reflection is meant to make us understand ourselves in order to reach our desired potential, change something we don’t like about us, or act in a way that reflects our higher self to the best of our ability.

For me to read that we need to stop thinking of ourselves seemed like the complete opposite of what I learned all these years.

Ever since I started my self-awareness journey, the core of my practices was self-reflection, which means I thought a lot about myself, how I feel and how I’m behaving or showing up in the world. Self-reflection became part of my identity, and it showed glaringly when I talked to people about life and spirituality.

My practices went beyond thinking to deeply analysing and completely focusing on the inner world and the inner thoughts and feelings. I have dozens of journals that have pages after pages of me just writing about myself.

Now the writer of ‘The Untethered Soul’, Michael Singer, comes to tell me that this is exactly the source of my suffering!

On page 94, Singer presents a simple concept that shifted my perspective about how I’ve been using my mind to become a better person. He used the analogy of quitting smoking and compared it with quitting thinking about ourselves.

“You just stop telling your mind that its job is to fix your personal problems. […] Your mind is not qualified for that job. Fire it, let go of your inner problems instead.”

To be completely honest, it felt good to know that my mind is not qualified to fix my problems. It meant I can finally relax, and all I had to do instead, is just let go of trying to fix my “problems.”

Come think of it, how can the mind, which essentially created or contributed to the problem, be the entity qualified to fix it? This reminds me of the core concept in Islam, of which it took its name: surrendering!

What would happen if I truly stop engaging in thought and analysis about my issues, or if I even let go of the attempts to change? What would happen if I shift my perspective from one of inner-reflection to inner-surrender? If I change my beliefs from ‘I need to analyse this and understand why it happen and make a plan to change it’ to ‘I have no control over this and I will trust in a higher power to have it resolved and I will just let go’?

The book presents the practices that we need to adopt to free ourselves from self-focused thoughts, and eventually from suffering. But before I make my final judgement, I want to continue exploring the book.

The next chapter is chapter 11 titled “pain, the price of freedom.”

If you have read the book and it has in any way inspired you or made you think, please share that with me. I would love to hear your thoughts 😊