Repetition Doesn’t Spoil the Prayer

Constructive living sessions begin May 3rd

Please read to the end of this post. The schedule for our next Mindset Shift U sessions on Constructive Living is announced at the end.

Professor Ethan Kross's book, Chatter, describes a study by British anthropologist Andrew Irving where participants tracked their thoughts in real-time. The specifics significantly differed, yet those surveyed “often dealt with negative ‘content,’ much of which sprang up through associative connections, the pinging of one thought to another.”

Not surprisingly, those surveyed “also spent a considerable amount of time thinking about themselves, their minds gravitating toward their own experiences, emotions, desires, and needs. The self-focused nature of the default state, after all, is one of its primary features.”

Our inner “monologues also emphasized something else universally human: The inner voice was always there with something to say, reminding us of the inescapable need we all have to use our minds to make sense of our experiences and the role that language plays in helping us do so.”

Elsa Bailey's book The Uncommon Book of Prayer, reminds us of the form these monologues can take: “Every worry is a prayer. Every complaint is a prayer. Every grudge is a prayer. Every avoidance is a prayer. Every sadness is a prayer. Because they become a focus, a theme upon which we meditate. Of course, we don’t call this prayer. We call it thinking.”

Eric Schmidt and Jonathan Rosenberg's How Google Works is the source of this essay's title, "Repetition Doesn’t Spoil the Prayer," and they add:

In most aspects of life, you need to say something about twenty times before it truly starts to sink in. Say it a few times, people are too busy to even notice. A few more times, they start to become aware of a vague buzzing in their ears. By the time you’ve repeated it fifteen to twenty times you may be completely sick of it, but that’s about the time that people are starting to get it.

The more we repeat our grudges, worries, etc., the more we groove them into our minds. Repetition does not improve a bad prayer. These are prayers we aim to disrupt.

The upcoming Mindset Shifts U sessions on Constructive Living will help us drop our bad prayers.

We will not bolster the harmful belief that life is controllable and should be mastered.

Similar to Kross's research, and as past Mindset Shifts U sessions have shown, it's a common human tendency to have a persistent, critical inner voice that negatively judges ourselves, others, and our lives. Your inner narrator is pretty sure of what you need more of and less of; it often looks at others as objects to be used or obstacles getting in your way. There is nothing wrong with you; you are human.

Our work is to value less the inner voice that speaks for our ego and more the voice that speaks for our true nature.

In our sessions, we will uncover ways for handling our feelings that differ from the usual strategies of suppression, expression, over-analysis, denial, and indulgence. We won’t learn how to change our feelings, but we will learn how to change our relationships with our feelings. The peace of mind that comes from a well-lived life is the goal of our upcoming sessions.

We will read contemporary works by David K. Reynolds and Gregg Krech, each of whom provides actionable philosophies and tools that stop our chattering negative mind from taking charge of our lives. All you need is a willingness to start. Let’s reiterate, we won't be reinforcing the harmful idea that life is meant to be controlled and mastered.

Reynolds and Krech offer more than typical self-help clichés and empty promises in their contemporary books. They don’t believe you can do anything if only you practice the right techniques, but they do offer philosophical perspectives to help you commit to the life you were born to live. Similar to Oliver Burkeman, they'll help overcome the fear of missing out. Life is short, and Reynolds and Krech will help us increase our gratitude for the life we live.

Earlier this week, in his newsletter Oliver Burkeman wrote this:

We want to find some person, or some philosophy of life, that will spare us the fear or discomfort or self-doubt or tedium that so often seems to come along for the ride, whenever we try to make progress on things we care about. We hate feeling yoked to reality in such an unpleasant way; we long instead to soar above it, in a realm free from problems.

Burkeman adds, “It’s the mark of a bad self-help book, a dodgy spiritual guru or an incompetent therapist that they’ll be only too happy to encourage the illusion that this might one day be possible.”

Reynolds and Krech will not encourage such illusions, but we will find our struggle reduced. Without striving for self-improvement or fighting with feelings, something more real—more of who you truly are—will have space to emerge.

The books you will need:

• David K. Reynolds, Water, Snow, Water: Constructive Living for Mental Health

• Gregg Krech, A Natural Approach to Mental Wellness

This Audible program with David Reynolds is an outstanding supplement to the books and a delight to listen to: Constructive Living.

Sessions for The Art of Constructive Living

Beginning May 3, Session 1: Feelings Aren’t Commands
Reynolds: Chapters 1-4, 8 (the chapters are very short)

Beginning May 10, Session 2: Coexisting With Discomfort
Krech: Skills #1 and #2

Beginning May 17, Session 3: Taking Responsibility One Choice at a Time
Reynolds: Chapters 5-7

Beginning May 24, Session 4: Directing Attention With Purpose
Krech: Skill #3

Beginning May 31, Session 5: Reducing Suffering and Victimhood Through Attention and Action

Reynolds: Chapters 9-18 (very short chapters)

Beginning June 7, Session 6: Active Self-Reflection Leads to Greater Understanding Krech: Skill #4

Beginning June 14, Session 7: Building a Purposeful Life
Krech: pp. 145-175

Beginning June 21, Session 8: Embracing an Imperfect Reality Through Forgiveness
Reynolds: Chapters 19-23

When you become a paid subscriber, you not only receive new sessions of Mindset Shifts U, but you also receive all past sessions. Your support makes this project possible.

I’m preparing a program titled Classical Wisdom for Living a Good Life, which will begin this summer at Mindset Shifts U. We will read works by Epictetus, David Hume, Adam Smith, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Leonard Read, and F. A. Hayek to consider how we can increase our emotional and spiritual freedom in today’s troubled world. To the extent that we free ourselves, we become a more potent force for goodness in the world. You won’t want to miss this unique program or the coming program on Constructive Living.

Mindset Shifts U—All Sessions