Christians don’t pay enough attention to their thoughts. The Desert and Eastern Fathers and Mothers got it. Much of their spiritual counsels talked about vigilance, watchfulness and constant prayer (often the Jesus Prayer). They realised that our thoughts aren’t always, or perhaps evenly mostly, our own.
Take some time to sit still and watch what thoughts arise. You’ll notice that many or even all arise without you causing them. They bubble up from who-knows-where without “us” being involved. The Fathers and Mothers of the desert even chalked up many of these thoughts to demonic influences.
Yet, it seems to me, the idea of watchfulness and vigilance of thoughts is a foreign concept for most Western Christians. This is despite biblical injunctions such as “take every thought captive for Christ” or “put on the mind of Christ”. As a consequence, we are pushed and pulled every which way due to thoughts that arise and are taken far too seriously.
Here is the general cycle - a spontaneous passionate thought arises -> a feeling develops in response to the thought -> the feeling stokes more associated thoughts to arise and the cycle continues. Sometimes with catastrophic results.
Let’s consider an example. A colleague at work is demanding of us. A spontaneous thought arises “I am sick of being treated like this”. Then a feeling of anger or frustration develops. Further thoughts arise, perhaps “Brian thinks he is so good, yet I do so much more work than he does! I hate that guy”. The anger builds even more, and so do the negative thoughts.
This cycle of interior chaos all arose because of spontaneous thought, not of our choosing. Yet, rather than being watchful and noticing the thought arise, we get lost in it. The thought becomes in some sense intimate to us - we own it, we make it an expression of our self, we become invested in it. We identify with it. Thus, we get dragged into damaging internal conflict and perhaps even sin.
We all yearn, I think, for a quieter path. A path where peace and a certain buoyancy of spirit reigns. Yet in Western Christianity, I fear the tendency is to plunge ourselves into more noise and thought-forms. We suffer from some internal conflict, so we take on more devotions, more meditations, more imagining. In the West, we are so analytical and cerebral, yes, even in Christian circles. We never see more silence as the solution, but rather more words and thoughts; more fuel for the fire.
In the Christian tradition, there are many teachers of silence, many advocates of a quieter path. Yet for whatever reason, we have lost practical touch with this tradition. So we have little to offer a society that, amidst the confusion and anxiety of modern life, is yearning for the same quiet that we Christians secretly are. So they turn to other, usually Eastern, traditions that have a greater emphasis on contemplation.
We need to rediscover our Western contemplative tradition. We also need to find common ground with other traditions, the mystics of which, at least at the phenomenal level, share similar experiences. First and foremost, however, we need to become more recollected, vigilant and watchful - capturing each thought for Christ and His kingdom.
The way of the Mystics seems the only option left...