Ushering Thoughts out the Side Door

Thursday after Ash Wednesday, February 19, 2015

A BROTHER came to Abbot Pastor and said: “Many distracting thoughts come into my mind, and I am in danger because of them.”

Then the elder thrust him out into the open air and said: “Open up the garments about your chest and catch the wind in them.”

But he replied: “This I cannot do.”

So the elder said to him: “If you cannot catch the wind, neither can you prevent distracting thoughts from coming into your head. Your job is to say ‘No’ to them.”
[Thomas Merton, The Wisdom of the Desert, p. 43]


Have you ever tried to fast from thoughts? Or even to fast from certain thoughts? It’s almost impossible at one level. To concentrate on blocking thoughts from coming into your mind is yet another thought. “Don’t think about the elephant . . . don’t think about the elephant . . . don’t think about the elephant.” And in trying to block the thought, you are thinking about the elephant.

The wisdom of Abbot Pastor in the story is to allow the thoughts to come, just like the wind, but then to let them pass through your consciousness, again just like the wind.

Perhaps this metaphor is helpful: If you try to keep the thoughts out of your mind, you invest a lot of energy in barricading the door of your mind, keeping watch at the door, and doing battle to keep the thoughts out of the room of your mind. And you will almost never be successful.

A different strategy would be to leave the door of your mind open, so that you welcome the thoughts that come across the threshold. But then, open a door on the other side of your mind’s room so that the thoughts march right out the other door. Don’t allow the thoughts to take a seat or make a home in that “room.” (Because the real issue with thoughts is not that we have them, but that we build up emotional reactions and commentaries around them.)

Usher them out the other side. It’s a much gentler, compassionate way to deal with thoughts that disturb you. It is a way of fasting from the thoughts that typically lead you to anger, judgments, criticism, and defensiveness.

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