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Can we control our thoughts? Why do thoughts pop into my head as I'm trying to fall asleep?
Barry Gordon, professor of neurology and cognitive science at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, replies:
We are aware of a tiny fraction of the thinking that goes on in our minds, and we can control only a tiny part of our conscious thoughts. The vast majority of our thinking efforts goes on subconsciously. Only one or two of these thoughts are likely to breach into consciousness at a time. Slips of the tongue and accidental actions offer glimpses of our unfiltered subconscious mental life.
The intrusive thoughts you may experience throughout the day or before bed illustrate the disconcerting fact that many of the functions of the mind are outside of conscious control. Whether we maintain true control over any mental functions is the central debate about free will. Perhaps this lack of autonomy is to be expected as the foundations for almost all the mind's labors were laid long before our ancestors evolved consciousness.
Even deliberate decisions are not completely under our power. Our awareness only sets the start and the end of a goal but leaves the implementation to unconscious mental processes. Thus, a batter can decide to swing at a ball that comes into the strike zone and can delineate the boundaries of that zone. But when the ball comes sailing through, unconscious mental functions take over. The actions required to send him to first base are too complex and unfold too quickly for our comparatively slow conscious control to handle.
We exert some power over our thoughts by directing our attention, like a spotlight, to focus on something specific. The consequences of doing so can be amusing, as in the famous experiments in which about one third of the people watching a basketball game failed to spot a man in a gorilla suit crossing the court. Or the consequences can be disastrous, as when a narrow focus prevents a driver from noticing a light turning red or an oncoming train.
Although thoughts appear to “pop” into awareness before bedtime, their cognitive precursors have probably been simmering for a while. Once those preconscious thoughts gather sufficient strength, the full spotlight of consciousness beams down on them. The mind's freewheeling friskiness is only partly under our control, so shutting our mind off before we sleep is not possible.
This article was originally published with the title Can we control our thoughts? Why do thoughts pop into my head as I'm trying to fall asleep?.
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21 Comments
Add CommentAre you trying to say that people cannot exercise intentionality as a function of cognition? "The intrusive thoughts you may experience throughout the day or before bed illustrate the disconcerting fact that many of the functions of the mind are outside of conscious control."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat the hell happened to my introspection? And then, the failed attempt at raising an eyebrow by bringing 'free will' into the discussion. Normally when one talks about freewill they'll do so by speaking in context with a moral event- such as whether criminals can choose to not be criminals, among other scenarios. Yet you profoundly envelope the concept in a discussion about the ability to freely think. What an unimaginative world it must be for you.
We kind of presuppose the ability to make our own choices, minimally, in an iterative way, and at least in a way that manifests descending control upon our motor, visual, speech functions, et cetera.
This piece makes so many wrong analogies- 'attention as a spot light'?- yet I cannot conjure enough care to outline each and every misleading point in this article.
Please focus on the illusive 'science' aspect of this magazine's journalistic significance, save the pop psychology for the local newspapers.
What is becoming of SA these days?
Yes, the research supports the view expressed in the article.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBode, S., et al 2011 Tracking the Unconscious Generation of Free Decisions Using UItra-High Field fMRI. PLOS ONE, 6(6)
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Eagleman, D. et al 2002 Causality and the perception of time. Trends in Cog.Sci, 6(8)
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Most of the day, I'm on autopilot. But as some people discuss, we can also be mindful. The 5% of the day that I am mindful, I do try introspection. I ask myself during that time, and it would be hoped on a continuous basis, how what I'm thinking compares to the ideal. Then I can next ask why I'm thinking that non-ideal thought. Then I can, for example, detach from that desire, hatred or ignorance. Eventually our unconscious mind will have less affect on us and we can live out our lives more fully in touch with our conscience. Then we can help guide our fellow beings in the same direction and that is my goal.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThanks.
Michael
"What the hell happened to my introspection?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt disappeared up its own presumption. Can you be certain that introspection is by definition conscious, intentional and purposive? No, you most certainly cannot! Mental health establishments are full of people who only wish they could control their introspection and literally get out of their own heads!
When the author says "we" (aka I) what does she mean? She does not say; she can't; it's an illusion and the cause of all suffering, as Buddha well knew and taught.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe brain might be complex, but you could simplify it as a set of feedback loops. 'Does/Did this action do any good for me?' 'Does it gain anything for me or feel good?'
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisetc etc Obviously it is in many ways more complex.
What I have seen however is that many people do not know why they do the things they do, these are on autopilot so to say, just going with whatever they feel; I really liken these people to complex organic robots.
At the other end of the spectrum, you have the people who can actually figure out why they are like they are, and change things. Change the way they are by 'bettering' themselves. Hopefully, this makes sense to people.
Your mind does what it wants at times because of the monsters from the Id. They are constantly looking for a way out!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJust ask Morbius from planet Altair IV he knows all too well!
We are only aware of the result, not the process.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDoes this even qualify as an article? From what I can tell the author hasn't said anything.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPhilosophers are not qualified to do science. Scientists are not qualified to do philosophy.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI have disciplined my mind so that when I am falling asleep and get those pesky thoughts I just concentrate on my breathing like they teach in Pranayama and it works for me.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThat is what meditation is about; getting rid of those stupid, fruitless thoughts.
This subjective interpretation of thoughts - conscious vs. subconscious (are there unconscious thoughts too?) completely ignores the possibility that brain chemistry and/or other physiological conditions modify the characteristics of thought processes in preparation for transition to sleep state processes. In other words, perhaps our brain processing shifts from an objective driven to evaluation & relational ordering mode.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThese physiological processes are probably the cause for rather than the result of our perception of conscious vs. subconscious thoughts...
Well,interesting for certain!I really don't know if I qualify for anything other than having thoughts,which I'm told are energy.With 60,000 or so thoughts running through my mind in one day,weather connected or disconnected I wonder how I sleep at all.Knowing that the mind is only a concept helps I guess,at least I don't have to see a surgeon to have it removed.I'm sure glad I have a sub conscious and a conscious mind.When I start out to drive my car to town sometimes I don't know how I arrived at my destination.I am too busy watching for traffic lights and defending myself from other drivers.Suddenly I'm there and wondering how I don't remember anything along the way.My sub conscious mind drove my car!I suppose it also stores my thoughts when I have no immediate need for them.If they try to sneak in to the conscious mind before sleep,I meditate,getting into the void or gap between each word where it is absolutely quiet and try to stay in there as long as I can.This tends to slow the thoughts long enough to fall asleep.Works for me!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe trick to sleeping is to think of something boring. You get bored, you doze off.....zzzzz
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhile drifting off to sleep, allow no words to pass thru your mind. This is easier than it sounds. First, no stories are allowed, then no sentences, then strive for a blank awareness. The speech center will cede dominance to the visual center and dream like imagery will arise. Such are typically fainter images than one's dreams, but can be quite vivid. Focusing on the imagery promotes sleep by disentangling the self from its subversive 'To Do' lists and offers a certain entertainment factor as well. A Dzongen Buddhist technique instructs students to memorize their hands (say,in a steepled Mr. Burns like position. At length, this visual memory work will result in the sense of a second pair of hands, somewhat like the phantom limb phenomena, and at length hand imagery will become the dominant imagery while drifting off to sleep and will lead to finding your hands in your dreams with consequent lucid dreaming. This takes at least a year, but work on this can be done at otherwise unfocused moments. I haven't yet had any result as a lucid dream, but the memorization work does result in pre-sleep hand imagery, so I'm still hopeful.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhile drifting off to sleep, allow no words to pass thru your mind. This is easier than it sounds. First, no stories are allowed, then no sentences, then strive for a blank awareness. The speech center will cede dominance to the visual center and dream like imagery will arise. Such are typically fainter images than one's dreams, but can be quite vivid. Focusing on the imagery promotes sleep by disentangling the self from its subversive 'To Do' lists and offers a certain entertainment factor as well. A Dzongen Buddhist technique instructs students to memorize their hands in a steepled (Mr. Burns like) position. At length, this visual memory work will result in the sense of a second pair of hands, somewhat like the phantom limb phenomena, and hand imagery will become the dominant imagery while drifting off to sleep and will lead to finding your hands in your dreams with consequent lucid dreaming. This takes at least a year, but work on this can be done at otherwise unfocused moments. I haven't yet had any result as a lucid dream, but the memorization work does result in pre-sleep hand imagery, so I'm still hopeful.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI enjoy introspection because I am a mystery. Can I control this mystery, given that energy never dies so I might have had many past lives? Enlightenment says we cannot. We can control our re-actions to experiences. We become a peaceful drop of the ocean flowing with the waves or still. We cannot change what our energy system is or was, only what will be. When there is cause, things arise and we have no control over that, including thoughts. We can train ourselves to have silence, more favorable thoughts and outcomes, we can learn to control the future by how we live today, so moral living will bring a mind that enjoys less free will wanting to be like divine minds, renouncing demonic activity will help the outcome of control thoughts and by being purely virtuous, then we can control our thoughts. We will never really control what people choose to take from us, but our minds will be silent. Now I have to ask the Dalai Lama, why exactly, does being virtuous create a controlled mind. In order to meditate we must train to have a quiet mind through Deity Yoga and the like. My mind was crazy thoughts and visions before bed, now it is calm and at peace. So, we can learn to control our behavior, not cause and effect given our mysterious beings so unknown. We can learn to place our focus on things that bring us peace, like God or love. Unless we unravel our mystery of who and what we are, becoming pure Atma,like Krishna, we will always be controlled by our minds, cause and effect and that can lead to problems. That, causes suffering. I used to only see demons flowing through my mind as a child. That is why I am God oriented. Uh, why is that in me? Mysterious beings we are. When there is cause, anything our undying energy has experienced can come to the surface. We have existed since beginningless time, that is a lot unknown thoughts. God bless.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI always failed to control my mind in conscious,so i agree with the author
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat you put IN is what you get OUT . Not so hard ? Kids watch TV and dream about it . We read a book before sleep time and dream about it . Been happening my whole life - Big mystery ? NOT !
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDear Gordon
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou are really correct to raise this issue. I am partly agreed with you. However, there is always a misconception about unconcious/conciousness.
I would highly appreciate if you can join my page on Face Book "Psychology Professionals". I have a lot to discuss this and other issues on Psychology. Thanks.
Haroon Hameed
roon_meed@yahoo.com
I too am on "autopilot"especially when driving from point A to point B.I sometimes wonder how I got there,who drove my car?!Thank God for the sub-conscious mind!I can control my thoughts to a certain extent through meditation.I should practice mindfulness to a greater extent.I always should be aware of what goes on around me.
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