Your 'me-me-me network' and how to keep it from running your life

Are you 'in your head' a lot?  In that constant, incessant thinking, chatter, mental noise? 

Isn't it exhausting? 

And then... what do we do?  We often try to escape our thoughts by turning to something else - our phone, eating, online shopping, alcohol, drugs, social media ... anything we can do do distract ourselves from our own thinking.

This type of ruminative thinking is
connected to 'self-referential' thinking and things like our past, our future, what we think someone else is thinking, assessing and judging our emotions, and other stuff.

Does that sound familiar as to where you 'go' in your own head?

The tricky thing with just trying to avoid 'being in our head' is that we don't actually do anything to soften the me-me-me network. We need to actively work other brain circuits that will compete with it.

The way I hear people describe what they're doing to 'not think so much' is trying to leave their brain-body by altering their state - either with substances, or by using technology, among other things.

I'm suggesting that we stop trying to leave the mind-brain-body, and we actually fully enter into it.

We can do this by bringing awareness back to our senses.  This includes our five senses and our visceral senses.  Both of these bring us back into exactly what is happening right now, but without creating an assessment or judgment about it (which is what the me-me-me network tries to do all the time).

These 5 strategies can help you release yourself from the grip of the me-me-me network, which ultimately helps you feel more engaged in life and less trapped in your own thinking.

After you've watched, let me know in the comments... what is one of your strategies for getting out of that mental noise, and what do you notice about 'being in your head'? When does it usually happen, and where do you thoughts tend to go?


Here is my response to a comment below about the contradictory information that exists about the DMN:

I agree, Graham..this is much too simplistic of a perspective. It is an old video and since then much more has come out about the DMN. It’s is much more complex than that. It’s great to point out contradictory views. I hesitate to take videos down even when I have updated my own information as i think they are still launching points for discussion. Thank you for adding to the conversation.! I’ll actually add this to the description to encourage viewers to do their own exploration on this topic!

It’s important for us to examine how different ideas apply to our life and to explore research on our own as a complement to what we read or watch on platforms such as YouTube.



#selfregulation #getoutofyourhead #neuroplasticity #mindfulness #meditation