So, last week, did a talk on working with obsessive, repetitive, intrusive thoughts.

And we talked about a bunch of tools that people can employ to reduce the symptoms.

But tonight we're going to talk a little bit about one of the underlying psychological factors

and which requires an entirely different approach to working with.

So to start off, we come to meditation from very often the exact same reason why people come to therapy which is very often we're unable to manage our emotions in certain contexts.

We're prone to spiraling intrusive thoughts, chronic stress.

Very often it's difficult for us

to pursue really meaningful goals

or to unearth a foundation of purpose in life.

And all of these struggles have in common that one,

they're difficult to address, and two, the reason they are difficult to address is because the causes or the factors involve are buried networks that are inaccessible to conscious control.

So for example, you can change somebody's belief very easily, you can change somebody's belief very easily you can tell somebody how to or train

somebody had to use a new computer but when it comes to something like, for example, panic attacks,

you can tell them, well, there's no need to be nervous speaking in front of a large group of people. There is no reason

to be worried driving under tunnels or being stuck in an elevator or whatever.

And reasoning and logic are going to have absolutely no effect whatsoever

because the underlying factors that generate a panic attack are essentially implicit systems stored in pre-ious regions of the brain, very often associated with regions

that are wholly beyond any conscious control.

Very often areas such as the right midbrain

and other parts of the right hemisphere are not really capable of being, no matter how

much willpower you have, you can't change the emotional state you're in or the mood you're in.

So one of the major factors that underlie obsessive thought and many many other issues that we'll be talking about is

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