The Selby Solution

Book Excerpts


Quiet Your Mind

John has spent 30 years exploring, researching, experimenting and refining this new approach to mind management and personal fulfillment. During the last five years he's written several core texts presenting his Methods.

QUIET YOUR MIND is John's primary psychology text, delving deeply into how you can become master of your own thoughts and emotions - and break free from old habits and inhibitions that drag you down.

Below are excerpts from that book.

Purchase The Text from Amazon or our bookstore.

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Excerpts from the book:

Quiet Your Mind

"We tend to be unaware that we are thinking virtually all the time. The incessant stream of thoughts flowing through our minds leaves us very little respite for inner quiet. Our actions are all too often driven rather than undertaken in awareness – driven by those ordinary thoughts and impulses that run through the mind like a coursing river. To find our way, we will need to quiet our thoughts and pay more attention to this moment."

Jon Kabat-Zinn
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QUIET YOUR MIND: Table of Contents

Prologue: The Ultimate Choice … pg. 6

PART ONE: Primary Programs

Chapter 1: Who’s Running Your Mind? … pg. 22
Chapter 2: Quieting Judgmental Thoughts … pg. 55
Chapter 3: Breaking Free From Worries … pg. 102
Chapter 4: Listening To Your Heart … pg. 145

PART TWO: Life Applications

Chapter 5: Not Lonely When Alone … pg. 196
Chapter 6: Insight At Work … pg. 221
Chapter 7: Bliss In Sexual Passion … pg. 238
Chapter 8: A Good Night’s Sleep … pg. 251
Advanced Mind-Management Programs
Free Online Audio-Guidance Support
References/Bibliography
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We all know from experience that our most valuable and profound moments in life happen when our thoughts become momentarily quiet, and we open up to a direct heartfelt encounter with the world around us. QUIET YOUR MIND teaches how to shift at will into that special “quiet mind” state of awareness where reflective thinking stops, and the true spontaneous experiencing of life begins …

Never before has the psychological whistle been blown so clearly on the detrimental effects of the non-stop mental chatter of our thinking minds. As researcher, therapist and educator John Selby points out, we are indeed a nation of unwitting thinkaholics.

With solid scientific documentation yet written in a heart-to-heart tone of voice, QUIET YOUR MIND offers a precise exposé of how negative attitudes and thoughtflows directly generate the emotions of irritation, worry, impatience, guilt, inadequacy, hostility, shame and despair.

More importantly for resolving this universal dilemma, Selby then teaches his unique easy-to-follow mind-management process through which we learn to let go of fear-based mental habits, listen more to the wisdom of our own hearts, and experience a more intuitively-clear and spiritually-peaceful engagement with everyday life.

From this research and long-term experimentation and technique development with clients, he has created a truly successful approach to rapidly and effortlessly transcending the thoughts that torment us, and attaining a more integrated, spontaneous, and fulfilling state of consciousness – on an everyday basis.

This definitive guidebook and accompanying streamed-audio training programs will lead you regularly to the refreshing point where your habitual thoughtflows become temporarily quiet, as you turn to your heart for deeper guidance … and start experiencing the peace and pleasure of life at your maximum potential.
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Foreword: The Ultimate Choice

For hundreds of years now, Western civilization has become more and more engulfed in the thinking mind’s grand assumption that its own mental chatter and non-stop flow of judgments and worries is the most important happening on planet earth. Ever since Descartes made his intellectual’s assertion “Cogito, ergo sum ~ I think, therefore I am,” the talkative verbal function generating our stream-of-consciousness commentary on everything happening around us has by default gained free reign to dominate almost every moment of our lives.

In exact contrast, this book will demonstrate that only through regularly quieting the entire flow of thoughts and images, memories and reflections that tend to fill our minds, can we regain intimate and fulfilling contact with the sensory, intuitive, and heart-felt experiences that emerge only when we quiet our thinking minds, and shift into direct encounter with the world around us.

Related studies also indicate that we most choose between being absorbed in deductive verbal reasoning (a past-future function of the mind) and direct experiencing of the world (a present-moment function of the mind) – because it’s very difficult to do both at the same time. Consciously or unconsciously, we’re constantly choosing to be engaged either in thoughts about life, or in the direct experience of life.

As a first goal, the following discussions will shine a bright spotlight on this ultimate mental choice, demonstrating that maintaining a healthy balance between direct experience in the present moment, and cognitive reflection upon that experience, is the ideal mental flow for a fulfilled life.

FREEDOM FROM MOOD SWINGS

Allowing our minds to be consumed in chronic thoughtflows not only shuts us off from direct present-moment encounter with the world around us – it also leaves us vulnerable to an over-dose of a host of negative emotions that can confuse our minds, stress out our bodies, and destroy any feelings of peace, joy, and transcendence.

This book takes on the goal of making sure all of us understand the true source of our negative mood swings – and teaches the most practical and effective psychological techniques for identifying and then permanently putting aside those thoughts that pollute otherwise enjoyable and fulfilling lives.

Most of us would give a great deal to be able to break free from the mental agitations and emotional tensions that consume so much of our inner lives.

Rather than remaining chronically fixated on often-disturbing thoughts about our likes and dislikes, worries and confusions, conflicts and frustrations, we’d certainly prefer to be enjoying the simple yet elusive qualities of mental clarity, heartfelt intimacy, inner peace, and emotional calm – not to mention the even more valuable realms of intuitive realization and bliss ...

Many people, especially intellectuals who live virtually all the time in their thinking minds, actually believe that it’s impossible to quiet the flow of thoughts through their heads. As we’ll explore in depth in this book, such a fatalistic assumption about our mental functioning is now known to be psychologically untrue.

We do possess the inherent power to assume control over the content of our thoughts, and to quiet chronic thoughtflows altogether whenever we so choose.

Of course, a certain amount of mental problem-solving and cognitive reflection is essential to human life, and can actually be quite fun, even deeply fulfilling to engage in. Deductive thinking is an invaluable mental tool enabling us to create and maintain our entire technological civilization.

However, the recurring dilemma with our habitual thoughtflow is that they all too often carry a negative rather than positive emotional edge to them, generated by old fear-based attitudes, assumptions and beliefs that no longer correctly reflect our present reality. Such thoughts from out-dated or distorted beliefs will predictably provoke anxious, aggressive and depressive emotions – which in turn make us suffer.

Usually we’re not aware of the underlying psychological source of such mood swings. Minor or sometimes even major attacks of anxiety and anger, depression and hopelessness, inadequacy and guilt, grief and rejection seem to sneak up on us from out of the blue and overwhelm us.

If only we could avoid getting caught up regularly in such mood swings, life would be a joyous pleasure to wake up to each morning.

EXPERIENTIAL REALMS

How in pragmatic day-to-day life can we act on our own, to break free from feeling that we’re helpless victims of our own negative moods and thoughtflows? What’s the underlying psychological process that enables us to shift from thoughts that tend to upset our lives, to a more experiential present-moment state of mind?

The professional resolution to this question has been evolving somewhat traumatically for a hundred years now, beginning with the early explorations of psychological pioneers such as Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung, Erich Fromm, Krishnamurti and Wilhelm Reich, and advancing by mid-century into the more present-moment therapy approaches of Gestalt therapy, transactional analysis, reality therapy and Bioenergetics.

Then in the early 1960’s a specific answer to the mind/emotion mood-swing question came to the fore when psychologist Aaron Beck formally documented what observant folk, especially in meditative communities throughout the world, have known for centuries – that our emotions don’t emerge suddenly out of nowhere.

From Beck’s early work in cognitive psychology at the University of Pennsylvania has emerged the most successful school of therapy to date, called cognitive therapy – in which patients suffering from chronic negative emotions such as anxiety and depression, anger and confusion are taught to identify the recurrent thoughtflows that stimulate these negative emotions, and one way or another to replace the negative thoughts and beliefs with more positive realistic thoughts and beliefs. T

hese new thoughts in turn stimulate positive emotions, encouraging a general sense of inner confidence and wellbeing.

This general approach to therapy does work and work very well, as documented by an NIMH-funded study just released by researchers at the University of Pennsylvania and Vanderbilt University showing that a four-month period of weekly cognitive-therapy treatment delivers considerably higher short-term and also long-term success in treating depression, for instance, than does traditional psychiatric treatment involving psychoanalysis and anti-depressant drug medication.

Furthermore, parallel studies document that for treatment of non-acute anxiety and depression conditions, self-applied cognitive therapy programs can be of great lasting help.

However, as we’ll discover step by step, the cognitive act of replacing negative thoughts and assumptions with more positive thoughts and assumptions, doesn’t in itself fulfill our deeper needs for genuine peace of mind, intuitive clarity, emotional healing and the discovery of our human potential beyond surface concepts and mental self-image.

Our discussion will of necessity take up where all but the more advanced cognitive therapists leave off, by demonstrating as Einstein wisely pointed out – that we can’t solve a problem using the same mental constructs that created the problem in the first place.

What appears to be the more powerful, complete approach to freeing our minds from thoughts that push upsetting emotional buttons, as indeed many of the more innovative therapists are currently exploring and employing in their work, includes first doing our homework in evaluating and modifying our underlying beliefs – and then learning to quiet our thinking minds altogether.

PRIMARY MIND RESEARCH

The specific techniques for shifting from deductive thinking to more intuitive and experiential modes of consciousness being introduced in this book have not of course emerged out of a vacuum. A great deal of psychological and neurological research, experimentation and client application have given birth to the programs being taught herein.

Specifically, during the last thirty years my colleagues and I have been involved in numerous research efforts studying brain function related to cognitive versus non-cognitive mental activity, where “cognitive” means a conscious flow of thoughts or images through the mind’s awareness. Especially important to this book’s programs were several experiments I participated in a number of years ago that, after considerable further refinement, have evolved directly into these new programs for taking charge of your mind and tapping the power and blessing of inner quiet.

These results (replicated numerous times elsewhere) demonstrated without question the direct causative link between the chronic worried thoughts we allow to run through our minds, and the resulting anxious feelings we experience as negative emotions, physical stress and general discomfort.

Seeking to further understand the thinking mind’s influence over the body and emotions, at NJ-NPI’s Experimental Psychology Division, my colleagues and I conducted an experimental study of several highly-advanced Indian yogis, scientifically documenting their remarkable ability during meditation to alter their bodily functions (heart rate, body temperature, blood pressure, EEG activity, blood clotting time, sensitivity to pain, etc), through inner mental actions, and a shift from normal thinking to present-moment focusing in meditation.

Perhaps most importantly for the pragmatic dimensions of these present programs, I worked with scientists at the Bureau of Research in Neurology and Psychiatry to duplicate and expand highly-intriguing Russian EEG studies in the formal arena of perceptual psychology, demonstrating that when a subject’s visual focus (way of looking) shifts from point-fixation (focusing on one object at a time) to space-fixation (being aware of two or more objects at the same time) the flow of thoughts through the mind ceases altogether – as evidenced both subjectively and by EEG data.

This insight pointed us toward developing specific perceptual-shifting exercises that anyone can do anytime or anywhere, to effectively quiet the flow of thoughts through the mind, and generate a present-moment state of awareness.

Related studies I participated in at NJ-NPI offered yet another vital clue to the puzzle – that when we focus our attention on just one bodily sensation, thoughts usually continue flowing through our mind. However, when we learn the simple mental process of fully focusing on two or more distinct bodily sensations at the same time (breathing and heartbeat, for instance, or sight and sound) all thoughts cease flowing through the mind.

This finding scientifically documented what was predicted from more subjective studies concerning the psychological procedures common to all meditative traditions – namely that purposeful re-focusing of one’s mental attention in particular ways can directly and predictably quiet the flow of thoughts through the mind.

Research by scientists such as Andrew Newberg of the University of Pennsylvania with his neurological studies of meditating Zen Buddhists and Franciscan nuns (whose brains were observed in action through radioactive-marker brain-imaging), will regularly be presented to document the psychological claims being made in this book.

A NEW HEART

The first three chapters of this book, although of serious importance in explaining how our thoughts influence our lives, and how we can transcend judgmental and anxious mental habits and thus emerge into a new realm of more fulfilling experience, are actually just necessary steps we must make, before being ready to reap the true pay-off of this book – a new lease on our own hearts.

Throughout the history of humankind, the oral and written literature has spoken of the wisdom of listening to our own hearts for guidance. We can now begin to understand more clearly how we do indeed feel and even think with our hearts.

Furthermore, research has shown that our hearts broadcast a powerful electromagnetic forcefield that influences and indeed interacts with the energetic projections of other peoples’ hearts. This heart-based energetic interaction has been known for many thousands of years.

A primary final goal of this book is to teach specific techniques for shifting from head fixation to heart fixation, in our core sense of identity and interaction with those around us. Chapter seven with its focus on sexual relating further develops this theme and potential.

We’ve developed what other people call cold hearts in order to protect ourselves from further heart pain. This book from start to finish is aimed at helping all of us open our hearts again, heal the old heart wounds, and learn to regularly quiet the thinking mind so we can listen to the deeper wisdom and guidance of our genuinely-intelligent hearts.

Scientifically we’re just at the beginning of a major revolution in how we understand the neural interaction between the brain and the heart. We already know that it’s definitely a two-way communication with the heart sending neural messages to the brain that stimulate chemical and hormonal activity and decision-making. We also know that, from a therapeutic point of view, emotional healing requires an integration of feelings from the heart with ideas and thoughts from the cognitive center of the brain.

This book takes us to the frontier of this rapidly-expanding area of study.

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WHAT’S TO BE GAINED

When seen from a psychological and physiological point of view, the benefits of regularly letting go of past-future thinking and shifting into more present-moment modes of mind are very impressive. When we realize that each and every moment of our lives, we have the choice between being lost in thought or fully engaged in life, the choice is quite easy to make on a regular basis.

Before we go further, let’s pause and get clear together on exactly what you’ll gain in your life, by mastering the set of “quiet mind” techniques being taught in this book:

Cognitive Calm:

In the very act of quieting the flow of thoughts through your mind, you’ll find that you encourage a special state of inner peace and mental calm. When the constant chatter of your inner commentator ceases its chronic judging and evaluating of everything happening around you, you’re free to be fully here in the present moment, relaxed and enjoying whatever’s happening.

Physical Pleasure:

All while you’re lost in thought, you’re simply not present in your body – because thought takes you immediately off into the past and the future, away from your physical presence altogether.

Heart Awakening:

You only experience the primal positive feeling of love flowing through your heart, when you’re focused on the experiential present moment. Thus when you’re head-tripping you’re clearly out of touch with your heart.

Intuitive Brilliance:

The predominantly left-hemisphere deductive mind moves chronically from point to point, detail to detail, securely locked away from any sudden flashes of insight and inspiration.

Anxiety Reduction:

Almost all of your worrying is a direct result of the negative anxious thoughts habitually running through your deductive mind. As soon as you learn to actively quiet your worrying mind and emerge into the here and now, you effectively break the grip of anxiety on your soul.

Business Success:

Even in formal business circles the personal power, mental clarity and business insight that comes from participating in the dynamic flow of the present moment is being acknowledged and encouraged. Business folk are rediscovering what sages of old have always known – that genuine success comes to you most predictably when you’re tuned into what’s happening right now around you, where you can respond spontaneously with your whole being rather than being held back by plans made somewhere in the past.

Life Possibilities:

Each new moment is alive with a great many choices and opportunities if you’re living consciously in the present moment. But as long as you’re overly goal-oriented, plotting and planning your future well in advance, you miss out on every bright opportunity that doesn’t fit into your past-future projections of who you are and what you’re doing in life.

Sexual Potential:

Most of us tend to make love with our thinking minds still very much actively engaged – we’re busy talking to ourselves about what’s happening; we’re anticipating what our sexual partner wants; we’re telling ourselves what to do and not to do; we’re worrying if we’re satisfying our partner; we’re even sometimes thinking about what we need to get done after we make love.

Health and Vitality:

Your physical health is directly undermined by thinking chronic negative thoughts that in turn provoke tensions and stress that can seriously disturb your immune system. By learning to live more deeply in the here and now, you can reduce physical stress and thus return your body to its natural healthy state. There’s nothing more revitalizing than spending relaxed time in the here and now, where the flow of healing love and pleasure can begin to wash away all the contamination of negative thoughts.

Spiritual Dimensions:

All meditative practices teach that direct engagement with the here and now offers us our primary encounter the divine in human life. Therefore nurturing a quiet mind, and opening our hearts to present-moment experience, is a primary prerequisite of the spiritual path. In mystic terminology, Spirit isn’t a phenomenon of our personal memory banks or our imaginations of a projected future – Spirit inflows through our hearts only when we are “here” in the present moment. We tune into spiritual guidance not while we’re busy “talking to” God, but rather, when we’re quiet and receptive in our minds.

A NEW LEARNING EXPERIENCE

Based on the above list of direct benefits from learning to quiet our minds, the motivation to continue reading a book on mastering a quiet mind is obvious. And there’s no question – reading about a new way to advance our lives is definitely an essential step toward accomplishing that expansion. We need to develop a conceptual understanding of such a process, before moving into actually experiencing and mastering the process itself. Learning something new almost always involves a cognitive conceptual phase.

But ultimately the question will arise – how can we move beyond the “talk about” discussions, and actually have the experience being described?

 

It’s one thing to develop conceptual understandings of the potential of human consciousness – yet quite another to actually receive the goods being described. Almost all of us have suffered the frustrating experience of reading an inspiring self-help or spiritual book, then feeling stuck with the unfulfilled desire to go the next step with the author – to close our eyes and listen directly to the author’s voice guiding us personally through the actual experience we’ve just read about.

I have personally felt impatient writing self-help and spiritual books that lead readers conceptually toward embracing a new experience – but then leave them without the direct audio guidance I provide for my clients and students, that leads them effortlessly into the actual experience itself.

Each time in this book that you come to a section presenting the actual guidance needed for experiencing a new procedure, you’ll find along with the printed words, a free internet address (www.johnselby.com) taking you immediately to a streamed-audio or downloadable program of my voice guiding you through the process.

Thus you can go online whenever you want personal guidance, close your eyes, and relax into an intimate experience of the process being learned. For those of you without access to a computer, or wanting to listen to the audio guidance away from your computer, there is also a very low-cost CD version of the audio programs described at the end of this book. You will also find me online ready to answer whatever questions regarding particular issues you want elucidated.

JUMPING IN

Even before we move into the first chapter of this book, let’s focus on experiencing directly the primary process of this book – that of helping you re-direct your mind’s power of attention to shift your mental functioning away from concepts, memories, imaginations and worries, toward the immediate and always new present-moment experience coming into being all around you and within you, right here, right now.

This mental shifting process is a learned ability, and the more you exercise your mental-shifting muscle, the better you’ll get at accomplishing the process.

While reading these words that move your mind’s attention in linear progression across this page, you can begin to expand your awareness in experiential directions by also being aware of the air flowing in and out your nose or mouth as you breathe …

… don’t do anything to change your breathing, just experience your mind’s attention beginning to expand to include not only ideas and symbols but also your own body here in the present moment …

… and as you continue reading these words, and feeling the sensation of the air rushing in and out your nose or mouth, also begin to be aware of the sounds around you …

… and when you come to the end of this paragraph, see what unique experience comes to you as you close the book momentarily, and tune fully into your breathing experience … your whole body here in the present moment … the sounds … the colors …

Pause and experience ... and if you want, click below and go right to the actual guided experience, taken from the WAKE UP COURSE ...

Listen To This Audio!

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"You say you want a revolution –
You’d better free your mind instead …"

John Lennon / Paul McCartney
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Feel free to purchase the full text

... and stay tuned for the upcoming online course that will guide you effortlessly all the way through this book's Quiet Mind method!
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