How do we introspect?

Observing yourself

All of our time, we are so immersed in viewing the external world, fulfilling our responsibilities that we hardly get time to view inside and introspect.

Introspection, is an examination of one’s thoughts and feelings. But I believe it is a very strong self analysis tool which can expand to more areas of life! In order to understand introspection, we must understand the things we can control and we cannot. Hence, if you want to deep dive within yourself, you must understand the source of your thoughts, words and actions. We must make the detachment between the physical and metaphysical world; between mind and matter; our body and our soul; the emotional and the rational.

Getting to the fundamental questions,

How do we steer our thoughts, feelings, senses, words and actions?

How do we steer them in such a way so that we win over our desires, anger, ego, violence, hatred, attachments, etc?

How can we be concious about our life so that we can steer what we can control into achieving peace with ourselves?

How can we be concious about what we think, what we consume, what we feel, what we speak, what we do?

In order to get the control of the chariot that we’re riding, control the five horses riding it (what we call our senses), we need to stepback, pause, reflect daily about these questions and take control of what we can.

We are the kind of questions we ask to ourselves.

This article won’t give you the answers but will try best to give you the right questions to ask yourselves daily and examine your life through different levels of conciousness. Let’s get started? Start asking yourself these questions and examine, pause, think, reflect and let it flow. You can ask these questions daily to yourself and see the magic unfold!

Ideally, one should start introspection by gratitude and a reality check first. Let’s be grateful for whatever we have, appreciate everything, loose the revengeful thoughts and get a neutral smile on the face. Reality check should be getting a sense of context your life is in, what stage are you at, what time in the history you’re in and please tell yourself that you are not your body, you are not your assets but rather, you’re a soul who is in this body. In short, it should be a bird’s eye view of the reality around — but without expressing any thoughts on the same. We have to observe the reality and maintain a neutral emotion.

Non-materialistic aspects

So, what are the different levels of conciousness which we can experience?

Let’s start with the qualitative and non-materialistic aspects of the primary levels of conciousness.

1. What do I think most of the time?
2. What are the types of thoughts that i’m generating? Are they powerful? Are they positive? Am I hurting anyone through my thoughts? What thoughts am I radiating?
3. Am I being creative with my thoughts and perspectives? Am I examining reality from multiple perspectives?
4. What affects my thoughts? Who are the people influencing my thoughts?
5. What are my core values? How am I treating people in my family, friends, work, society, etc? What are my values towards nature and other human beings? Am i protecting, conserving, respecting or am I destroying or harming them?
6. Are my virtues same for every human and every situation or are they selective and weak?
7. Do I show compassion and empathy to everyone? Do i add value to people?
8. How do I judge things on what is right for me or wrong in a given context?
9. How open am i to challenge my beliefs and accept new things and open to learn?
10. How do I think or gossip about other people? Am i generally envious, jealous, happy, frustrated, inferior, superior or content?
11. Do i control my senses or my senses control me? Do they make me run around and make me crave for food, pleasure, beauty, smell and voices? Who is the master and who is the slave?
12. Am I happy in pursuit of satisfying my senses or am i happy when I control them?
13. How are my emotions most of the time? How do they vary with different people in my life? How resilient am I? How uniform are my emotions? Are they extreme? Am I being anxious or am i content?
14. Who has the trigger to my emotions? The surrounding people? The situations? Or do I have the trigger to my emotions?
15. What is the type of vocabulary that I use most of the time? What are the words that I speak? Are they pleasant? Are they good? Are they destructive or hateful? What are the types of words that i should be using from now on?
16. What are my decisions ultimately inclining towards? What would be the purpose of every action or decision that I take? Will it help me earn more money, will it help me gain a skill, will it satisfy my senses, will it give me peace, will it give me power?
17. Am I having fun in my current profession? Does it excite me? Am I curious enough? Am I driven to do that? If not, what steps should I take to reach there?
18. What are the things that I’m addicted to? What craves me? What excites me?
19. What are the things, characteristics, people, feelings, experiences and assets that I love and do not love?

Now that we have introspected on non-materialistic aspects, let us explore the materialistic aspects :

Materialistic aspects to introspect on

1. What are my core skills? What am I proficient in? How would I want to use my skillsets towards my purpose?
2. What are the resources that I consume the most? Do i consume more plastic, more food, more energy, more water? What waste resources do i generate from the things that I consume?
3. Do i excercise regularly? Am I controlling my body or is my body controlling me? Who is the master here?
4. How much deep sleep am I getting? Am I satisfied with my sleep?
5. What is the type of food I eat everyday, at what time, in what quantites? Is it good for my health? Is it pure or junk? Is it nutritious? Do i appreciate for the food I get to eat everyday? Do i get angry when i do not get tasty food?
6. Fasting is the best way to remain healthy. How often do I fast? Should I fast more, sleep more and excercise more?
7. What information do I consume on a daily basis? People, social media, newspapers, articles, books, news? What is the type of information do i like to consume? What information can enrich my knowledge or perspective? What information will make me more informed? What are the reliable sources?
8. What art do I know? Do i immerse myself in any art form? How would I like to express myself through an art form?
9. What are the sources of entertainment that I enjoy?
10. What am I investing my time, money and energy on right now? What are those 3 priorities?
11. Who are the people what I spend my most of the time with? Are they helping me grow? Do they accept me as I am? Do they inspire me? Am I adding any value to their life? How do I want my circle of people in life should be?
12. How much money do I think I will need to lead a dignified life on my terms? How much is the greed and how much is the need?

Lastly,

How is my life impacting nature and other people? how do I want my reality to be? How do i want my life to be? How can I truly become the best version of myself?

Happy introspecting!