Amale Bouzlafa

It Was Never the Problem

There’s a lot of content telling people to stop thinking.
To quiet the mind.
To silence thoughts.

But that advice never really made sense to me, because it’s impossible.

Thinking happens. Automatically.
Just like breathing.

You don’t wake up in the morning and decide to breathe. You don’t monitor every inhale. You don’t try to control your lungs. Breathing happens because you’re alive. Thinking happens for the same reason.

So why do we treat thoughts as if they’re a malfunction?

The problem was never that thoughts appear.
The problem is what we let those thoughts mean.

Thoughts Are Neutral. Meaning Is Not.

A thought, on its own, doesn’t do much.
It comes… and it goes.

But the moment a thought starts to say something about you, about who you are, what you should do, what this situation means, that’s when it gains power.

The same thought can exist in two very different ways:

• it can come and pass
• or it can come and take over

The difference isn’t control.
The difference is meaning.

Overthinking doesn’t happen because there are too many thoughts.
It happens because one thought leads to another, then another, then another, all connected by the meaning we attach to them.

Control Is Not Clarity

When people try to suppress thoughts, what they’re really doing is searching for control.

Control the mind.
Control the reaction.
Control the discomfort.

But trying to control thoughts doesn’t break the loop, it keeps attention locked on it. It turns thinking into a battleground.

And most of the time, control doesn’t show up because we’re strong.
It shows up right before vulnerability.

What Are You Afraid Will Happen If You Don’t Interfere?

At some point, I started asking a different question:

What if I didn’t try to control the thought?
What if I didn’t try to analyze it or neutralize it?
What if I just sat with it?

Then the real question appeared:

What am I actually afraid will happen?

And most of the time, the answer wasn’t action.
It wasn’t chaos.
It wasn’t losing control of my life.

It was emotion.

Emotional release.
Feeling.
Exposure.

And that’s the part we try to avoid.

Control often isn’t about the thought at all.
It’s about avoiding the vulnerability that comes with letting the emotion move through.

Letting Thoughts Be Is Not Letting Them Lead

There’s an important distinction here.

Letting a thought exist does not mean obeying it.
Letting emotion move does not mean acting impulsively.

Thoughts can affect the body, without being allowed to dictate action.

And this is where the confusion usually happens.

Thoughts Are Like the Wind

You don’t control the wind.
It changes direction. It comes and goes.

But you’re still steering the boat.

Thoughts are the same.
You don’t control them.
But you can control the action that comes from them.

The direction of your actions is still a choice.

That’s not about force.
It’s not about discipline.
It’s about authority.

Perspective Changes Everything

Words don’t change reality by themselves.
But they change how we see a situation.

And when perspective shifts, action follows naturally.

Not because we pushed harder, but because clarity removes the need to fight.

The moment you stop trying to silence your mind, you realize it was never the enemy.

And that changes how you move.

Trusting it will bring some light to someone’s shadow,

Amale 💫💙