Your Thoughts Aren't Facts - Even Though They Feel Like It.

You're lying in bed at 2 AM, and your brain decides it's the perfect time to remind you of every awkward thing you've ever said, every deadline you're behind on, and every way your life might fall apart. Your heart races. Your chest tightens. You feel anxious, overwhelmed, maybe even panicked.

But here's the thing: nothing is actually happening. You're safe in your bed. No emergency exists. The only thing creating this physical and emotional reaction is the story your mind is telling.

This is the invisible power thoughts have over us. And most people never realize they can change it.

What Feelings Actually Are

Before we talk about thoughts, let's clarify what feelings are—because most people confuse feelings with thoughts without realizing it. Feelings are physical sensations in your body. They're the tightness in your chest, the knot in your stomach, the tension in your shoulders, the racing heart, the lump in your throat. These are your body's responses to what's happening in your nervous system. Emotions are the interpretations we give to those sensations. When you feel that tightness in your chest and your mind labels it "anxiety," that's an emotion. The same physical sensation could be labeled excitement, anticipation, or nervousness depending on the story you tell about it.

Here's where it gets interesting: your thoughts create your emotions, and your emotions create more thoughts, which create more emotions. It's a loop. And if you're not aware of it, you're trapped in it.

The Thought-Feeling Cycle

Imagine you send a text to a friend and they don't respond for three hours.

Your thought: "They're mad at me."

This thought triggers a physical response: stomach drops, shoulders tense, heart rate increases slightly. Your body is preparing for threat—social rejection, in this case. You interpret these sensations as anxiety. Now you're anxious.

The anxiety produces more thoughts: "What did I do wrong? They're definitely upset. Maybe they don't want to be friends anymore." These thoughts intensify the physical sensations. The anxiety grows. The thoughts become more catastrophic. You're now in a full spiral—all from a thought you created about why someone didn't text back. Then your friend responds: "Sorry! Phone died. Want to grab coffee?"

Instantly, the physical sensations change. The anxiety evaporates. Your body relaxes. What changed? Not the external situation—your friend was never actually mad. What changed was the story your mind was telling. And your body responded to that story as if it were real.

This is the power of thoughts. They create your emotional reality.

Why Your Thoughts Feel Like Truth

Your brain doesn't distinguish between a real threat and an imagined one. When you think "I'm going to fail," your body reacts as if failure is happening right now. Cortisol and adrenaline release. Your nervous system activates.

The physical sensations then reinforce the thought. "I feel anxious, so there must be something to be anxious about. My body wouldn't lie to me."

But your body isn't lying—it's just responding to the signal your thoughts sent. And if you're not paying attention, you'll believe the entire story without question.

The thoughts feel true because:

They arrive automatically (you didn't consciously choose them)

They trigger real physical sensations (which seem like evidence)

They're often repetitive (your brain loves familiar patterns)

The brain likes to make conclusions - it is wired this way, even if the conclusion isnt true - it feels true.

The Practice of Witnessing Your Thoughts

Here's the game-changer: you are not your thoughts. You are the awareness that notices the thoughts.

Think about it. Right now, you're reading these words. But there's also a part of you that's aware that you're reading. That's witnessing. That's consciousness observing itself.

You can do the same thing with thoughts.

When a thought arises—"I'm not good enough"—you have two options:

Option 1: Merge with it. Believe it completely. Let it generate emotions and actions based on that belief. This is what most people do most of the time.

Option 2: Witness it. Notice it as a mental event. "I'm having the thought that I'm not good enough." This small shift creates distance.

This isn't about positive thinking or trying to replace negative thoughts with positive ones. This is about recognizing that thoughts are just mental events passing through consciousness. They're not commands. They're not facts. They're just thoughts.

How to Practice Witnessing

1. Name the thought

Instead of "I'm anxious," try "I'm having the thought that something bad might happen."

This simple reframe creates space between you and the thought. You're no longer fused with it.

2. Notice thoughts as sounds

Imagine your thoughts as sounds in a room. You can hear them, but you don't have to follow them or believe them. They're just noise.

3. Label thought patterns

"There's my catastrophizing thought."

"There's my comparison thought."

"There's my 'I should' thought."

Naming the pattern breaks its hypnotic power.

4. Watch thoughts like clouds

Visualize thoughts as clouds passing across the sky of your awareness. You're the sky—vast, unchanging. Thoughts come and go, but you remain.

5. Ask: "Is this thought useful?"

Not "Is it true?" but "Is it useful?" A thought can be technically true but still unhelpful. "I made a mistake" might be true. "I always mess everything up and I'm a failure" is not useful, even if your brain insists it's true.

What Changes When You Witness

When you practice witnessing thoughts rather than merging with them, several things shift: The emotional intensity decreases. Thoughts lose their power to hijack your nervous system when you see them as thoughts rather than reality. You gain choice. Instead of automatically reacting to every thought, you can choose which ones to engage with and which ones to let pass. The thought-feeling loop breaks. When you don't believe every thought, you stop feeding the cycle that creates emotional suffering.

Your identity becomes less rigid. You stop defining yourself by the content of your thinking. You're not "an anxious person"—you're a person who sometimes has anxious thoughts.

Your thoughts create your feelings. Your feelings create more thoughts. And if you're unconscious of this process, you're being controlled by a feedback loop you didn't choose. But the moment you can observe a thought without becoming it, you've found freedom.

You don't have to believe everything you think. You don't have to follow every thought down the rabbit hole. And you definitely don't have to let your mind's worst-case scenarios dictate how you feel. The next time your brain serves up a catastrophic thought, try this: "That's an interesting story my mind is telling. I wonder what would happen if I didn't believe it?"

Your thoughts will keep coming. That's what minds do. But they only have as much power as you give them.

And you get to decide.