Mind...Your Junk Drawer

Dear Why Team member,
I hope this week’s message finds you well and will be of service to you.

Last week, as I have done quarterly now for a number of years, I spent an entire day with my business/life coach and good friend Dr. Roger Hall - I always come away reinvigorated from the intense time of reflection on Why, What and How. One of Roger’s teachings is that of the junk drawer. Most everyone has a junk drawer in their home, the drawer that is the catch-all for all that little stuff that doesn’t really fit anywhere- so it just goes in the drawer. When something gets misplaced, it’s to that drawer one often goes to. I’ll ask you the question Roger asked me:
“What is sitting on top of everything in the junk drawer?”
Naturally, “What was put in it last”.
He uses this as an example of how our minds work. We tend to think of the last thing put into our mind. You have no doubt heard the saying “Top of Mind”. It is what is on top that gets most of our attention - for the mind is most certainly filled with junk. 
Now, one might say, let’s just clean out the drawer. And much of this can be accomplished via meditation; however life, on any given day, can quickly refill the junk drawer of the active mind. What is powerful to notice here is that our mood in any given moment is influenced by what sits on top of our mind’s junk drawer.


Years ago, when Roger first gave me this insight, I have leveraged it in preparation for a speech. The material was in my mind, but with time moved toward the back of the drawer. Practice and preparation becomes an exercise of getting the speech insights and ideas back on top to be readily available when needed. I have leveraged this insight for years. But last week, the junk drawer insight took on a different flavor. Roger leveraged the junk drawer insight again to speak to WHY the practice of gratitude is so vital to experience an abundant life. Without disciplined intention and attention to the Mind - Your Junk Drawer, the true junk in the drawer can be all we think about. 


Have you noticed little children? They are prime examples of how our mind works and of how we can influence the ones around us. Earl Nightingale talked a lot about the power of our mind to propel us or to anchor us: “a child imagines himself walking like the adults he sees above him. As soon as he walks he wants to run. As we reach success and plateaus in life we begin to imagine ourselves reaching the next one and that's our imagination, leads us on from one idea to another one every day and every year of our lives.” Imagination is born out of the information we entrap from each day’s events.


Because our minds are wired primarily for protection, defense, war - the unaddressed mental junk could move negative emotions or experiences to the top - and the more easily available, the more frequently we incorporate these top-of-mind negative emotions into our reality. 
The remedy? 
Consistently and intentionally observing and deciding what you keep and what you want on top of your drawer. What is readily available to serve you and those you seek to serve? We Create our experiences proactively or reactively. Without consistent attention to what is top of mind - more negative easily accessible thoughts form and shape our experience of life. Consider this simple path to minding the mind and what sits on top: RTP


To Reap The Possibilities, give more attention to Read, Think & Partner. What we read goes to the top of our mind and of course influences what we think. Consider the people around you and what they think and how what they speak can sit at the top of your mind as well. It is said that we are the sum-total of the top five people with which we interact. We have all heard that birds of a feather flock together - Why? Because they share the same thoughts and behave accordingly from the junk at the top of their drawers. 


Mind your….junk drawer. 


Pay attention to what sits on top. Lift your own life and others by simply listening to your own spoken words. Are they truly junk? Then throw them out. At the very least, try not to put those thoughts at the top of another’s mind. Lift up yourself and others with uplifting thoughts placed at the top of your mental drawer and at the top of others. The spoken word constructs or destructs, creates or destroys.
Attend more to what’s at the top of your drawer - at the top of your mind - and you’ll become more - for yourself and for others.


Make it a great week!​

Steve Luckenbach