âThought Wormsâ, now what the hell is that? Something caused by thinking? Good enough reason to not think anymore!
Not really. What we call thoughts, researchers are calling âthought wormsâ as depicted by brain activity patterns.
Researchers have been able to detect transition points between thoughts. Instead of pursuing what the new thought it, they focused on when the new thought occurs and how often.
Through this research they have measured that an average person has somewhere close to 6,000 thoughts a day!
In the process busting the pre-existing myth that a person has 70,000 thoughts a day. I couldnât sustain a single thought worm about the fact that I had 70,000 of them. Maybe now I will try! Not that 6,000 is a any less.
Maybe 70,000 was the upper end of the range for those of us blessed with hyper active monkey brains!
But on a serious note, the ability to observe oneâs thoughts is the central tenet of meditation and mindfulness.
Even with a short period of practicing meditation, one begins to notice the ability to observe the thoughts and the transitions from one thought worm to the other. The difference obviously is that the observance is limited to the short period of time when one practices meditation.
Clinically measuring these thought worms especially early on in life can lead to proper diagnosis of ADHD so the research is indeed promising. Here is the link to learn more.
Either ways, it is a fascinating thought-worm (sorry had to!) to think that all human advance started with a thought worm just like all humans did from another kind of worm!