There's a lot written and posted about the impossibility of controlling thoughts, or thought stopping.

I just want to say that I found the practice helpful.

I watched my thoughts, and if anything negative appeared, I stopped it.  It worked very well. 

Why do people say not to stop negative thoughts?

Not an impossibility.Hellz yeah it works very well.  I suppose there is  danger of suppression of thoughts, but bringing negative thoughts and bringing ill will to cessation ASAP each and every time you can remember to do so is the real deal.Clinging, delusional sense of ownership, they perhaps think they can look and investigate negative thoughts and figure it out, but that method is like playing with trash and bile, better to throw it out!  

Put it out as if your head was on fire!!  


Woooohoooo!!!!



Psi

Congratulations, CCC. You're making progress.

You see, the practice works: "When those evil unwholesome thoughts connected with desire, hate, and delusion, which have arisen owing to (wrong) attention given to an object, have been abandoned in a monk and have subsided (due to his applying these five methods) and when (due to that) his mind has become steady and settled, unified and concentrated -- then that monk is called a master of the pathways of thoughts: he will think the thoughts he wants to think and will not think those he does not want to think. He has cut off craving, severed the fetter (to existence) and with the full penetration of conceit, he has made an end of suffering." (MN 20; Vitakkasanthana Sutta; Translation by Nyanaponika Thera, from his book The Vision of Dhamma)

Well those are two diff things.  In meditation, one can practice not thinking but you do need a few thoughts during the day to operate.  Try fixing your computer without a thought LOL!  The trick is not to have unneeded thoughts, which is most of them.  When you say stoppoing, I suspec tyou mean stopping the nonuseful ones.  SO how to not have unneeded ones?  Many suggest just observing and labeling nonjudgementally and that will lessen them.  But others have given examples of ways to deal with some stubborn thoughts, distract them with something else, think about the opposite, etc.  I think it's best to try the whole arsenal and see what works for you and I aso think that what has worked for me depends on what stage I have been in along the path too.  I think fo thoughts like a river that has a lot of energy, you can certainly train the river to direct in different ways and the longer it flows in teh new route, the more ingrained it is.  The river of energy can even transform over time to something else which I don't think of exactly as 'stopping' but it's kind of a quibbling point.  

That just seems like the mind (thought) has spread out as the controller and is taken to be oneself. A subtler form but still the same thing as before, with added suppression which could be seen as a form of violence..

Not stating an opinion here, just an observation.

I think some people refer to the fact by this that repressed stuff can come up stronger and/or elsewhere in your psyche and behaviour. I'm no psychotherapist, but I think that goes mostly for emotions and desires. I know first-hand that these can cause trouble later in life if not experienced fully. There arising and passing also makes a great tool for insight.

Thanks for all the input everyone.  I'm considerig it all, except the comment about 'violence' which I don't understand.

The attitude of "You shouldn't appear.", "Shut up", "You're unwanted" is not very peaceful in my opinion. And that's not the nature of reality either. The suppression might not be seen that clearly as described in the first sentence though, but that seems to be the attitude among many meditators. It's a bit like you're trying to suffocate an aspect of yourself which you don't like (because you're believing your thoughts about how things should or shouln't be). That's what was referred to.

I just stop it.  Like hitting DEL on the computer keyboard.

I've been thinking about the whole suppression thing.  Looks like it's an issue if you go "lalalalalalala" in order to prevent the arising of such thoughts into consciousness, creating a pressure cooker.  But I'm wathing carefully, and as soon as I see it, I hit DELETE.

Hopefully I'll make more progress.

So how can you be sure that that isn't thought activity based on the sense of separation that is driving the show? If it is, it will never get you anywhere because that "you" that thinks he/she is hoping for progression is just part of the thought stream that isn't recognized as thoughts. The polar opposite of the thoughts that it sees as unwanted. Two sides but the coin is one.

That whole activity seems to be coming out of the idea of purity. That idea hasn't worked in the world (look at history) and it isn't working any better psychologically although it might seem otherwise at the moment.