But not everyone. And Like the Elephant that may seem to be a snake to those who grab the trunk, or a tree to those who grasp a leg, this Voice is sometimes called Doubt, sometimes called Defense Mechanism, sometimes called Thought, and sometimes (often) called Me. This last is an insidious and dangerous identification. But the most dangerous form is that where you cannot track the Voice well enough to even notice it, let alone name it. Where you do not even stand aside from it, and therefor cannot hope to bring about any power to bear upon it.

One place I learned a part of this was while studying Psychology in my first college. As a major. (Not as a Psych major, but for a practical curriculum designed for working counselors in the Mental Health/Addictions field). One of the paradigms of Psychological practice and theory is called CBT—Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. And the lens this theory sees through is one of human behavior dictated by practiced and well-mapped thought chains that are built over time. From an original stimulus to our action/nonaction is a linear arrangement of ideas. You change behaviors by seeing them as responses to these arrangements. You alter responses by altering the chain of thoughts. At first you cannot recognize this chain of thoughts. It happens too quickly, and really, it is not made for you to ponder it. It does not move with that intent. But in time, you will learn to hear and "see" each and every chain of thought that darts around behind your intentions and actions. If you listen beyond the weave of static and noise that makes up so much of our supposed self-talk. If you want to find them.

I have traced the shape of this truth in Martial Arts, in my 2 1/2 years of of training and competing in Tae Kwon Do. In this discipline I was given the opportunity to strip away the layers of noise and actually turn and face this speaker, this Voice. And just as Karate is a "Hard" martial arts form, and Judo a "Soft" form (one directly blocks and strikes, the other redirects and levers others' energies)—the way in which you engage this Voice in Tae Kwon Do is also as a "Hard" form of confrontation. At first. This is like waking yourself from a dream, where a huge jolt of energy is required to bring yourself out, to traverse the inherent inertia of being in a State already. Like an electron jumping shells, for those who prefer or understand chemistry metaphors.

In TKD, you must meet this Voice head-on. It will, at first, be a Struggle.

In this line of thinking—using the language of Martial Arts—we could continue and posit that the reshaping of Self through CBT is a Soft form of confronting the needed change of Voice. In CBT, you learn to recognize the thoughts as they happen and retalk them, more or less. Stop them and reshape them. Through recognition and will and effort. You must re-make the "tapes" that play through persistence and insistence. In TKD, you simply say "Bah, tiny voice! I no longer recognize your power! You are false!" And you move right ahead. At least I did. I don't know if others are as conscious of their internal dialogue. And I don't mean the voices that are right up top. The voice I speak of is the shadow of internal dialogue. It does not actually enter the conversation, because if it did, you could look at it in the light of day. And it would fall apart, for it is not large. Only very quick and well-disguised.

In TKD (or in everyday life!) the Voice I speak of manifests as a judgment of your ability (to lift, to last, to move quick enough, to endure, to not give up, to not shrink away, to not duck, to stay relaxed, to train, to succeed) that you never even hear. I reiterate to the point of comedy, the speed of this aspect. I do this because if you are to truly change or reach higher levels of yourself (and we dip back into martial arts metaphors now) you must step onto the mat. You must prepare to become something you were not. You must crouch, get that weight on the balls of your feet and learn to observe the slightest twitch or lift of a heel; to be in motion by the time your opponent engages their strike. To move quicker.

So, the Voice moves very fast, and before you train in a discipline of listening for that voice, you won't know it has spoken and been heard and heeded, even. Someone says "help me stack this wood" or "please carry this" and the Voice darts in and says tooheavy or idontfeellikeit or i'mnotable or just can't.

The end result appears to be that you can't lift it. Maybe you try, but drop the load halfway to the stairs. Or you feel bad before you even touch the wood. Or you get angry. Or you get sad. Or you reinforce the rest of the Voices that you have stored up over time. Or do it, but remain as you were, mired in complaint and inability. You carry no confidence forward or reinforcement of good ideas to the next task.

CBT might tell us that the chain of thoughts is something like this: I was planning on relaxing/You just asked me to carry something for you half an hour ago/You are always asking me to carry things for you/Like when you asked me to carry the bike yesterday/Yesterday I lost an arm wrestling match/I am weak/I cannot carry that heavy object/I will look foolish in front of everyone/You are asking me to look foolish/I don't want to look weak and foolish/Who the hell are you to make me look weak and foolish and as you know, I'm not talking about a person sitting there playing Solitaire as they bat around big marshmallow thought bubbles. A smile can fade quicker than the time it takes for one of these chains to yank us around. This entire hand is played out in sniffs, in shades, half-sketched images. The whole damn deck ruffles from suit to suit in about half a second. If that. The thinker may never know this chain of thoughts just rippled across their mind. They may just drop the load and say something nasty, and storm off. Or bring up something the other person did a month ago, and now both people are feeling bad and angry. This can poison countless relationships and lives and remains such an obscured dynamic in the entire scenario that it is never addressed. We focus on larger, slower pieces. Ones that we can fret at, kick around. But that will never affect those parts of ourselves which trap us and perpetuate such dynamics.

In the words of the Master my mother followed when I was a child (and who became my own teacher) this voice that wants nothing more than to trap us into pain, believing in pain, worshipping and spreading pain and doubt and confusion (my understanding, not his words) is the voice of the Mind.

These terms, when I was young and learned them, were not used as you and I use the word "mind." You and I, in America, use it neutrally. To us, the Brain is the shell and the mind, the function. More or less. But in the teachings I was raised with (I won't call it Religion, it was not), "The Mind" is the voice in you that will never die, cannot be out-argued, has no care for what happens to you as long as you are suffering (and engaging it, because you cannot win by actually wielding logic or thought). It is the voice of hate, of critique, of dissatisfaction, of self-doubt, of fear, of entropy, of negativity. It pretends to have agendas, but they are all convenient masks intended to disguise the one true agenda: your suffering and confusion. This Voice is the "devil" on your shoulder. It is always with you. You normally identify with it. This is false. This is the Mind's intent.

In TKD, this voice is not named. It's cure is named, using the "Tenets" of TKD. You simply learn to follow a program where you act in ways that do not allow for The Mind to creep in. TKD is wise in this way; it does not focus on the Mind. It does not focus on the crime; it does not focus on the negative. This shows the truth that even by turning your attention toward the mind ("glorifying Satan," or "Uttering Sauron's name," "living in the Problem instead of the Solution", etc) you send it energy. Even by engaging a struggle you validate it. Transforming yourself into Reaction still uses the language of the Action.

In TKD, you orient yourself using The Tenets. The Tenets of Tae Kwon Do are Courtesy, (Ye Ul) Integrity, (Yom Chi), Perseverance, (In Nae) Self-Control, (Guk Gi), Indomitable Spirit, (Baekjul Boolgool). There is no Dojang (School) without these. There is no Kata without these. There is no Tae Kwon Do without these. Without these, you are but practicing to hurt people and fend off hurt from yourself. Empty mechanics. What you are taught is framed in these. What you are rewarded for is framed with these. What you are penalized for is framed with these. The dialogue about your technique and success and failure are framed with these. Thus, their absorption is organic and experiential and firm. Training and self-confidence replace doubt, worry, and panic. The Mind is afforded no room. The Voice is replaced with a calm, practiced, felt art. A oneness of alignment of body, mind, and heart.

In addition to training in Tae Kwon Do, I've spent some time in and out of institutional settings during my teen years, and slightly beyond. I learned a bit of behavioral reconditioning. You might even say I have mastered Bootcamp of the Mind; of the self-administered Behavior Mod process. The details are irrelevant to this current discussion except to note that in these places, if you study, you can learn further aspects of the Voice, or The Mind. You learn of its elusive nature, and of the speed with which it can move.

In my childhood, and in the lessons of my teacher, you learned not to say "the amazing and unmatcheable speed with which the Mind can move" as that is giving The Mind what it wants: power. Your belief, your energy. You are aiding it. As noted, religious types might tell you not to praise Lucifer, his deeds, or his might. I always note these recurring patterns, metaphors, shapes, because I have learned that it is in these overlaps of experience that we can know Truth. This is the language of Life's truths. And when you can speak it, you gain immense powers. You learn that you are the one who can choose to empower that dark force, or reduce it. And talking about how powerful it is is empowering it.

So you choose not to.

This is reflected in the therapeutic notion of "Negative Self Talk."

The Voice does move fast. Not so fast that you can't move quicker, though. You can learn to listen quick enough to hear it. It sounds like you. It uses your thought-shapes. It uses your lingo. It uses your favorite arguments, even.

But it is not You.

This is why we must practice to stand aside from this Voice, to stand apart from it. When we hear it to note that it is speaking. To remind ourselves of its agenda. And how not to engage it.

This can be difficult when so much of the world speaks along with this voice; this worm, this "Mind," this "fear." The TV speaks in harmony with this Voice; many politicians speak in harmony with this disharmonic voice. Much of the world plays to your fear, to your doubt, to your self-loathing. Much of the civilized world speaks to the darkness in you. To the fear, to the doubt, to the weakness. Much of the civilized "world" wants to control you. That is to say, many people want to control you. Many factions and groups, organizations, and beneficiaries. To make you dependent. Make you weak, and afraid, and diseased.

I've known people that truly make me want to cry knowing them. Simply because I see what a whorl this Voice has them in. They have not learned to separate themselves from the Mind; they think that voice is their own. And they listen. They give it power, and they feed it, and then they cry that they can't escape it. And it is like watching someone drown in front of you. They sadly twist from your most loving and firm grip.

You see, we all listen to this Voice from time to time. We can't help this. We are human. And this "choice" we are given? This "Good" and "Bad"? Well, it entails the ability to become lost in Maya, to bend an Eastern concept to my own needs a bit. To become lost in illusion of doubt and trouble and fear; to bring it in close. To make it real.

But we also have the power at any time to step back. To wake up. To shake it off. To speak aloud "I don't believe that." Or better yet "I do believe that." Or "who said that?" "Where the hell did that come from?" and "Every day is a new one, and today, so am I renewed." And so we can learn. And change.

Some call this voice Hope. And we can hear and have as much of it as we want. At any time. And with this hope, we can do whatever we choose. We can remap our reality, our inner world, our behavior with others. We can reach the higher levels of our self, and escape the traps and cycles we so often believe are our fate. And if there is a voice that is now telling you I am being naïve or simplistic or emotional or simply poetic—that is the wrong one to let into your heart.

Part 2 to follow.