Talking Back
When you read a title for an article like this, you might think it would be about habit training (kids talking back to their parents in a mean way) or narration, but I want to talk about something different. This “talking back” is talking to yourself and controlling your thoughts. Charlotte Mason wrote a lot about this, especially in Volume I, Home Education.
Perhaps you’ve had this happen to you: a thought comes into your head, out of the blue. Now, you can choose to either follow that train of thought and go down the rabbit hole or to think about something else. Of course, choosing to think about something else is much more difficult and takes more will power. Charlotte Mason gave these examples of thoughts coming into our heads: “…who is to keep hummingbirds out of a geography lesson, or a doll’s sofa out of a French verb? Here is the secret of the weariness of the home schoolroom– the children are thinking all the time about something else than their lessons; or, rather they are at the mercy of the thousand fancies that flit through their brains, each in the train of the last. ‘Oh, Miss, Smith,’ said a little girl to her governess, ‘there are so many things more interesting than lessons to think about!’” (Home Education, page 139)
Another good example she gave was about a class about glass: “You talk to a child about glass – you wish to provoke a proper curiosity as to how glass is made and what are its uses. Not a bit of it; he wanders off to Cinderella’s glass slipper; then he tells you about his godmother who gave him a boat; then about the ship in which Uncle Harry went to America; then he wonders why you do not wear spectacles, leaving you to guess that Uncle Harry does so. But the child’s ramblings are not whimsical; they follow a law, the law of association of ideas, by which any idea presented to the mind recalls some other idea which has been at any time associated with it” (Home Education, Page 138). We, as people, are always thinking. “The mind…is never idle; ideas are for ever passing through the brain, by day and by night, sleeping or waking, mad or sane. We take a great deal too much upon ourselves when we suppose that we are the authors and intenders of the thoughts we think. The most we can do is to give direction to these trains of thought in the comparatively few moments when we are regulating the thoughts of our hearts” (Home Education, p. 138).
We often say a “train of thought.” It’s a good expression because one thought often leads to another like one part of the train follows another. It follows the association of ideas. One idea is often linked to another, and so it goes.
The difficulty comes when we try to change the way the train of thought goes: to change our thoughts. Miss Mason said, “We think, as we are accustomed to think; ideas come and go and carry on…You do not deliberately intend to think these thoughts; you may, indeed, object strongly to the link they are taking…, you may be able to barricade the way, to put up “No Road” in big letters, and to compel the busy populace of the brain world to take another route” (Home Education, p.108). This ability to “talk back” to ourselves and to start thinking about something else is hard. It takes a lot of willpower and is something that needs to be trained. “Pride, resentment, jealousy, an invention that a man has labored over, an opinion he has conceived, any line of thought which he has no longer power to divert, will endanger a man’s sanity” (Home Education, p. 115).
We often don’t think of it, but our thoughts are powerful. The brain is powerful. My great aunt is almost 97 years old and has Alzheimer’s, where her brain is slowly dying. However, her brain has made it so that she doesn’t eat much anymore. She’s skin and bones because her brain has told her, “I’m not hungry,” even though she’s malnourished and starving. She has to take medicine to help her feel hungry, so she’ll eat anything at all. I asked her one time if she wanted any ice cream (yes, she still eats ice cream sandwiches!) and she said, “No, these people won’t let me eat it.” Her mind had made up people in the room who weren’t there at all and were stopping her from eating. She’s lost the power to feel pain from being hungry, so she’s not in pain, but her mind is dying.
The Bible also talks about our thoughts in a few places. David tells himself to praise the Lord in Psalm 103 (verses 1 and 2): “Praise the Lord, my soul; all my inmost being, praise His holy Name. Praise the Lord, my soul, and forget not all His benefits–” David also mentioned it in a prayer before a big group of people. (“Lord, the God of our fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, keep these desires and thoughts in the hearts of your people forever, and keep their Hearts loyal to you.” 1 Chronicles 29:18). If you do a Bible search for “thoughts,” you’ll find quite a few verses that talk about our thoughts and God’s thoughts. It’s a great study to do.
One final thought before we finish up here. We should try and have some kind of system in place to challenge our thoughts. Thankfully, God has helped us with this: “Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable – if anything is excellent or praiseworthy – think about such things”
Rachel Bubb 2024
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