How to free yourself from negative thoughts? We’d all like to have an OFF button to press when our thoughts loop around in our heads and make us suffer. But what if that OFF button did exist? What if we could have that precious freedom to think or not to think? Ho’oponopono suggests 3 steps to inner peace.

1 – Realize that we are the creators of our lives

When something bothers us, whether it’s a difficulty, a flaw in a person, a money problem… we are the creators. This is what Ho’oponopono tells us.

So, written like that, it may come as a shock to you, because it’s not easy to understand that we create our own problems.

Our erroneous beliefs and memories
How do we create our problems? It’s our thoughts! Indeed, it’s through our thoughts that we create our life, our reality.

These thoughts most often come from our beliefs. Ho’oponopono talks about memories. Unfortunately, our beliefs and memories are often erroneous.

We have no responsibility for the creation of our memories and beliefs. We simply haven’t been conscious of anchoring them within ourselves. In fact, we inherited them from our childhood, our parents and even our ancestors.

The problem is that these beliefs and memories cause us to suffer and create negative thoughts, which in turn create problems in our lives.

“It’s very important to free ourselves from everything that can pollute our thoughts, i.e. all those unconscious memories that constantly distort our perception, our way of thinking and consequently our creations.”

How can we free ourselves from negative thoughts? By understanding that they come from erroneous beliefs and memories, not from reality.

We are the creators of our lives
Faced with this realization, we may feel defeated: if I’m not aware of my memories or beliefs, then what can I do?

Ho’oponopono tells us something powerful: we are the creators of our own lives.

We can create the life we want. We have complete power. In fact, we are totally free! How do we do it?

By freeing ourselves from our erroneous beliefs and memories, and therefore from our negative thoughts.

Taking responsibility
Step 1 is to simply understand this. I write simply, but it’s not simple.

Indeed, when we’re faced with a problem, more often than not, our reflex is to define ourselves in relation to the outside world. In fact, we rob ourselves of our freedom by victimizing ourselves. We’ve learned to do this. As children, we unloaded on our parents, then on our teachers, and then on the state, our boss and our partner…

This may seem comfortable to us: they’re the problem, not us. But, in fact, it’s not a question of who’s the problem, who’s doing it wrong and who’s doing it right.

The important thing is to take back our responsibility, to go back inside ourselves.

How can we free ourselves from negative thoughts? By looking at our difficulties in life and realizing that they are 100% of our own making. There’s no need to feel guilty, just to free ourselves from it.

2 – Transcend the way we look at things to free ourselves from negative thoughts

Ho’oponopono speaks of “passing the baton”. To understand this term, we need to accept several things. It has to do with our identity.

Accepting our identity
We’re not just our minds; we’re also home to an inner child and a soul. What’s more, we’re connected to the Universe, God, Spirit… an entity that connects everything and everyone.

We know our mind all too well. It produces our thoughts. It’s useful, because it allows us to make choices. It’s even more useful, because it’s also what allows us to converse with our inner child.

Our inner child lives in our heart. It’s the emotional part of our being. It’s also where our beliefs and memories are stored. In fact, when we face problems and suffering, it’s our inner child who suffers. With our minds, we’re able to talk to him and reassure him.

Then there’s our soul. The divine part that will help us transcend our memories and beliefs that are causing us suffering. Our “job” is to learn to connect with it and trust it.

How can we free ourselves from negative thoughts? By accepting that we are not “just” our mind.

Transcending our gaze to free ourselves from negative thoughts
When we’re faced with a problem, a difficulty, a suffering, a negative thought that we dwell on, the first step is to understand that these are things we’ve created because of our beliefs, our erroneous memories.

The second step is to ask our divine part for help. In fact, our aim is not to understand our erroneous beliefs and memories and change them. No. Our goal is to cleanse them!

Ho’oponopono speaks of “healing”. How can we free ourselves from negative thoughts? By learning to heal ourselves, by cleansing our being of erroneous beliefs and memories.

But how do we cleanse our being?

Asking for help to free yourself from negative thoughts
To heal, we usually need a cure. The remedy offered by Ho’oponopono is love!

“Love transcends everything.

This love, which will enable us to heal our beliefs and memories and thus free ourselves from our negative thoughts, is called a “prayer”, a mantra.

This love lies within us, in our divine part: our soul. The one who knows that we are connected to all things, that there is no light or shadow, no good or evil.

To ask her for help, we have 4 words to say: Sorry, Pardon, Thank you, I love you.

“Sorry, I didn’t know I had this memory inside me,
Sorry to life and to myself,
Thank you for pointing out the problem I was unknowingly carrying,
I love you all, Life, my environment, the people around me, my erroneous memories, not forgetting… myself.”

Passing the baton
In fact, we’re passing the baton. For too long, we have given all the power to our mind, which is subject to our erroneous beliefs and memories.

Today, it’s time to give that power back to our soul, for it alone knows what’s good for us.

In other words, when we are faced with a problem, difficulty or suffering, let’s learn to breathe deeply, to accept that we are the creators of it, and to believe that we can free ourselves from it by asking our soul to “cleanse” the unconscious belief or memory that created it.

How can we free ourselves from negative thoughts? By stopping attaching ourselves to our mind and learning to let our soul guide us.

3 – Letting go of expectations to free yourself from negative thoughts

When Ho’oponopono suggests letting go of expectations, it means doing nothing. Doing nothing so that we can feel our soul’s inspiration on the “right” action to take.

This step invites us to become aware of our tendency to want to control everything, to live always with the intention of something. Unfortunately, this tendency leads us to put limits on ourselves.

Our mind is there to think and reflect, but it’s not there to KNOW what’s right for us to do. Only our soul knows.

When we experience a problem, difficulty or suffering, it’s a sign that we have a belief, a memory that prevents us from living to our full potential. Yet this full potential is within our reach, because our soul is always available to us.

“There’s nothing to change on the outside, it’s all on the inside.

“We have to trust life, but also be sure that the best solution will be brought to us and that it won’t always – not often – be the expected/hoped-for solution. But that doesn’t matter, because it will always be a pleasant surprise. What we have to do here is put our faith in our inner selves to find the best solution to our problems…”.

How can we free ourselves from negative thoughts? By explaining to our mind that it doesn’t have to worry about finding the right solution. It will come to us thanks to our soul.

Here’s what I’ve learned from Ho’oponopono

Ho’oponopono invites us to transform our difficulties and suffering through love and faith in our soul.

How can we free ourselves from negative thoughts? By ceasing to want to control everything, to look for the right solution… Our mind isn’t cut out for that.

What we have to do in life is quite simple: observe what’s going on inside us, understand that our judgments, our problems are only reflections of our inner selves, that everything belongs to us, that we’re not victims, but creators. We are free!

Our “weapon”, our antidote, our remedy for our problems and suffering is love.

We’re not here on Earth to fight, to change others or ourselves. We’re here to free ourselves. This liberation is achieved by loving and listening to our soul.

Find out more:

I invite you to read these 2 complementary articles:

Discover Negative thoughts: 10 habits that changed my life
Discover Become zen: 5 powerful tips for a peaceful life

I recommend this inspiring book:

The Mindful Way Through Depression by Mark Williams, John Teasdale, Zindel Segal, and Jon Kabat-Zinn

This book offers a mindfulness-based approach to overcoming depression, guiding us to free ourselves from negative thought patterns. The authors present practical exercises and strategies based on mindfulness meditation, enabling individuals to cultivate a healthier relationship with their thoughts and emotions.

If you’re feeling depressed or unhappy in your life, anxious about the future or worried about what happened in the past, I can’t recommend this book highly enough.
And if you don’t suffer from depression? – I think this book covers a wide range of emotional experiences, including low self-esteem, and can even help with anxiety issues. It examines our tendencies as individuals to always focus on the negative, how we end up self-criticizing and how, if we’re prone to depression and low mood, this inner critic can take control, making us feel worse about ourselves.

Thank you very much for reading this article.

If you liked it, let me know in the comments.

Take care of yourself