Are Your Thoughts Really Random? The Hidden Patterns of the Mind

Every day appears, at first, to bring new thoughts, and I complain that everything is so random.

Random. What does that word even mean?

Random: lacking a definite plan, purpose, or pattern.

Well, yeah. By that definition my thoughts certainly look random. One thought appears, another wanders in from somewhere else, and before long I have made three turns and a U-turn. But when I look again, there it is: a pattern forming.

So here we go once again, looking for patterns.

Just once, couldn’t I discover that everything really is random?

Undoubtedly, my mind says no.

So I asked my writing buddy. He says nope, not random either. Roy suggested that randomness may sometimes be nothing more than an unrecognized pattern. From my experience, that seems true.

Which makes me wonder: how does one actually become random?

Suppose I deliberately abandon this thought and jump to another one.

There. Random.

Except it isn’t.

I chose to change direction. I made the U-turn on purpose. The moment purpose enters the picture, randomness begins to disappear. There was a choice, and behind that choice was intention. That creates a pattern, even if the pattern is nothing more than my attempt to escape the previous one.

Rebellion does the same thing. Rebel against a pattern long enough and rebellion itself becomes the pattern.

Chaos is a little different, but even chaos often grows from patterns colliding with other patterns. Sometimes chaos is accidental. Sometimes it is intentional. But if it is intentional, we are right back where we started: choice, purpose, and pattern.

Now what is all this leading to?

I have to say, your guess is as good as mine. It isn’t leading anywhere in particular.

At least that is what I keep telling myself.

My internal narrator is laughing at the moment. He seems to know what I am doing before I do.

Then Elvis Presley wanders into the room singing about being caught in a trap and unable to walk out.

Of course he does.

Because apparently even my attempt to write about randomness has to include a song reference. There is another pattern.

Ugh.

Maybe that is it.

The pursuit of becoming random leads to self-entrapment.

I try to escape the pattern, but the escape becomes part of the pattern. I rebel against it, and rebellion becomes the pattern. I deliberately change direction, and the choice itself gives the turn purpose.

I wanted random.

I found pattern.

I tried rebellion.

I found pattern.

I tried escape.

And found the trap.

So perhaps my thoughts are not random after all. Maybe they only appear that way until I stand far enough back to see the tracks they have been leaving behind.

And somewhere inside my head, that narrator is still laughing.

He knew where this was going.

Random may be what pattern looks like when you have missed the beginning of the story. Circle back and there is the pattern.

Apparently, I was the last one to find out.