To get a look at how automatic and circuitous your own thinking process is, right now take a minute to point your thoughts in any direction of your choosing and try to track them as they run their course. You should write down all those that you notice for long enough to capture. After completing this exercise, repeat it two more times, again letting your thoughts run for one minute. In round two, imagine that your job is to figure out whether each thought is literally true or appropriate. In round three, imagine that your thoughts are like the voices of quarreling first-graders. Adopt a posture of curiosity and amusement as you listen to them, but do nothing else with them than to notice them. Take a minute each and do it. In round two, you probably experienced the sense of being pulled into your thought networks. Their loudness may have increased; a focus on content may have gone up. You might have noticed yourself getting involved in a kind of argument with your mind. In round three, you probably noticed more about the flow of your thoughts. Very likely, the specific content of the thoughts seemed less important. You had a sense of being outside the argument. That difference explains why defusion exercises weaken the link between automatic thoughts and behavior; our ability to step back from our thoughts grows stronger as we practice.