I have been talking quite a bit recently about negative talk, negative thinking, and negative people… Time to switch gears… Now that you can identify different forms of negativity and have some tools to deal with it, I thought we could spend a little time on the other side…
Positive thinking is a choice. It is a mental attitude that expects good and favorable results. It brings inner peace, success, improved relationships, better health, happiness, and satisfaction. It also radiates to people around you, and one way or the other, they are influenced by it. They might love your energy or hate your fucking guts for being so annoyingly positive but they will react...
Why is it so much easier to have a negative attitude than a positive one? The situations and challenges we face in the world each day expose us to negative thinking which, in turn, pulls us down. When these situations and challenges enter our minds, they generate negative thoughts and feelings. The BIG question here is ‘How do we develop a reasonable positive mind?’ You cannot be positive all the time but like negative minded people, your thoughts can influence your personality… Negative thoughts make negative people and positive thoughts make positive people… Hopefully, the following tips will help you develop a more positive outlook…
1. Be conscious of your thoughts.
Examine critically what you think about. Negative actions and words often come from negative thoughts and what goes through our minds. Like I said at the opening of this article, positive thinking is a choice. We have the ability to choose our thoughts, regardless of our beliefs. As soon as a negative thought comes into our minds, we should purposefully make it a point of duty to replace it with a positive one or at the very least, a more neutral thought. This may seem difficult at first, but like automatic negative thinking, replacing it can cause less negativity over time.
2. Write your thoughts in a thought dairy.
Keep a list of your thoughts, attitudes, and actions. Carry a notebook and write them down as soon as you notice them. This may sound like a pain in the ass but jotting down a few notes will help you see patterns in thinking. Then at the end of the day, critically analyze them and honestly assess your overall thinking processes. Do you automatically criticize or consider worst case scenarios?
3. Challenge the negative thoughts.
The purpose of challenging our negative thoughts is to be able to see quickly whether the thoughts are wrong or whether they have some reasonable useful content in them. If you have written down your thoughts and actions you will be able to recognize the negativity… This will enable you to determine the degree negativity overall and will also enable you to take appropriate actions. However, we should always make sure that our thoughts are genuinely important to achieving our goals. Some critical analysis is important. Some experiences do not have positive outcomes no matter what we think about them…
4. Try to see things in a positive way.
Having positive eyes helps us to develop positive thoughts. Try and identify the positive aspects of situations, people and experiences.
5. Dream of success.
Before you start any plan or action, clearly focus your mind on a successful outcome. It’s perfectly okay to be excited about a positive outcome before it occurs. Discover that childlike hope that whatever you take on will succeed. This will bring you amazing results. Avoid negative reactions and statements. Quickly find adequate solutions to problems or challenges as soon as they occur, rather than reacting negatively to them.
6. Look for positive people to associate with.
As I stated before when I discussed negative people, be careful the company you keep. It is good to be around positive thinking people who radiate positive attitudes. However, encountering a positive person and engaging them may seem a difficult task if you are still adjusting to your new mindset.
7. Develop new habits.
Our present attitudes are habits, built from the feedback of parents, friends, society and self, and these form our self-image and our world view. We can develop new habits and start a new life of positive thinking. The best way to form a new habit is to tie it to an existing habit. Look for patterns in your day and think about how you can use existing habits to create new, positive ones. How about a little mindful thankfulness at the first sip of coffee? Perhaps you can practice balance yoga or do squats while you brush your teeth? You have things you do every day that you can add a positive spin… Think about it, doing positive actions brings positive thoughts about yourself and the world around you…
Start tiny! Big behavior changes require a high level of motivation and discipline that often can’t be sustained. Starting with tiny habits to make the new habit as easy as possible in the beginning. Taking a daily short walk, for example, could be the beginning of an exercise habit. Or putting an apple in your bag every day could lead to better eating habits. When I began my exercise challenges, I chose routines that started out with as little as three sets of one pull-up per day! Easy at the start lets you succeed and you get great thoughts about yourself! Start small, think big!
Listen, the hardest thing I have ever done in my life was admit that I was wrong… My entire personality was tied to my negative thinking. People expected my sarcasm, my doom filled outlook on life and my belief that hope was a disease for idiots… My sense of humor, sense of purpose and my entire disposition thrived on it. When I began to suspect that my thoughts, speech, and actions were wrong, I was terrified… What would people think? I had spent decades denouncing and making fun of positive people… What would I do with my circle of friends and family who knew me only as the snarky, negative, and funny asshole that I had always been?
Well… I found out… I have dropped some people along the way, but I have gained more friends, developed better relationships and now I have a circle of people who I trust, learn from, and rely on to help me find my way down this new path.
Which brings me to the last recommendation…
8. Practice gratitude…
I am exceptionally grateful for my new attitude and way of looking at the world around me… It is exhausting and lonely in a world that has no hope and no path to redemption. The only people you can commiserate with share your world view and having the thought that this is a hopeless situation hammered home constantly tears you down… I was caught in cyclic reasoning where my negativity fed my attitude and my attitude fed my negativity and even though it was having devastating effects on my mental health, I still refused to change. Escape from that dark line of reasoning changed everything...
It only takes one decision to change everything... Make that decision now... Tell yourself that in the morning when your feet hit the floor that today will be the day... Make a commitment to yourself that you will work on every aspect of yourself for the next 90 days... Your body, your mind and your attitude... Commit to making yourself a better person not only for those around you, but for yourself... Will it be easy? Fuck no... Will the transition be smooth and painless? Fuck no... But if you commit to it, decide to not waver from it, will it work? Yes, and in ways you could never imagine... It only takes a second to make that decision, but it takes real commitment, real discipline and real hard work to become the absolute best version of yourself... You have the drive? The information you need, the science, the data, the ideas and the hundreds of people who have done it before you even thought about it are at your fingertips...
Get a mentor in a blog, book or a person and get to work.. Decide right now...
The 90 Day Life Change Challenge update... Tomorrow when I get up I will have eight days to go... I "Hulk smashed" today and plan on it again tomorrow... Stopped at the meathead store again after work and those guys cheered me up... Gotta love a meathead... The discussions in there are limited to pre-workout drinks, protein and I'm a pussy for being a vegan and we all laugh... I consider them a part of my circle of support...
See you all tomorrow... Just like always...
Love you like girls love diamonds... Stereotyping? Yep.... True? Oh yeah...
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