We all now once in a while get trapped in our own thoughts no matter what it is that we are thinking that this can be a positive outcome for us or a negative one. What we do decide to do upon the thoughts is up to us as it can make us or break us!
Did you know that the everyday thoughts that we think about either positive or negative that you will repeat often, eventually, will affect your behaviour and actions, and create changes in your life in accordance with these thoughts that you’ve been thinking?
We all must have probably had someone tell us sometime in our lives to “look on the bright side” or to “see the cup as half full.” Chances are good that the people who make these comments are positive thinkers. Researchers are finding more and more evidence pointing to the many benefits of optimism and positive thinking.
Such findings suggest that not only are positive thinkers healthier and less stressed, but they also have greater overall well-being. According to positive psychology researcher Suzanne Segerstrom, “Setbacks are inherent to almost every worthwhile human activity, and a number of studies show that optimists are in general both psychologically and physiologically healthier.”
Positive thinking…it can sound so simple, but often, not easy and that most of the time in our busy lives we seem not to act upon being positive, especially with the terms of events that we tend to go all negative- again by choice of course of our own. Our life is made of habits and even Buddha once said: “We are what we think.” This is why, it’s very important to constantly choose the positive way of thinking and make an optimistic attitude – your habit or second nature.
BENEFITS OF POSITIVE THINKING
Even if positive thinking does not come naturally to you, there are plenty of great reasons to start cultivating affirmative thoughts and minimizing negative self-talk.
Positive thinking… can sound simple, but often, not easy. Our life is made of habits and even Buddha once said: “We are what we think.” This is why, it’s very important to constantly choose the positive way of thinking and make an optimistic attitude – your habit or second nature. Let me share with you 10 advantages of being a positive person:
1) Positive mind attracts positive events.
First of all, if we decide to become positive, we can make the so-called “law of attraction” work in our favour. The main principle of the law of attraction is that “like attracts like”. If you will make positive thinking your habitual way of seeing life, imagine how many great things you can attract into your life!
2) Great and harmonious relationships.
When you chose a positive attitude, you will start to notice a lot of positive qualities in people and ignore their defaults, and then, you will start to create more meaningful friendships and great relationships. This type of attitude will create a very good and positive atmosphere around you.
3) Better the first impression.
If you make positive thinking your priority, you will always make a great first impression. People, usually, are attracted to kind and friendly personalities and a good first impression can have a big impact on the development of your future relationships.
4) Vibrant health.
Positive thinking is very beneficial for your health. Even several scientific studies have shown that people with a good, positive “vibe” are less likely to suffer from depression and they get ill more rarely than the negative thinkers. In many cases, bad thoughts are the main cause of deceases, and even the word “decease” means that the person is not at ease…Just change your thoughts and you will change your life. That’s why, taking care of our thoughts – is taking care of our health!
5) Key of success.
Positive people are more likely to be successful than negative ones. When you will implement positive thinking into your life, you will notice that success becomes easier and it’s not as tough and difficult, as many people think.
6) No more stress.
The main cause of stress is worry and negative thoughts. If we think about it further, we can understand that stress never solves problems, on the contrary, it can leave us helpless. Positive people overcome stress more easily. When you start to increase the quantity of good and positive thoughts, stress will gradually leave your life, until you won’t hear about it anymore.
7) Positive thinking and an optimistic attitude will turn all your problems into opportunities.
Negativity can blind people’s minds. If you turn your thoughts from the negative ones into positive ones, your eyes will be opened and you will see the bottle half full, instead of half empty. You will start to notice solutions and will understand that every problem is actually an opportunity to grow. All problems can be solved, and you, finally, will be able to see it.
8) You will notice the abundance of good things in your life.
Sometimes people live their life without knowing how blessed they really are, they take things for granted and forget to be thankful. As I mentioned earlier, there are certain laws in life, one of them says: “like attracts like” and another is: “you will reap what you sow”. When people live their lives complaining and mourning about their destiny, without appreciating the things that they already have, then, they risk losing even this. Appreciation and gratitude, on the contrary, can bring more good things to be thankful for into their life. So, let’s be thankful and let’s count our blessings.
9) Boost motivation.
A positive attitude will boost your motivation and you will start to achieve your goals quicker and easier. To have strong motivation is the same as to have “wings”!
10) Beauty will shine from within.
Positive thinking will make you look more beautiful. It happens naturally: smiling, friendly and happy people are, somehow, extremely attractive. Your inner beauty will shine and will become visible on the outside, as well.
When faced with stressful situations, positive thinkers cope more effectively than pessimists. In one study, researchers found that when optimists encounter a disappointment (such as not getting a job or promotion) they are more likely to focus on things they can do to resolve the situation.
STRESS RELIEF
Rather than dwelling on their frustrations or things that they cannot change, they will devise a plan of action and ask others for assistance and advice. However, Pessimists, on the other hand, simply assume that the situation is out of their control and there is nothing they can do to change it.
INCREASED IMMUNITY
In many recent years, it has been proven that many researchers have found that your mind can have a powerful effect on your body. Immunity is one area where your thoughts and attitudes can have a particularly powerful influence. In one study, researchers found that activation in brain areas associated with negative emotions led to a weaker immune response to a flu vaccine.
Researchers Segerstrom and Sephton found that people who were optimistic about a specific and important part of their lives, such as how well they were doing in school, exhibited a stronger immune response than those who had a more negative view of the situation.
IMPROVED WELLNESS
Not only can positive thinking impact your ability to cope with stress and your immunity, but it also has an impact on your overall well-being.
While researchers are not entirely clear on why positive thinking benefits health, some suggest that positive people might lead healthier lifestyles. By coping better with stress and avoiding unhealthy behaviours, they are able to improve their health and well-being.
BETTER RESILIENCE
Resilience refers to our ability to cope with problems. Resilient people are able to face a crisis or trauma with strength and resolve. Rather than falling apart in the face of such stress, they have the ability to carry on and eventually overcome such adversity. It may come as no surprise to learn that positive thinking can play a major role in resilience. When dealing with a challenge, optimists typically look at what they can do to fix the problem. Instead of giving up hope, they marshal their resources and are willing to ask others for help.
By nurturing positive emotions, even in the face of terrible events, people can reap both short-term and long-term rewards, including managing stress levels, lessening depression, and building coping skills that will serve them well in the future. There are so many more benefits of being positive as I’ve just mentioned a few while I am writing this as well as for you readers to read.
If you keep thinking about problems and failure, you attract these things into your life. That’s why we need to be sure what we think and act upon these thoughts will be ones that will bring us peace, joy and fulfilment.
However, on the other hand, if the feelings of anger, tension, irritation and worrying are your usual responses to any situation or changes in your life then you are undoubtedly suffering from the problem of negative thinking. To lead a better life filled with tranquillity, contentment and love we need to change our way of thinking.
The key to positive thinking is to discover our inner self to find out more about ourselves in who and what we are as a person as we all have a purpose in life. We all should be able to know and find that purpose of our life in time. We should try and make serenity, bliss and love a reality for ourselves in our lives so that we can live a long and fruitful life. Positive thinking sounds cliché, we have heard about it and read about it yet we still don’t practice it. We all have busy lives and it seems almost impossible to take out the time to work on changing our thinking, however getting this new way of thinking as a part of our lives won’t take more than 15 minutes every day, and once you learn how to get rid of negative thoughts and how to control your mind you’ll realize it is all worth the efforts.
In the long run, you’ll become conscious of the fact that simply spending 15 minutes on positive thoughts and a positive attitude can be the building blocks of a happy life!!! Start working on yourself, sit in silence and contemplate your thoughts……we all are moving too fast, we need to slow down and think about our situations and above all, we need to learn how to stop thinking about something that is draining all our positive energy and how to get rid of negative thoughts. Start connecting with yourself and your healing will begin. This silent contemplation is nothing but a variation of meditation, meditation helps you in looking inside yourself and look deeply into your thoughts.
Hurt, pain, anger and rejection all are negative feelings generated by negative thoughts we need to slow down and observe how we ourselves are creating the negative thoughts leading to these negative feelings. Positive thinking can be achieved through meditation because meditation is all about self-introspection…..looking inside you if we don’t perform it then, every new situation every change in our lives will have only one response from our negative thinking it’ll be resistance. The cause of this resistance is fear, the fear of losing what we already have like people, power, relationships, prestige, personality and money all of these fears lead to the fear of changes and ultimately pave the way for negative thinking.
TWO STEPS TO STOP NEGATIVE THINKING:
STEP 1
The first step of stop this negative thinking pattern is to start BI, and accept the changes in your life….. People, power, relationships, prestige, personality and money are like a flowing river, a flowing river changes every instant don’t try to build a dam because on the other side of your dam there would be a lot of pressure trying to stop the river, nothing remains constant hence we need to accept the changes in our lives. However be careful – DON’T ACCEPT YOUR FEAR, ACCEPT THE SITUATION.
If you have ever seen a wrestling match you would have noticed that the opponents first bow down to each other then they embrace each other, this is the change philosophy whenever you’re faced with changes first you need to embrace it and that is how you catch the momentum of the new situation. If you resist, you don’t get to know the momentum of the situation.
Once you have accepted the situation you say THIS IS IT! But then again questions would come to your mind you would ask yourself – Now What? Other questions would also arise in your mind, questions like Why, Where, What, How. How do we respond to these questions without being affected by our negative thoughts?
STEP 2
All we need to do is, instead of thinking about what is happening outside try and focus on ourselves and ask ourselves how do I respond to this situation. Don’t engage in the questions just work on your state of mind and ask yourself how you want to deal with your situation.
Don’t stop the river but don’t start flowing with it either if one person is angry and screaming you cannot allow yourself to flow with him, you have your own identity and your own thoughts you don’t have to flow with the river, so don’t stop the river and don’t flow with it either rather stay put and look at the river flowing by……same way in any situation that triggers your negative thoughts remember you are different from the situation, don’t try to stop the situation because you cannot actually control the changes happening around you and also don’t let yourself get consumed in the situation and the hardships that it brings with itself.
Any negative situation is not you, you are the creator of your thoughts and you have the choice to create a positive one or a negative one, make a wise choice. Don’t give your automatic responses to a situation that would be like flowing with the river, don’t do it be still; stay put and focus on your reaction and your actions in this situation and then you’ll start observing the power of positive thinking.
Again, to note here is that there are many more steps to ridding the negative thoughts as this is just a couple could think of while I was writing this piece for you all while reading.
If you often think about happiness and success, eventually, this is what you will attract into your life.
There is no magic here, I can’t just wave a magic wand in front of you all and say to you all think positive thoughts but only natural laws at work. This is, by all means, all up to you all to decide what you want in life and what outcome will it bring in your life.
You need to know what these laws in physics are and how to use them effectively in your own life.
You also need to start using them and continue until you get results.
“The predominant thought or the mental attitude is the magnet, and the law is that like attracts like.
Consequently, the mental attitude will invariably attract such conditions as to correspond to its nature.”
– Charles Haanel.
When you change your thoughts, you change your life accordingly. Again, this is a fact.
You can take advantage of this process, and use it to improve your life and make positive changes your life. If you constantly think about obstacles and failure, you will not try hard, not take advantage of opportunities, and avoid taking action and starting new projects in the works of what you’ve got planned. Eventually, your external life would mirror your negative thoughts.
“A mental image gives you a framework upon which to work. It is like the drawing of the architect, or the map of the explorer. Think over this for a few moments until you get the idea firmly fixed in your mind.”
– William Walker Atkinson
If you often think how difficult your life is, and avoid trying to change your thoughts, you close your eyes and heart to opportunities, make no effort to change and improve, become unhappy, not at peace and perpetuate the same situation over and over again.
If you think often about success, and about living a better, happier and more successful life, you will be motivated to do something successful about your life. You will become aware of opportunities, take advantage of them, and change your life.
People who constantly think about how poor they are, how difficult are their lives, and how more difficult they are going to be, stay in the same situation, and might even make it worse.
Successful people however on the other hand, they will see in their mind’s eye the life they want to live. They visualize their ambitions as accomplished, and do not allow negative thoughts, problems or obstacles to discourage them.
A thought, together with a strong desire and perseverance, turn dreams into reality.
“You are to become a creator, not a competitor; you are going to get what you want, but in such a way that when you get it every other man will have more than he has now.”
– Wallace D. Wattles.
So, you may be thinking about how positive thinking really works and what effects it has on us.
1. Changing your thoughts will change your life.
2. Changing your thinking habits will change how you feel, how you act, and how you react.
3. Inner change will lead to outer change.
There is plenty of information on this topic of changing your thinking habits and transforming your life
The nature of our thoughts determines the quality of our life whether it is sad, happy and contented.
Happy, optimistic, positive thoughts, emotions, and feelings generate a zing in our system which makes the blood flow freely and our heartbeat joyously. They create a spring in our feet and spur us to action. Let us remember the age-old saying that the mind- thoughts- can move the mountains. Or even the song by Miley Cyrus, The Climb. Pessimistic, sad and gloomy thoughts, on the other hand, create inertia and force us to stay bed-bound.
Our actions are the practical manifestations of our thoughts.
It is quite clear, therefore, that we must bring about a change in the way how and what we think in our lives in order to create happiness and a sense of fulfilment in our lives.
A good thing about our brain is that it willingly adopts any changes that we bring about in our thinking patterns.
Here is a list of 15 ways you can change your thoughts and give a positive direction to your life.
- Change your thoughts by creating positive affirmations
Affirmations are not always positive. They can be negative as well. The hexes created by the witches are negative affirmations.
The truth is that most people are given to making negative affirmations. When you think repeatedly that you are not going to succeed in a particular project, it is a negative affirmation. Affirmations, both negative and positive impact the neurological functioning of the brain. Positive affirmations are like mantras. They have a sacred and spiritual force about them. Let us be clear about creating positive affirmations.
They should not be normative or weak. I believe that we all should do positive affirmations early in the morning to build us up confidence and peace. I am a real strong believer in doing this as well as I’ve been doing this throughout my mornings despite the everyday struggles I face.
Thoughts such as I ‘should’, ‘ought to’ or’ abstain from’ are normative.
Examples of negative affirmations are: ‘I can’t do this. It is ‘quite difficult’. On the other hand affirmations should be forceful and determined such as ‘I can’, ‘I will’, or ‘I am going to’. As mentioned above, your brain is always adapting to your thought patterns and directs your organs to act accordingly.
Insert positive thoughts and affirmations
- Learn to apply full stop
We keep mulling over our misfortunes, the perceived wrongs committed to us by those who we have loved and stood by so sincerely.
We never stop cursing ourselves for the mistakes that we think we have committed. What would have happened if I had done this or that? What would happen if I do this or that in the future? This is not to suggest we should not learn from our past mistakes or plan our future intelligently. The only thing is we should stop thinking over and over once we have learned from our past and decided about our future to move on and let go – let go of situations that we can’t control in our lives.
- Let go of the need to be masochistic
Definition of masochism:
- The deriving of sexual gratification from fantasies or acts that involve being made to suffer physical or mental pain. Also called sexual masochism.
- The deriving of pleasure from being humiliated or mistreated, either by another or by oneself.
- A willingness or tendency to subject oneself to unpleasant or trying experiences.
Quite often we love to wallow in our misery. We enjoy creating self-punishing thoughts or being gloomy and pessimistic. Here is an example:
“If I start selling candles, the sun will stop setting, OR If I start selling shrouds, people will stop dying.”
I was born unlucky. Nothing good will ever occur to me. Such thoughts not only cause a harmful impact on the mind, but they adversely affect your physical health as well.
- Change your thoughts by counting your joys and blessings.
Most people take their joys and blessings for granted and start grumbling about what they do not have; or, when they are faced with problems and troubles.
Just think of those who are less fortunate than you. Or, think of a situation that could have been worse than it is now. You are crying because have hurt your knee in an accident. What, if the leg itself had broken? See the filled half of the glass for satisfaction and the empty half with a resolve to fill it.
I believe strongly in this one as we should be blessed with what we have as sometimes there’s others that doesn’t have what we got and I believe sometimes the everyday struggles that we go through teaches us a life lesson in general and that we sometimes need to not rush the process of what is needed to be done in our lives as some situations that we go through takes time and patience. We need to be in the moment and appreciate everything we have.
“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend.” ~ Melody Beattie
- Appreciate and enjoy what you already have.
Question to you all that are watching this today: Why is it so hard to appreciate what we have? Why is it so difficult to be sated with everything in our lives in the here and now? We always seem to be chasing the next big thing. Be it if we want to be famous, we want to be popular, be it we want to be beautiful, whatever it may be. We’re constantly lusting and yearning after the newest and best I’ve-just-gotta-have-it object, we move from one point to the next on this Hedonistic Treadmill that we call life, and we can’t seem to get off it.
The funny thing is that, for the most part at least, everything in our lives was once just a wish. We wanted that car we drive today so badly just a few years ago. The house we live in was once just a goal. The people or situations in our lives were once just a wish. So why is it that, today, we can’t appreciate all of those things? How come we’re not satisfied with the status quo?
This conversation isn’t a new one. I don’t know about you, but I’ve certainly been unappreciative of the things I’ve had in my life. Although I once lusted and yearned for those things, attaining them seemed to remove their lustre and their shine. When I achieved my goals, I wanted the next best thing. I was never really happy with the things that I had attained.
A great way to change your thoughts is to appreciate and enjoy what you already have. This is not to suggest that you should not aspire for a still better life.
Enjoy whatever amount of success you have achieved instead of feeling sad about what you have not been able to achieve. There is nothing wrong with always fixing higher benchmarks or goals, but failure to reach them should not spoil your enjoyment of what you already have.
I’ll explain more into how we can appreciate what we have in next video but remember this quote:
“If you realize that you have enough, you are truly rich.” ~ Lao Tzu
- Savour the joys of your achievements
It is one thing to achieve your goal; it is another to enjoy it after you have achieved it.
For example, you marry the woman of your dreams, but get bored with her soon thereafter and start looking for a new one. This is one of the most common causes of marital discords and breaks up. We know that relationships with anyone can be difficult but if we stick with it and work together through the good and the bad we can see some good in what’s happening in our lives. Males and females play different parts in a relationship. We all know or should know what’s important in a relationship to make it fulfilling for us.
“There are two things to aim at in life: first, to get what you want; and after that, to enjoy it. Only the wisest of mankind achieve the second.” ~
Logan Pearsall Smith
- Stand erect and hold your head high in trying circumstances
We often tend to feel demoralized in adverse conditions. We stop and feel low as if we are bending under their weight. This happens both literally and figuratively.
You will, however, surely feel better if you try to lift your spirits and also your head like a person determined to take up the challenge. This is the best way to get out of depression. Try it time and time again.
- Allow yourself to be playful and childlike
Children are known for the innocence and simplicity of the mind in life. They soon forget their quarrels with their friends and start playing together once again. As you may have seen them all once in a playground when they are playing or play-fighting with each other and just then return back to normal by playing again. This is the reason that generally they are always happy and smiling. Translated into the language of the adults, we should learn to forget and forgive.
“The great man is he who does not lose his child’s heart.” ~Mencius, Book IV
- Seek happiness and contentment in the present moment
Do not associate happiness with future events. I will be happy when things happen this way. It is like postponing your happiness to an unsure future. The better alternative is to try to postpone your sorrow to some future moment as much as you can. The time to be happy is today because yesterday
has already passed and you cannot be sure that tomorrow will bring any happiness.
“How simple it is to see that we can only be happy now, and there will never be a time when it is not now.” ~ Gerald Jampolsky
- Be a master of your moods
Be a master rather than a servant of your own moods. You are the ruler of the kingdom of happiness. Do not allow other people or circumstances to make you happy or sad.
Do not depend on material possessions to create happiness for you. It is for you to choose to be happy whatever the situation. Do not allow your heart to break up if your loved one has ditched you. If he/she can be happy without you so can you.
- Wake up with a resolve to stay happy during the day
Resolve the first thing as you wake up in the morning to remain happy throughout the day. Spend some time with the flowers and plants in your garden.
Listen to the songs of the birds in the trees or watch them flying high in the skies. Or, go out for a walk in the park nearby. Remember your resolve to remain calm as soon as you sense trouble coming. You owe yourself an ethical duty to remain happy.
- Your body is your temple, honor it.
Keep the temple of your body neat, clean and well-ventilated. Do not dump garbage of dirty, negative thoughts and toxic junk food in it. It is really difficult to remain happy when you are sick physically or mentally. There is a close relationship between the mind and the body.
Take physical exercises regularly according to your constitutional needs.
- Meditate daily
Most yoga and meditation gurus have complicated the process of meditation by using incomprehensible jargon about its practice and goals. Consequently, most people tend to doze off during the meditation sessions and stop practising meditation altogether. Ultimately, as we know now that there are always websites and apps that we can use for meditation and other purposes. Meditation comes in many different forms of techniques that we can use daily. Meditation is a practice where an individual uses a technique – such as mindfulness or focusing the mind on a particular object, thought, or activity – to train attention and awareness, and achieve a mentally clear and emotionally calm and stable state. Scholars have found meditation difficult to define, as practices vary both between traditions and within them. Meditation has been practised since antiquity in numerous religious traditions, often as part of the path towards enlightenment and self-realization.
Also, take stock of your day in the evening. Remember the little good things that happened. You were not held up in traffic snarls. Your car ran smoothly. There was no problem with your boss and colleagues. You had a delicious lunch or coffee. Thank your stars for a nice and happy day.
This will fill you with gratitude and make you a happier person.
“During meditation, your metabolism and your breath rate go down to a level of rest, twice that of deep sleep.” ~ Mike Love.
- Focus on changing yourself instead of changing the world around you
It is impossible to change the world around you. So stop fretting when people do not come up to your expectations. The best course is to change yourself or at least adjust to the people or situations you do not like.
“Never underestimate your power to change yourself; never overestimate your power to change others.” ~ Wayne Dyer
- Make the best of what you have
It is always better to make the best of what you have rather than pine for what you think is the best.
A perfect state occurs only in Utopia and the world you live in is not that kind of ideal place. Do not be worried about imperfections. The word ‘imperfection’ is derived from ‘perfection’. Even the most imperfect situation has some small element of perfection in it.
You change your life by changing your thoughts. If the thoughts you think are pure, your life will be pure.
To end on this note I would like to ask you all three questions: Do you believe that thoughts have the power to transform your life? What do you believe stands between you and complete happiness?
Is it your thoughts or something or somebody else?
