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It’s no wonder that bad things happen in threes (or fours or fives). It’s no wonder that certain slumps go on and on.
It’s easy to allow negativity to swallow us up. When we focus on bad things, that’s what we see.
But it goes beyond that: When we focus on bad things, we get more of them. We stop being on the top of our game. We stop looking for the good, positive aspects of our lives and we stop trying our best to find new, innovative solutions to our problems. We feel downhearted and defeated before we even get started.
If you feel a bad day coming on, you can help yourself by going on a negativity diet. Restrict from your day everything that’s going to make you feel bad.
Here’s how:
1. Avoid your negative friends. You know the ones: The complainers, the critics, the skeptics, even those who boss you around. Politely turn away from them today. You don’t need their negativity. Don’t rail against them or argue with them, just don’t acknowledge their negativity today – and seek to get in the company of more positive friends just as quickly as possible.
2. Watch what you read and listen to. Some people take a media-free day at times like this, but if you don’t want to do this, try reading the news rather than watching the graphic images of television news, which can seep into your psyche. And balance the doom-and-gloom news you read with optimistic news, such as the kinds you find on the pages of Ode Magazine and other “good news” outlets.
3. Don’t read the rants. Today, try to stay away from negative blogs. Too many of the personal – and even business – blogs out there have become unmitigated sources of rants and snarky confessions, without humor or other redeeming qualities. Sometimes we can read these tirades and we feel justified in our own anger, frustration, and irritation. But this just keeps us in that negative spot. It justifies our own ruminating – and that’s not good for anyone. Spend that web time chatting with your most positive and upbeat Facebook friend instead.
4. Instead of trying to control all of your negative thoughts, flood your mind with positives. Do something – right now – that makes you feel good and happy. Think positive thoughts. Make a list of positive facets of your life. Make a list of things you are grateful for. Don’t think too hard about it; just let your mind go and challenge your pen to keep up with your thoughts.
Now that you’re warmed up, write down a list of all the things that you love to do. Write for 10 minutes. Now go and do one of those things.
Turning a foul mood around takes some gentle distraction and a diet from negativity. Try it today and unleash the power of your own positive thoughts.
About the Author: Jamie Jefferson writes for BestSelfHelp.com – where you can find Medifast coupons and Diet to Go Coupons.
Copyright BestSelfHelp.com. Permission is granted to reprint this article on your website, blog, or electronic newsletter as long as the “about the author” box above remains intact. Click here for more free reprint articles.
Posted 1 year, 7 months ago at 2:42 pm. Add a comment
“All you need is love.” - John Lennon
Enlightened masters have told us, for centuries, about the healing power of love. They have told us that feeling only love for our fellow humans is the way to peace as well as peace of mind. It is the way to feel better about ourselves and others and our situation. It is the way to happiness – to heaven on this very earth.
In my own life, I feel like my feelings of love are too often on a swinging pendulum. When I am happy and content in my own life, it is easy to love. But then the more I love unconditionally, the more I feel like people are trying to take advantage of me. The more I do for others, the more I get caught up in my own resentfulness. And so then I retreat. I close my living room drapes and I stop being so unconditionally kind and loving. I burn out and so I stop. I disengage.
The truth is, it’s easier to be kind and loving for us all when we are closed in our homes, behind the living room drapes. It’s a piece of cake to be kind when you don’t have to talk to anyone. But then, for me, it takes a turn. I start to feel guilty and bored and lonely, and so I want to reach out and be unconditionally loving and kind again, and the cycle begins anew. The pendulum swings back the other way, and I begin to reach out and connect and then something happens again that shakes me back to deciding that I am better off just hanging out alone.
Does it work to be loving if I’m by myself, sending everyone kind thoughts from my living room? In theory, sure, but that’s not where I find myself to be happiest.
Recently I have defined “love” in a new way, and it’s helping. This new definition is more than just the notion that we love others by extending ourselves, no matter what, in selflessness.
This new definition says that we love best not when we are simply “doing love” (acting in a loving way) but when we are “being love.” And we do this by aligning ourselves with the positive force. We do this by aligning ourselves with all things good and loving and joyous in this world. We give love by finding those things that make us feel good – because when we are happy, we are naturally more loving.
We are each meant to live a wonderful, happy life. Today, think of love as aligning yourself with a position of positivity. Align yourself with the positive force that brings joy to your heart.
When you put yourself in a position in which you feel good and happy, the more good and happy you will feel – and you’ll be riding that positive spiral upwards. You can give love simply by having good thoughts and good feelings. Then see if you don’t feel more loving to your fellow humans. See if that helps you feel better about lifting people up, even with just your presence.
For some time, I feel as though I have had love backwards. You don’t love others to become happier and more loving. You get happy and feeling good and then, as a consequence, you become more loving, more open, more generous with your time and your gifts. When you feel good, you are more likely to give love, from a place of true peace and passion.
Put another way: When we feel good, we love more. We love better. We see opportunities to love beyond those that will make us feel resentful.
That means, conveniently perhaps, that the best way to love others right now might be to take a walk by yourself in the wide, wide world. It might mean volunteering to cook meals for someone or it might mean taking the kids on a weekend trip. Feeling love and being love can be anything that feels good to you right now.
I find that I am more open to feeling love when I can focus on things I enjoy. Things that make me feel love. Not to add another should to the pile, but to simply continue on with a joyful heart, ignoring non-love as though it didn’t exist and continuing with those things that strike that feeling of joy and happiness and love in my heart. That’s when I’m more open to extending myself in love and kindness. That’s when I’m more open to this heaven that yawns open and swallows me up right here on this earth.
May you find that love for yourself today – and everyday.
About the Author: Susanna Grace writes for BestSelfHelp.com. Read more from Susanna on her blog: SusannaGrace.com and follow her on Twitter.
Copyright BestSelfHelp.com. Permission is granted to reprint this article on your website, blog, or electronic newsletter as long as the “about the author” box above remains intact. Click here for more free reprint articles.
Posted 1 year, 7 months ago at 2:14 pm. Add a comment
Attitude is everything.
It’s something parents and coaches say. But is it true?
While it might not be quite everything (because a positive follow-up is pretty important, too), a positive attitude is a huge key to your success and happiness in this life.
That’s because positive experiences beget positive experiences. The more positive actions, feelings, and moods you can generate in yourself, the better you’ll feel and the more positive the attitude will be that you display to others. When you are around more positive people, it will be easier for you to stay positive. Then you’ll naturally attract people with greater success and you’ll be more open to life’s good opportunities when they present themselves to you. On it will go, in an ever-widening upward spiral of success.
Put more simply, if you have a negative attitude, you will naturally invite negativity. If you have an attitude for positivity, you will naturally invite positivity, and, it follows, greater success and happiness.
So how do you develop this positive attitude? Here are five thoughts that might help on your personal journey to a more positive mental attitude.
1. See your life as a series of simple choices. Like a lot of things in life, if you can begin with small, manageable baby steps and don’t get intimidated by the process, you’ll go far. You don’t have to come out the door singing “oh what a beautiful day” every morning to be a positive person. You can be a positive person within the realm of your own personality type. Just try to remember, throughout your day, that you always have a choice whether to look at something positively or negatively. You always have a choice whether to respond to something positively or negatively.
2. As much as you can, surround yourself with other positive people. Especially when you are just getting started trying to maintain your positive attitude, you will be vulnerable to a friend’s toxic thoughts and actions. If many of your friends are chronic complainers or they always leave you feeling exhausted, strive to cultivate more positive friendships. Positive friends bring you up, reveal your hidden strengths and make you believe in the power of your own positive attitude and success. Allow their infectious attitude to take hold in you. Then strive to be a positive friend yourself. You’ll naturally attract even more of these uplifting friendships.
3. Rise above. Look at your goals and edge them just a tiny bit higher. If something is important to you, don’t settle for mediocre. Step up from where you are right now by honing your skills and climbing the ladder to bigger and better. Don’t allow yourself to become bored and complacent with your routine. That’s no way to live. When you get bored, it’s easier to allow yourself to fall into negative thinking. Have a dream for yourself that’s so big, you’re excited to get out of bed each morning so that you can edge yourself closer to your goal.
4. Use your challenges to spur you even higher. If you find yourself in a difficult situation, don’t allow yourself to give in to negativity. When we are faced with challenges, it just means we are getting out there and really living. That’s a good thing. When you are faced with a challenge, allow it to motivate you. Look for the opportunity in the challenge. What is this trying to teach you? How can you use this difficult situation to become a more positive person with an even better attitude about life?
5. Serve, positively. Model your positive attitude to people around you. As a parent or as any other role model in your community, make a point to be as positive as possible, and watch how the power of positive thinking and a positive attitude actually ripples through a community. When you share a good attitude with others, they will share it, in turn. You can make a huge difference in just the choice that you make right now: Will you be a positive person or a negative person?
One of the most important things to remember, your whole life through, is that you have a choice – at every age and every stage, with everything you do, say, and think – to be positive or negative. Those individual choices will add up to create the life you lead and the kind of effect you have on the world. Make your legacy as positive as humanly possible and you’ll lead a happier life, naturally.
About the Author: Jamie Jefferson writes for BestSelfHelp.com – where you can find coupons and discounts on Tony Robbins seminars and Hay House events.
Copyright BestSelfHelp.com. Permission is granted to reprint this article on your website, blog, or electronic newsletter as long as the “about the author” box above remains intact. Click here for more free reprint articles.
Posted 1 year, 7 months ago at 11:02 am. Add a comment
The Gratitude Game is a richly rewarding game to play, and it’s simple to learn. When you’re feeling sad or blue (which we all feel from time to time), simply make a game out of your own gratefulness, finding abundance everywhere and saying thank you for it.
For best results, go beyond the obvious: Beyond your family, your friends, the sun, the moon, the trees, the air on your skin. Here’s an example from the last five minutes of my own life:
I pour a cup of coffee and thank the men and women in the coffee fields, the people who roasted the coffee and ground the coffee and the people who made the bags for the coffee. I feel gratitude for the car that drove to the market to buy the coffee. The cow that made the creamer I am now pouring in my coffee. The soldiers who fought and died to make my country one in which I can, as a woman, go to the market with anyone I wish, with any thoughts in my head that I wish – and the freedom to voice those thoughts, if I so choose.
If you are an experienced player of the Gratitude Game, you can turn your thankfulness even on those things that might annoy or irritate you. Again, an example from the last five minutes of my life: The little neighbor boy who keeps ringing my doorbell when I’m on a business call. I say thank you for the business that made the call necessary. Thank you for the garage, where I can go to get away from the noise. Thank you for the ability to be calm and respectful when I talk to my neighbor boy about please ringing the doorbell only one time, and – if no one answers – to try again later. Thank you that he has a nice mother and father who respect me. Thank you for neighbors and friends.
When you can make a game out of it, stretching your sense of gratitude almost to the absurd, it’s difficult to continue on being sad.
Sometimes, in order to break yourself out of a blue mood, the best thing to do is simply and however possible to break the cycle of negative, repetitive thoughts – because these do nothing but bring you down and make you focus on all the negative, difficult, trying things in your life.
Sometimes, the best thing you can do is to distract yourself from your own rumination. The more you can manage to focus on positive thoughts and feelings (which the Gratitude Game naturally helps us to do), the more you will attract positive thoughts into your life, and on it will go, creating a beautiful upward cycle, increasing your happiness level, even if just by a little bit. Because when you can increase your happiness level even just a little bit, it’s easier to raise it just that much higher. You can play the Gratitude Game again until you feel better and better about your life. And the better you feel, the easier it becomes to amplify those good feelings even more.
There’s no limit to the amount of joy and gratitude and happiness you can feel in any given situation, in any given moment, on any given day of the week. Play the Gratitude Game as often as you think of it, and see if you don’t start feeling better about your life – right now.
About the Author: Jamie Jefferson writes for BestSelfHelp.com – where you can find coupons and discounts on Tony Robbins seminars and Hay House events.
Copyright BestSelfHelp.com. Permission is granted to reprint this article on your website, blog, or electronic newsletter as long as the “about the author” box above remains intact. Click here for more free reprint articles.
Posted 1 year, 7 months ago at 11:11 am. Add a comment
