Positve thinkings: everything you need to know to exploit them and develop positive thinking.
Look at the stumbling blocks as stepping up to the stars.
Denis WaitleyPositive thinking is a hotly debated topic in personal growth that divides people into two streams of thought.
There are those who think it is one nonsense more harmful than beneficial and those who praise it as the ultimate way to get whatever you want.
As is often the case, the truth lies a little in the middle and we cannot label this practice as negative or positive in an absolute sense.
It all depends on how we use positive thinking and how we use it to improve ourselves.
Let's begin the discussion by discovering why it is useful to know how positive thinking works.
Why are positive thoughts important?
There is a saying whose author is difficult to establish:
Pay attention to your thoughts, because they become words.
Pay attention to your words, because they become your actions.
Pay attention to your actions, because they become habits.
Pay attention to your habits, because yours become your character.
Pay attention to your character, because it becomes your destiny. [Anonymous]
This simple adage is very helpful in understanding the process of transforming our thoughts into actual events.
If the assumption of this saying is true, even if not taken literally, it is evident that what we think affects the world around us.
The moment we think something we influence our behavior which consequently affects our actions and the material world around us.
To learn more about this, I suggest you read the article on self-fulfilling prophecy.
Now, before understanding how to use positive thoughts, let's dismantle a bit of nonsense that runs on the subject.
The nonsense about positive thinking
As always when a topic is successful, nonsense begins to turn.
In particular, we go from one extreme to the other, stereotyping positive thinking and its forms.
Positive affirmations are not the panacea for all ills and never replace common sense and the good use of your brain.
Let's try to eliminate some nonsense.
- Thinking positive does not mean attracting things to oneself like in the theory of attraction
- Positive thinking does not negate the reality that surrounds us
- Thinking positive doesn't solve all of life's problems
- Positive affirmations are not meant to attract gold and wealth
- Positive thinking is no substitute for commitment and hard work
- Thinking positively does not mean forcing a state of mind
- Thinking positive doesn't mean smiling at random for no reason
- Thinking positively does not mean becoming incurable and blind optimists
- Positive thoughts are no substitute for planning your goals, strategy and action
- Positive thinking isn't enough to get you back if you've hit rock bottom
Trivial isn't it?
Yet there are people who base their empires by playing with phrases like these.
Positive thoughts become nonsense if we attribute powers to them that they do not have: Regarding this point, I recommend that you read the article on the lies of personal growth.
Now let's see 3 exercises to avoid negative thoughts and take advantage of the positive ones.
Three exercises to take advantage of positive thoughts
# 1 The gratitude journal
When we are too focused on negative events, we lose our positive attitude and enter a negative spiral.
In these cases, a tool whose usefulness I have repeated several times is useful, I am talking about the personal diary and I add that inserting a section dedicated to gratitude is very useful for positive thinking.
Write every night at least 10 things we're thankful for it is very helpful in attracting our positive thoughts.
If you already write a diary, cut out a small space for this exercise, here are some examples.
- Today I am thankful for eating the things I like
- I am happy to have spent time with my family
- I am grateful for taking an extra step towards my goal
- > I am very grateful that my cat purred me when I got home
- I am thrilled with the hug my son received
- I am grateful for being able to go to the gym
This exercise serves to focus more on the positive events of our day so as to attract other positive thoughts.
Obviously, always thinking positively is not the panacea for all ills, even pessimism can be useful.
Generally, however, we are all unbalanced towards negative thoughts and thanks to this exercise we can balance our mindset.
Let's move on to the second exercise on positive thinking.
# 2 The Ma technique
The ma technique is very useful when we tend to see the negative side of things, leaving out the positive.
The but is a small word with a great hidden power: if it is inserted correctly in a sentence it is capable of make us perceive its meaning in a very different way.
Let's see an example sentence.
I was very good ma I was wrong to do the job.
How do you feel when you hear this phrase? I bet you had the feeling that the first part of the sentence, "you were very good", has lost its importance.
This happens because the but, if correctly entered, erase everything that comes first.
We therefore tend to focus on the part of the message that comes after the but leaving out what comes first.
In these cases it is useful to reverse the sentence in this way.
I got my job wrong ma I was very good.
As you can see, the sentence immediately takes on another aspect e our brain focuses more on positive affirmation instead of the negative one.
The substance does not change but we perceive the meaning of the sentence in a slightly more positive way and perhaps in a more proactive and stimulating way.
Let's see the third exercise.
# 3 Take out the trash
In the book The Way of the Peace Warrior, which I recommend you read, the character ironically called Socrates tells his disciple, Dan, to take out the trash.
Socrates, however, does not refer to the garbage of the house but to what is found in our brain.
Our mind is continually flooded with thoughts of all kinds they prevent us from living and appreciating the here and now.
Throwing away the thoughts that we do not need in the present is very useful if we have a too pessimistic and catastrophic vision of the world, especially if we tend to imagine lots of negative scenarios that could occur.
Whenever we think of phrases like:
- It is useless to try so hard it will not help
- I'm not going to that party so I won't have fun
- It is useless to go to that place so I will never know anyone
We deny ourselves countless possibilities because they are all thoughts that lead to self-fulfilling prophecies.
When I wrote the article dedicated to positive sentences, I reported this quote.
Positive thinking will allow you to do everything better than negative thinking can.
Zig ZiglarZig Ziglar frames the situation I was telling you very well, thinking: "useless so much it won't help" does not open any door, while instead thinking that "it could be of some use", opens a door.
Let go of negative thoughts that drown you with a tsunami: take out the trash.
Being positive is not a panacea
As I said, positive thoughts are not the panacea for all ills and sometimes it is useful to think a little negatively to prepare for the worst.
As always, however, exceeding on one side or another damages us and if we tend to be negative these 3 positive thinking exercises are very helpful in balancing our thoughts.
If you liked this article, I invite you to share it on your favorite social network in order to help me grow the blog and help another person to think positively.
Thank you
