Positivity
One can’t be forced to feel positive. There are plenty of sayings on offer (e.g. Think positive, Stay positive) that suggest our life will turn on its axis as soon as we’ve decided to think positively. Although these sayings hold a lot of truth, they can get very annoying at times and a bit pseudo – esoteric.
The question remains as to how we achieve being more positive, think more positive thoughts by way of being more optimistic and turn our general feeling around towards a more positive outlook?
On mulling the subject over within myself and researching POSITIVITY, I’ve come across a few things that make sense to me and that speak strongly for themselves:
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Most of us will have heard of ‘Law of Attraction’, meaning similar energetic frequencies attract one another. For a year now I have been practising staying more present, a concept that I came across in Eckhart Tolle’s ‘The Power of Now’ years ago and that has a massive following community with Dr Joe Dispenza’s teachings and meditations.
According to quantum physics, our thoughts and feelings have a frequency and a corresponding unique vibration that attracts similar frequencies into our lives. This means that negative thinking attracts negative energy, positive thinking attracts positive energy.
Tolle, Dispenza, Buddha and many others have suggested the same – how we think creates the energy that ultimately manifests our realities. This must mean that we can steer where we’re going. All very well, you might think, but how do I achieve that, especially at times when things are negative in my life? …
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One essential is knowing how we tick, what triggers certain thoughts and feelings in us, and how to actively (not on a purely cognitive level, more on a deeper awareness level) step out of creating the same patterns that will lead to a negative outcome. It’s about knowing your inner landscape.
What does that mean? It’s like knowing the terrain in the countryside that you’re planning to do a hike / walk / ride in. The better we know where it’s dry, safe, tricky, hilly, rocky or whatever else, the better we can dress for it and move in it.
The same is true for us. The better we understand ourselves in certain situations or with certain people, the better we can move and steer within ourselves – away from a bad feeling towards a positive feeling.
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Many teachings imply that ‘what we think, we become’ – that there is a lot of power in our mind. The question is how to facilitate this power to our advantage.
Plenty of practices have picked up on mentally rehearsing and visualising what the outcome is supposed to be. Imagining / seeing / visualising something so strongly that we believe we can touch it, smell it, feel it and be it.
By changing one’s thoughts and expectations, visualisation seeks to affect the outer world through firstly ‘creating’ a different one in our mind.
Winners in all walks of life are known to use this technique by mentally practising what they want the outcome to be. There seems to be a direct connection between deeply believing something is possible and it actually taking place. For decades it seemed impossible to even imagine that the 4–minute mile could be broken. It took until 1954 to achieve this impressive run, only for the mile soon to be run in under 4 minutes again and again.
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Practise mindfulness, become present in the moment, slow down a gear.
Slowing down is a deliberate choice that can lead to greater appreciation of life or of what life has to offer. Finding pleasure in small things again, taking the time to actually notice them can make a big difference to how we feel, how we perceive situations and even our life in general.
Allowing our concentration and attention to be in the moment doesn’t mean the past or future aren’t important, but it takes us out of the habit of never actually being in the ‘here and now’.
The ever wandering, worrying, unfocused and scattered mind will become a tortuous hamster wheel that traps us in reoccurring thought patterns, which won’t have any power in achieving a different, desired or fresh outcome.
Staying present: Simple exercise – Sit or lie somewhere comfortable, close your eyes. Breathe in through your nose, slow and deep into the tummy, repeatedly, letting the out-breath become slightly longer than the in-breath. You think 1 on the in-breath and 2 on the out-breath or just pay attention to your breathing. Just breathe. For 5 /10 /15 .. minutes. Then bring the attention back to your environment and open your eyes again. Tap into your feelings – are you more relaxed, calmer? Practise daily for a week. Check in with yourself again – has anything changed?
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Getting out of the drama of being over-emotional and becoming more emotionally resilient allows us to adapt easier to adverse situations. Resilience begins with adaptability, acceptance and gratitude.
Emotional resilience begins with learning our emotional triggers, learning how to actively interrupt thoughts (and feelings) and taking the power away from what is going on at that moment in time. Is what I am feeling really the truth, or is it ‘my’ truth? Is there a difference? Accepting one’s state of mind and emotions by checking in with ourselves and aiming to take the role of observer as a neutralising step can be a very helpful tool.
Secondly being grateful for something positive like a happy moment is another essential step to adapting to situations. It is much more difficult to lean into joy than into a worst case scenario for most of us, as it always seems to be accompanied by the notion of loss again. Knowing that happiness is an emotion, not a state of being, accepting it for what it is and being thankful for it.
With practice, staying optimistic more self–reflected and emotionally open will become easier and even second nature.
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And lastly, life means constant change and transformation. The more our frequencies become positive, the more we will attract like–minded people into our lives, the more we will feel supported, understood and whole.
We are social beings that thrive through connection. Living with that in mind, a kind gesture, a moment’s extra patience, a smile, an appreciation of something we see or perceive, or giving an unexpected compliment can all be little steps in connecting to people and practising positivity.
Life’s journey isn’t easy, often feels unfulfilling, too hard, empty or not enough. No matter what we feel we lack, we can always concentrate and work on changing / transforming our thoughts to ‘this moment feels fulfilling, rewarding, lovely, happy, successful, whole …’ and create a tiny positive spark within ourselves that will radiate out and attract the same back, usually when we least expect it.