Positive Thinking

Find happiness and achieve your goals through the power of positive thought

Gill Hasson

• Publisher: Capstone
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9780857086914
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Personal Development
• Subtopic: Mental Health & Wellbeing

Bestselling author Gill Hasson is back to help you learn how the power of positive thinking can change your life

Are you stuck in a rut? Do you feel plagued by negative thoughts and emotions every day? Gill Hasson, the bestselling author of Mindfulness and Emotional Intelligence, is back to help you move on from those pesky negative emotions and focus on the positive instead. Gill's practical and reassuring approach to the benefits of positive thinking will have you applying it to your own life every day.

If you struggle to see past setbacks both at work and at home, it can be tricky not to let those negative emotions affect you in every area of your life. This book will give readers the tools to view life with a positive outlook and charge ahead in achieving goals that once seemed out of reach.

Learn how to:

• Identify the triggers for negative thoughts and understand how to turn them into positive ones
• Deal with setbacks and make the most out of negative situations
• Improve your happiness by accepting situations and learning how to move forward
• Understand how the power of positive thinking can help you achieve your goals

The power of positive thinking is not a new idea; it's been around long enough to become almost a cliché, but there's a reason behind its longevity: positivity works. This book shows you how to break through the clouds today, and start working toward the life you want.

Part 1
Positive Thinking and Positive Action

1
You Are What You Think

Positive thinking vs. negative thinking

Positive thinking will let you do everything better than negative thinking will. Think positively and you're likely to enjoy positive results. Negative thinking, on the other hand, can lead to outcomes you'd rather not have. Negative thinking undermines your confidence. It contributes to indecision. It defeats you. It beats you. It creates the ‘bad luck’ that you'll later lament.

Think positively and you'll feel able to manage and do well. Think negatively and you're likely to feel overwhelmed and powerless. What you think and say to yourself can have quite an impact on what you can and can't do, as shown by this simple exercise. Try it for yourself. You'll need another person to help.

Part 1:

• Ask the other person to stand and extend their dominant arm out horizontally, at shoulder level so that their arm is parallel with the floor.
• Ask them to think of a time when they failed at something – a test or exam or job interview, for example. Then ask them to think negative thoughts about themselves: ‘I’m weak. I'm not as clever as other people. I'm hopeless. I'm pathetic, I'm not good at anything. I can't do this.'
• Ask the person to continue thinking the negative things. Tell them you are going to stand behind them and attempt to pull their dominant arm down to their side. Ask them to resist you pulling their arm down.

Part 2:

• Now, ask the person to hold their dominant arm up again at the shoulders, parallel to the floor.
• This time, ask them to think of a time when they achieved something, succeeded and did well at something – passed a test or exam, got offered the job, did well in a sport, for example. Then ask them to think of positive things about themselves: ‘I try my best. I can do well. I feel good about myself. I am a good person. I am strong. I can do this.’
• Ask them to repeat the positive statements to themselves while you attempt to pull their arm down to their side. Ask them to resist the pull.

Typically, in the first part of the exercise, the person's arm is more likely to give way to your pull. Negativity overwhelms them and it's not easy for them to be strong. However, when the person's thoughts are positive, their body has the ability to resist the force that's pulling their arm down. They are more likely to stay strong and resist your pull.

So what does this little experiment prove? It shows us the power of our thoughts over our bodies. When we think negative thoughts, we tend to zap our strength. When we have positive thoughts, we become stronger and are more in control.

You are what you think. And what you think, you are.

It's important to know, though, that neither negative thinking nor positive thinking is more real or true than the other. Either way of thinking could be real or true. But what does make one way of thinking more real is the one you choose to think and believe. As Shakespeare said, ‘For there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.’

Your thoughts can be understood as your ‘self-talk’ or your ‘inner voice’. Your self-talk provides you with a running commentary rather like the constant text at the bottom of a 24-hour news channel. This self-talk directs your thinking and shapes your beliefs, expectations and actions.

Self-talk has a way of creating its own reality. Telling yourself you can do something can help it happen. Telling yourself you can't do something can make it more likely to be true. And because your brain speaks with your own voice, whatever it says, it feels real and it feels true.

To a greater or lesser extent, we simply accept particular beliefs and ways of thinking. That's all well and good if those thoughts are helpful and constructive. It's not so good if those ways of thinking are negative and produce thoughts and feelings that are unhelpful and self-defeating.

Positive intentions of negative thinking

So if positive thinking is the most helpful, beneficial way to think, why do we think in negative ways? Let's start by trying to understand this.

Negative ways of thinking are an aspect of emotions such as fear, worry, anxiety, disappointment, guilt, shame, regret, resentment and jealousy. Often, these emotions include thoughts such as ‘I can't do that’, ‘I’m scared', ‘It's not fair’, ‘I’m such an idiot', ‘It's his fault’, ‘It's her fault’, ‘Nothing ever goes right for me’ and ‘I wish I hadn't done that.’

We usually think of emotions like fear, worry, disappointment etc. as ‘negative emotions’. Why? Because they make us feel bad. And yet, these emotions, like all other emotions, do actually have a positive intent.

Take, for example, the emotion of guilt. Typically, the thoughts that accompany guilt are ‘I’ve screwed up, I shouldn't have done that, it's my fault. I feel bad about what I did.'

How can this way of thinking be positive? Well, the positive intent of guilt is to prompt you to recognize your wrongdoing and then to think about and take action to put right or make up for what you did wrong.

If, though, when you feel guilty you simply wallow in your guilt, beat yourself up about what you did wrong or try and suppress or deny how you feel, then your thoughts and actions (or lack of action) remain negative. Those thoughts and actions or inactions do you no good whatsoever.

The positive intentions of ‘negative’ emotions act in the same way as the positive intention of physical pain. If, for example, you touch something really hot, the pain makes you pull away. It feels bad, but the positive intention of that pain is to protect you. It's the same with emotional pain; it can prompt you to take positive action.

What about a difficult emotion such as regret? How can that be positive? The positive intent of regret is to prompt you to learn from what you now wish you had or hadn't done; to behave differently in future. Regret is only negative when you are stuck in regret; you allow it to keep you there and leave you feeling defeated and hopeless. But it's not the emotion that's negative, it's your thinking and lack of positive response!

Furthermore, the fact that you know that emotions such as guilt and regret make you feel bad can actually motivate you, too. They can motivate you not to do something that could result in you feeling guilty or regretful.

Narrow perspectives

Emotions such as guilt, fear, anger, sadness and regret narrow your perspective and your thinking. There is a good reason for this; narrowed thinking focuses your attention on the ‘negative’ situation so that it becomes the only thing you can think about in order that you take action. Positive action. Again, just like putting your hand on something hot, all your attention is focused on it, and your response is positive (and quick!).

Supposing, for example, you're anxious about a test or an exam. The positive intent of anxiety is to focus your thoughts on what you need to revise. It starts to work against you, though, if the anxiety overwhelms you.

Or, supposing one Friday evening you notice a mole on your arm that seems different. You're worried about it. Worry forces you to think about little else over the weekend other than getting to see a doctor on Monday. It's annoying that you can think of little else, but the fact that you are so preoccupied makes it likely you'll go and see the doctor and get the mole checked out.

Another example of an emotion that narrows and focuses your thinking is sadness. Sadness helps you to slow down enough to take...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Introduction
• Part 1: Positive Thinking and Positive Action
• 1: You Are What You Think
• 2: Moving on from Negative Thinking
• 3: Taking Positive Action
• Part 2: Developing and Maintaining Positive Thinking
• 4: Finding and Keeping Motivation
• 5: Creating a Positive Mindset
• 6: Building Your Self-Esteem and Confidence
• Part 3: Positive Thinking for Difficult Situations
• 7: Dealing with Disappointments and Setbacks, Trauma and Tragedy
• 8: Managing a Fear of Failure, Perfectionism and Comparing Yourself with Others
• Conclusion
• Useful Websites
• About the Author
• Index
• EULA