Maintain a Positive Mindset

“Watch your thoughts, they become words.

Watch your words, they lead to actions.

Watch your actions, they create habits.

Watch your habits, they build your character.

Watch your character, it becomes your destiny.”

~ Upanishads

Bad things happen to us all the time.  Our loved ones leave us, we lose our jobs and we can get to the stage where we lose faith in life altogether.  Everything happens for a reason.  There is nothing wrong with going through anger or sadness but keeping these emotions inside of us leads to stress and negative energy.  We need to feel it, cry it out, but then we must release it, let go and end the pain.

When we are in a state of hopelessness or something unthinkable happens to us, we need to look at the bigger purpose of our lives.  Eventually we have to believe that something great is going to come out of all of this.  There is no way we go through all this pain for no reason.  There comes a time where we need to bounce back and put our energies into something positive like going out and helping others.  Being grateful for a situation can help us believe that this was just the way it was supposed to be.

So how do we change out mindset?

Reprogram our conscious mind.

When we go through difficult times, we feel sad, angry or resentful because we think that something bad has happened to us.  This is not true.  Everyone has a different reaction to similar circumstances because our thoughts make us feel the way we do.  We need to shift these negative thoughts and look for the positives in the situation.  It is like staring at a closed door when if you just took a step back, you would see all the other doors that are open.

Holding onto past mistakes and heartaches affects our present mindset.  The past does not exist.  It is only a place in your mind.  The only thing that does exist is the present.  There is no future for when it arrives it is actually the present again.  Let go and live in the moment.

If we are feeling overwhelmed, we need to ask ourselves, “What problem do I have right now at this moment?”  The answer should be nothing.  A peaceful state of mind generates positive energy.  We are the cause of our own suffering.  We have a choice on how we feel and react.  We need to become aware of our thoughts.  This is our conscious mind.  It is time for us to reprogram it. 

Reprogram our subconscious mind.

Negative beliefs from our past affect our life.  When we were children, for example, we might have been told that we are not good enough or we are stupid from parents or teachers.  This conjures up thoughts that stay lurking in our subconscious mind.

We need to tap into our subconscious minds and reprogram the negative beliefs with positive ones.  Take a look at certain areas in your life now – health, finance, career, work and relationships.  Put on a scale from one to ten how you are performing in each area.  Let us take our disease for an example.  When we are in denial about our addictive habits, it is because we have limiting beliefs.  If we have been mentally or physically abused in our childhood, we feel unworthy, useless and incapable of being loved.  We can blame others for the way they treat us, we can use past experiences to influence our thinking and we can sit on our pity pots forever believing that this is our fate and it is not our fault.  These excuses are caused by our limiting beliefs embedded in our subconscious from the past.  Subconscious beliefs are far more powerful.

We need to bring these limiting thoughts to the conscious.  It is not easy to do this but when you become aware of your thoughts, you can learn to react differently.

There are a few tools that you can use to do this:

·         First and foremost join a program like AA where you can share with people who understand what you are going through and help you recover.

·         Read the Big Book, find a sponsor and do the 12 steps as soon as you feel ready to move on and let go.

·         Make a list on a page with your limiting beliefs on the left.  On the right hand side put positive statements which are the opposite – practice them. 

·         Put up a poster with a motivating quotation and / or picture in a place where you can see it regularly - a reminder to persevere.

·         Do positive affirmations every day to shift that negative thinking.

·         Take a quiet time out of your day and find a quiet place to pray or meditate.  Prayer is asking a question.  Meditation is listening for the answer.

·         Read positive literature or watch motivating videos.

·         Follow motivational people who have been where you are and have succeeded.

·         Keep it simple – try not to overcomplicate everything.

Elevate your vibration in the universe

This is part of the Law of Attraction.  I will just skim the surface of it as it relates to our thinking patterns and our mindset.

Everything is made up of energy.  Our thoughts are energy.  Whatever you project, you attract.  So positive thoughts are positive energy and attract positive things.  Negative thoughts are the opposite.

Fear, anger and resentments vibrate at low energy levels.  Love, gratitude, peace and joy vibrate at high energy levels.  The higher the energy level your thoughts are vibrating at, the more you will attract like-minded people and things.

So even in the midst of chaos, if you are grateful for what you have, you will attract good things and your entire life will change.   When you create peace and serenity within your own being, it radiates out into the world and the world becomes a more peaceful place one person at a time.