Understanding Power of Positive Thinking

Norman Vincent Peale, wrote the book The Power of Postive Thinking, and he himself admits, he did not imagine it would be the best seller that it was. But he is glad to have reached so many people. But he was glad to have reached so many people.

It becomes quite clear when listening Dr Peale, that he was a preacher, in addition to his work as an author. However, regardless of your paticular spirtual beliefs and affiliations. His ideas on postivie thinking and attitude hold true.

Everyone has bad days right?

The question to ask yourself when you have a bad day..how did you day start? Did it start on an upbeat note?.. or did things start going wrong from the moment you stepped out of bed?

Whether we are aware of it or not, our brains are constantly at work, and if it is not doing something productive, it is probably sneeking in all kinds of "self talk". So when you get of bed and stub your toe, and you say to yourself "It's going to be one of those days", or "I souldn't have gotten out of bed this morning", you are already setting your day up for failure.
The core concept behind postive thinking is the notion that your mind (your subconscious or whatever you want to call it), will work to establish the vision we set for it. If we set low expectations, and no vision, we will delivery low quality of work, and never really get anywhere. This inturn will make us feel low, and qusetion ourselves, lower our self-confidence and continue a vicious downard spiral of self fulfilling defeat.

If we don't set a vision, if we don't adopt an attitude of postivity, we allow our negative thoughts and ideas to creep in. We might not even be aware of this, we might not hear them. We automatically push things out of our mind and may not even notice the long term pain that it causes.

Steps toward Postive Thinking:

0 - Become aware of what your thoughts/feelings are. I find guided meditation helps witth this.

1 - Set your vision (long term) and your expectations (daily). How do you envision your day, when problems occur (and they will), how do you envision yourself handling this problems, with confidence, in high spirits. Imagine in advance, the positive additude you will apply to the situation. It won't always work, but it givs you the best chance. You are pre-programming yourself to choose your response and not be re-active to it.

2 - As you become more and more of your "inner voice", write down the thoughts that seem to occur most frequently. For each "thoughtlet" ask yourself. Does this thought work for me? Is it helping me? If these thoughtlets are designed to hurt you/ lower your confidence. Develop for yourself counter-statements. Just as your brain has been trained to fill your head with these "idle thoughts". You can re-train your brain with positive re-inforcing thoughts to counter-act the effect. Challenge those negative thoughts - openly and honestly. Look out for the traps we fall all fall into and say to yourself, "No that is not true, I am tricking myself"

3 - Take time at the end of each day to reflect upon it (perhaps write these down in a log.. or a blog). How did your day end up, compared to how you envisioned it. What worked well today? What did not? Should I make any changes to my thoughts tommorow?

4 - Learn to have faith. Regradless of your spirtual beliefs. I belive the one of the ten steps for substance abuse, something like "Find God as you understand him/her". We are hardwired to believe in things we cannot hear, or see, but we just "feel". This feeling can be a source of great comfort at times when we feel low, when we feel like we are loosing hoope and it is an important tool to continue the flow of positive thinking within our own minds.

Two ways of viewing people in society:

1) The worlds is made up of "Good People" and "Evil People" There are "evil" people in the world. The evil ones go around delibrately hurting others, causing pain and they have no remorse or regret for doing so

2) The world is made of mostly good people, although there may appear to be a lot of evil people, in reality there are very few truely evil people. Often it is just good people that make poor chices and bad mistakes. Everyone can make mistakes/accididents. Most people after the fact will apologize and try to learn from these mistakes. These are "unintentional" things that can happen.

To quote a lesson from a prior employer

"You come close to what you aim for..So aim High !"

Show Notes:

The Powerful problem with Positive Thinking

How The Power of Positive Thinking Can Change Your Life

The Power of Postive Thinking,

The power of Postive Thinking - Google Books