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Top 12 Tips for Changing from a Negative Thinker to a Positive Thinker
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If you haven’t heard, negative thinking can affect our lives in numerous ways. It’s bad for our health and it increases our stress levels. Changing your manner of thinking can be difficult, however, and it’s easy to fall into negative thinking. We hear negative things on the news every day, and many of us have a negative newsfeed in our heads about ourselves as well. We hear negative gossip from friends and sometimes even from our bosses and coworkers. Negative thoughts are often self-fulfilling prophecies. When we believe that negative things are going to happen, isn’t it funny how they often do?
Now this doesn’t mean that you should be unrealistic and say that things are great when they aren’t. Sometimes life sucks. Bad things happen. The key here is to have positive thoughts about the eventual outcome. For example, if you wreck the car, yes, that sucks, however, you can say “Well, at least no one was hurt, I have insurance, and now I can shop for another car! I always wanted a red one!”
Keep reading and find out how you can change your life forever simply by changing your thinking from negative to positive.
1. Start with the Glass Half Full Theory
No matter what happens in life (within reason, of course) try to look for the good, not the bad. If you are having a crappy day, try to look for the good things that happened during the day instead of focusing on the bad. Try to think optimistically. Don’t see the glass as half empty, see it as half full…maybe even half full of vodka!
2. Don’t Over Think
Sometimes we get so absorbed with little details in life that we forget to pick our heads up and look around at all the wonderful things that surround us. Instead of dwelling on all the “what ifs” (what if I don’t get that promotion? What if the bottom falls out of that stock?) try to stop worrying about it. As long as you are doing your best and working towards improving things, don’t spend so much time over thinking the situation.
3. Meditate and/or Practice Yoga
Meditation will help you learn to calm and quiet your mind. Yoga will also help you to focus your thoughts away from negative things and teach you how to choose what you will focus on, in this case, more positive thoughts.
4. Fake It Till You Make It (Smile)
Sometimes it’s hard to put on a smile and act happy when you don’t feel it. However, smiling, even when you don’t feel like it, will greatly help to change your mood. Watch some funny videos if it helps, spend more time with a friend who is funny and entertaining, anything that will keep you smiling. Fake it until one day you find that you aren’t faking it, you are feeling it!
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5. Be Grateful
One of the basic fundamental ways to learn to become a positive thinker is learning how to be grateful for everything in your life. You have so much to be grateful for. You have so many things that you take for granted every single day; your bed, the internet, your cell phone (even if it’s not an iPhone 6), clean water, a place to sleep, a kitchen with food in it, your television, and your health. So many people in this world have none of those things and would love to be in your place. Practice writing down 3 things every single day that you are grateful for and watch how your life changes.
6. Find Like-Minded People
It helps to surround yourself with like-minded, supportive people. There are more than enough nay-sayers to go around in this world; you don’t need to keep them in your life. Look for positive, happy people. You know which of your friends and family will be there for you no matter what. Keep them in your life and distance yourself from the others.
7. Eliminate the Drama
This also means eliminating those “dramatic” people in your life. You know who they are, the ones who seem to jump from crisis to crisis? Every hangnail is a life threatening emergency and they seem to have one every day. Yeah, those people: dump them. Oh, and those negative people on your friends list on Facebook? Dump them too. It’s time for you to focus on gratitude, happiness, and the positive things in life, not silly drama.
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8. Think Realistically and Change Your Tone
As we said earlier, you don’t need to say something is great when it’s not, or that you don’t have concerns about certain issues, these things are normal. However, you can face reality with a positive tone. For example, let’s say that you and your recent ex-husband are trying to work out a custody agreement with the kids. This is never fun and you have every right to be concerned that this won’t work out well. The truth is, you have complete control over your thoughts, so you can think (and say) something like “I’m sure we will have some difficulties adjusting to this new schedule and finding a way to work it out but I am confident that we will find a solution to this that everyone will be happy with.”
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9. Sing
No matter your taste in music, singing your favorite songs always seems to make you feel better, right? So do it! Sing out loud! You aren’t auditioning for American Idol, so forget what you sound like, and sing for the pure pleasure of singing!
10. Take Responsibility for Your Thoughts
If you want to be a happier, more positive person, you have to take responsibility for what you think and feel. You are in complete control of your thoughts. So instead of thinking that other people are in control of your feelings, your life, and your thoughts, take responsibility for your own thoughts.
11. Be Kind to Others
It’s such as simple thing, but it will generate waves of powerful positive feelings and thoughts for you and the person you are kind to. Do nice things for others, no matter how small, they count. This is a win-win situation for everyone involved and you have nothing to lose. Being nice means you are a good person and that is a positive thing.
SEE ALSO: 14 Things to Get Rid of If you Want to be Happy
12. Be Kind to Yourself
In addition to being kind to others, you need to be kind to yourself. Stop that negative self-talk. Don’t wear yourself out working and doing more than you actually have time and energy for. You need to take care of yourself as well as others. So at least 3 times per week, take 1 hour a day to go for a nature walk, read a book, soak in the tub, and enjoy how food it feels to be you.
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