Allow it to be

Changing Negative Thought Patterns Into Positive Thought Patterns  By: Keath Low

Creating a new image begins with changing how you talk to yourself each day.

Where Negativity Comes From

As children, each of us live with the barrage of commands from the adults in our lives: stop fidgeting, pay attention, sit up straight. For some, those commands became a consistent source of pain, maybe you heard words such as "You're stupid" or "You're lazy." As we grow into adulthood, we don't leave these remarks behind us, but instead, we continue them on our own, telling ourselves over and over again how inadequate we are.

Our negative thought patterns have the ability to reap havoc on our lives. Sometimes, we create our own reality by what we say to ourselves each day. For example, if we have one or two lousy things happen to us in the morning, we tell ourselves what a terrible day this is. Throughout the day, as we repeat this over and over, we begin to focus only on what has gone wrong. By the end of the day, we have convinced ourselves it was the worst day ever. If instead, we had accepted that the morning started off poorly, but the rest of the day looked promising and repeated this to ourselves all day, we would view our experiences differently and look for the good in what was happening.

And so it goes throughout our lives. When we continue to barrage ourselves with negative thoughts of ourselves, we tend to believe them. We view ourselves in this negative way.

Negative Can Become Positive

Although difficult, you can change your thought process and change your outlook about yourself and about your life. This takes practice and work and dedication. But the results are definitely worth it. According to several psychologists, the process of changing negative thought processes into positive can take months, slowly, though, you will begin to notice a change in how you think.

Steps to creating a more positive thought process:

1.      Be aware of your thoughts and what you tell yourself each day. Keep track of the negative on a piece of paper for several days. Notice how many times you put yourself down through your thoughts.

2.      Use a piece of paper folded long ways down the middle. On one side, write down each negative thought. On the right side, write down a positive thought to replace it. Be as specific as possible. You might write down a correction to the thought, as well as a goal. For example, if you wrote down "I can't believe I lost my keys again, I am so stupid" as a negative thought, your positive side might include such phrases as "I am fine just the way I am" and "I lost my keys today, I am going to start hanging my keys on the hook each day so I know where they are." Your list should now include the most common negative thoughts you tell yourself each day.

3.      Use a black pen and cross out each negative thought. As you are crossing them out, tell yourself these thoughts no longer have any control over you.

4.      Begin to read the positive side to yourself several times each day. Each time you find yourself sliding back into your negative thoughts, tell yourself "STOP" and repeat your positive statement instead. As you begin to do this continually, you will notice the negative thoughts do not come as quickly as they used to.

5.      Keep a tablet with you and write down any new negative thoughts you may have. At the end of the day, go through the same process, exchanging, on paper, negative thoughts for positive ones. Cross out the negative and add your paper to your previous one, so that you can continue to feed yourself positive statements and goals each morning and evening as you read your list.

6.      Make sure you complete this entire process each day. The act of writing down your positive thoughts will make them stronger, reading them out loud several times a day will make them stronger still.

7.      As you begin to see progress, note how many times each day you are writing down negative thoughts about yourself. If you are completing all the steps above consistently, you should begin to see your negative thoughts decrease. Maybe in the beginning you were constantly writing down negative thoughts and filled up pages quickly. Several weeks later, you might see that you are filling up only a half a page in the same amount of time you were filling up a whole page.

No matter what, keep it up!! This can be a long process. It took you years upon years to get the point you are at now: constantly barraging yourself with how you are not good enough. Don't expect to undo years of negativism in just a few days. Keep working at it and you will have a better and more positive self-image!!

I love this article and it is so true.  Changing your negative thinking into positive thinking takes effort but it is one that is well worth it. It can impact your sense of self-esteem and improve your overall well being.

When you complain and groan about how miserable you are and how life isn’t fair and nothing ever goes right for you, Be honest, do you really want your life to change for the better? If the answer is YES! Then it takes action on your part to change your life from focusing on the negatives to the positives.

Face it nobody is going to wave a magic wand over you and say POOF! Your life is going to be perfect now. If you are expecting your life to be perfect then you are already setting yourself up for failure and disappointment because life is not perfect… however it can be pretty dang good and joyful if you want it to be.

As I have said many times, it is a choice. It is well within your power to determine if you are going to have a good day or a bad day. It all depends on where you put your focus and what you allow your thought patterns to be. Sure things are going to go wrong sometimes but that doesn’t mean that your whole applecart is going to be turned over… unless you let it.

It takes effort to turn negative thinking around. I used to call it “Stinkin Thinkin” and that negative thinking can pull you under that rock quicker than anything if you direct your energy and focus to it’s gravitational pull. BUT what if you let the negative stuff roll off your back like water off a duck’s feathers and you stay bound and determined to see the positive side of things in your life?