“Once you replace negative thoughts with positive ones, you’ll
start having positive results.” – Willie Nelson
***
What do these statements have in common: “The happiest person is the person who thinks the most interesting thoughts” (William Lyon Phelps). “Let muddy water stand and it will become clear” (Lao Tzu). “If you judge people, you have no time to love them” (Mother Teresa).
They are all talking about positive thinking, that’s what. Norman Vincent Peale, the man who wrote the bestselling, The Power of Positive Thinking, points out: “The person who sends out positive thoughts activates the world around him positively and draws back to himself positive results.”
What do you call a man who goes into a restaurant with no money and figures on paying for his meal with the pearl that he hopes to find in the oyster he plans to order? He is an optimist at its best. Optimism, according to Ambrose Bierce, is “the doctrine or belief that everything is beautiful, including what is ugly.”
The opposite of optimism is pessimism, defined as seeing the worst aspect of things or believing that the worst will happen.
Two buckets met at the well. One of them looked morose. “What’s the trouble?” asked the second bucket sympathetically.
“Oh!” replied the first, gloomy bucket. “I get so weary of being dragged to this well. No matter how full I am, I always come back here empty.”
The second bucket laughed. “How curious! Why, I always come here empty and go away full. I’m sure if you started to think that way, you would feel much more cheerful.”
The first bucket was pessimistic while the second bucket was optimistic. The latter sees the bright side and thinks positively.
“Look at the sunny side of everything,” Christian D. Larsen urges. “Think only of the best, work only for the best, and expect only the best. Be as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own. Forget the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future. Give everyone a smile. Spend so much time improving yourself that you have no time left to criticize others. Be too big for worry and too noble for anger.”
More than 4000 years ago in China, Confucius wrote: “Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.” That’s a positive attitude.
Approaching life from a positive thinking perspective will determine the outcome. If you choose to take the negative approach, consider a challenge too difficult to broach, or decide that you don’t have what it takes, you will fail.
Positive thinking means seeing the whole picture rather than just a part of it. More importantly, you need to decide for yourself. Others can make suggestions but the final decision is yours.
As Roy T. Bennett, author of The Light in the Heart, puts it: “Don’t let the expectations and opinions of other people affect your decisions. It’s your life, not theirs. Do what matters most to you; do what makes you feel alive and happy. Don’t let the expectations and ideas of others limit who you are. If you let others tell you who you are, you are living their reality – not yours. There is more to life than pleasing people. There is much more to life than following others’ prescribed path. There is so much more to life than what you experience right now. You need to decide who you are for yourself. Become a whole being.”
Positive thinking can have a big impact on your physical and mental health. “Many studies have looked at the role of optimism and positive thinking in mental and physical health,” writes Alison Sherwood for webMD.com. “It’s not always clear which comes first: the mindset or these benefits. But there is no downside to staying upbeat.”
Some physical benefits may include: longer life span, lower chance of having a heart attack, better physical health, greater resistance to illness such as the common cold, lower blood pressure, better stress management, and better pain tolerance.
The mental benefits may include: more creativity, greater problem-solving skills, clearer thinking, better mood, better coping skills, and less depression.
“When people in one study were exposed to the flu and common cold, those with a positive outlook were less likely to get sick and reported fewer symptoms,” Sherwood writes. “During another study, women who were optimistic were less likely to die from cancer, heart disease, stroke, respiratory disease, and infection.”
When a person responds to life, that’s positive; but when he reacts to life, that’s negative. That’s what Zig Ziglar, one of America’s motivational speakers, believes. “You get sick and go to the doctor,” he explains. “Chances are good that after an examination, he would give you a prescription with instructions to return in several days.
“If, when you walk back in, the doctor starts shaking his head and says, ‘It looks like your body is reacting to the medicine; we’re going to change it,’ you probably would get a little nervous. However, if the doctor smiles and says, ‘You’re looking great! Your body is responding to the medication,’ you would feel relieved.”
A positive attitude is every bit as important to success as talent. It’s important, too, that optimism – like actions – speaks louder than words. Many enormously successful people have bent over backwards to appear prudent – belittling even themselves or their own achievements – without ever slowing down in their pursuit of excellence.
