In this article, I want to talk about a subject, that we hear a lot about and talk about a lot, but my experience is, that a lot of people misinterpret it.
I'm going to talk about positive thinking, from a slightly different approach, than we usually take.
The reason for writing this article is that there are a lot of people who, when they hear the phrase "positive thinking", they think of something like "find the problem, the life situation, the event, that is most distressing, that I suffer the most from, and start thinking positively about it".
If that's the attitude of anyone, the bad news is that it's completely hopeless and a complete waste of time. It makes no sense, because as long as I can't believe in what I'm telling myself, nothing really changes. Until then, the positive thought will not have a positive emotional impact.
The essence and the point of positive thinking is to put it on a realistic basis. It is very important to believe in what I think. If I can't believe it, because I don't have a realistic basis, it's just cheating. I'm trying to fool myself, to deceive myself, when I know in my soul that it's all empty and meaningless.
But what can we do, if we find ourselves in a situation in life, that we experience as a tragedy and we feel, that our positive thinking has completely failed us, when we feel, that we are in a situation, that we cannot realistically think positively about.
We have all experienced, or may be experiencing, tragedies in our lives and we feel unable to look at them from a positive perspective.
What should we do?
In this article, I want to talk about two solutions, that I think everyone can apply.
The first one is to write down all the positive things in your life, that are good, that you can be happy about, that you can be grateful for and focus your attention on them. Don't focus exclusively the problem, that you are currently suffering from, but try to focus on the positive things.
Many people will think I'd rather not write it down, but I'll think about it. The two are not the same, because when I write something down, I do much deeper work on it, than if it just slips through my mind. It's essential not to type it into a computer, but to write it down by hand on a piece of paper, keep it and when you think you need it, take it out and read it.
The other one is what to do about the current problem, the negative situation in your life that you cannot think positively about. You can do many things, the problem is, that none of them lead to a solution. We can complain, curse, berate ourselves and others, but none of them lead to a solution.
When there is really big trouble and we really experience the situation as a tragedy, the only thing, that we can do is to accept it. There is nothing else we can do. Maybe in time we will, but at the moment we can't do anything else.
We are in it now, we are trying to find a way out, but we can't. We can rebel, we can protest, but usually it is not effective. It is much better to learn to accept it. If only, because in most cases, we can't see the intricacies of life. Life is so complicated and complex, that the average person cannot see what is the cause of what. We do not know these things. Often, we can look back in retrospect and see what the cause or consequence of something was and why we had to experience it.
The average person is like a chess player who only ever sees one or two moves ahead in the game. He has no idea what will happen in the twentieth move. I'm sure you've had situations in your life, where you felt you couldn't cope. A very difficult tragedy happened and you wondered why you were given this burden, why is this stroke of fate.
Then a period of time passes, a year or two or even ten years, and you look back at a certain period of time and you understand, even though it was very bad, you suffered a lot, that it was very good, that it happened that way.
Based on my personal experience and my conversations with others, it is my view, that we learn the most from and grow the most through the very situations, that we are currently struggling with. Accept it when it comes up, because you never know, what positive things might come out of it.
Let Me Tell You A Story I Know
A very poor man lives in a village. His only possession is his horse. Everybody wants to buy his horse and they offer him a lot of money. The poor man is very attached to his horse and he does not want to sell it. It happens one day, that this horse disappears. The old man looks everywhere for it, but he can't find it. The people of the village come and say, how unfortunate this is. He had one horse, it was all he had, and now he had lost it.
The old man was a wise man and said that we'll see, how it turns out. After a few days, the horse turns up, and he brings some wild horses from the wild with him. So the number of the old man's horses multiplied in a short period of time.
The people of the village come again and, with some mockery, they say in amazement, how lucky you are. The poor man replies, in his own style, that we shall see. The old man has a son, who has tried to beat the wild horses. But one day one of the horses threw him off his back and the boy's leg broke.
The village people gathered again and said, what a misfortune. The old man said again, we will see what will happen. In a few days, war broke out in the country. The young men of the village were being taken to the battlefield.
However, the old man's son, because he is injured, can stay at home. The village people again tell the old man, you're very lucky.
I don't know, if there is a sequel to the story, but one thing is for sure, it tells us what the message is, what the lesson is. The story is about how the limited human consciousness, the mind, cannot see the whole situation, the consequences, only the particular situation in which it finds itself. We do not know, what fate has in store for us. It is possible, that out of exactly, what I am experiencing today as a tragedy, a wonderful thing will arise later in life.
When you feel, that there is no solution, no consolation, no way out, do these two things for yourself.
A marvelous article. Thank you for sharing it.