Why is it so much easier to have a negative attitude than a positive one? What’s inside you that just naturally pulls you to the negative side of things?

You read the books, you attend the seminars, you buy the tapes, you even wear the t-shirt…..and things seem to go well for awhile. You feel better, your outlook is better, and you’re hopeful. That is…..until something happens that sends you reeling all over again.

It doesn’t even have to be a major, catastrophic event to send you back to the land of negative thinking. It can be something as simple as someone cutting you off in traffic or pushing ahead of you in the grocery checkout line. What gives those seemingly simple occurrences of every day life so much power to literally throw you into a tizzy all over again?

This never ending cycle continues because its source is never addressed. You “try hard” to be positive, attempting to over-ride how you truly feel. It’s a lot of work pretending to be positive when inside you know all too well that it won’t take long and one of those annoying life issues is going to creep up and dump all over your positive attitude.

Negative attitudes come from negative thoughts that come from reactions to negative behavior….and around the cycle goes. And you must know that none of this negative stuff is coming from God. There is nothing negative about the way He thinks or acts.

So how do you put a stop to all this nonsense? How do you get to a place where your positive attitude is what’s natural for you and not the other way around?

I wish I could give you a magic formula that, when applied correctly, would erase your negative attitude in 3 days. Yup, can’t you just see the infomercial on a product like that? For just $19.95 you can have all your dreams come true. What a bargain! People would be lining up for this one.

But alas….the real world isn’t quite so simple. But the good news is that there are some things you can do to help you transition from the land of negativity to a much more positive place.

• First, focus on what you’re thinking about. Remember the part about being stuck because you’ve never addressed the source? All your negative actions are coming from your negative thoughts. Your body has no choice but to follow wherever your mind goes.

  It is possible to control your thoughts, regardless of what you’ve been led to believe. As soon as a negative thought comes into your mind, purposefully make it a point to replace it with a positive one. At first, this may take some work, because chances are, you will probably have a lot more negative thoughts in your head than positive ones. But eventually, that ratio will reverse itself.

• Second, stop letting other people’s negative attitudes influence yours. This may mean you need to stop hanging around with people who do nothing but spout negative stuff. You can’t afford to do it when your goal is to become more positive. The negative people in your life aren’t going to like it when you stop participating. Just remember that birds of a feather really do flock together.

• Third, make a list of all the areas in your life that you want to change. List all your negative attitudes too. If you can’t really think of things to put on your list, just ask your family. I’ll bet they’ll help you make it a REALLY LONG list.

• Fourth, take the time to write strong, life-giving, positive affirmative statements. Make a commitment to read those statements out loud every day. Enjoy how great they make you feel. Know in your heart that you’re making progress, even if you can’t see it just yet. Just keep affirming the positive.

• Lastly, take the time to pray about this. You can’t change by yourself. But you can spend time with the One who can help. You do what you can, and you let God do the rest. It really IS that simple.

This process will change how you think and that’s the real key to changing how you act. Remember…..your body will follow wherever your mind goes. There is no way to separate the two, so you might as well “program in” what you want instead of randomly leaving it to chance.

Just know that God’s version of right attitudes contains nothing negative. And if you want God’s best for your life, it starts with right thoughts…..His thoughts to be exact.

Since time immemorial, yoga therapy has been in practice in India for curing innumerable diseases and human ailments. This time tested form of therapy that has been ignored in the recent past, has now however being appreciated fully. DVDs and other audio-visual mediums have also come out in this regard.

Some forms of yoga, like the Pranayama (specialized breathing exercise) has even received recognition from medical professionals in the US. Clinical evidence reveals that breathing through alternate nostrils, as practiced in yoga, is responsible for a positive balance in the two hemispheres of the brain and the autonomic nervous system (ANS). Based on various breathing techniques, yoga therapy alters the frame of mind towards positive thinking and restores mental energy lost by negative thinking. Yogis (Ascetics) are said to regard psychotherapy as the modern form of yoga therapy.

Yoga Therapy and its Effects on the Mind

Yogic exercises no doubt keep the body in good form, but its effect on the mind is far reaching as well. Much before the modern mind forming drugs were introduced, Yogis were able to take control over mind practicing through yoga.

Yoga and Food

“Food should be taken in as much of their natural state as possible”, advise the Yogis. They also felt that it is better not to process the food that is to be consumed. A diet consisting of such food, it has been established, makes possible three functions of the process of digestion:

Absorption > Assimilation > Elimination

A recent study of the American Cancer Society found that more than one third of all the cancer fatalities were caused by bad or faulty nutrition. Yoga therapy and yogic food could perhaps have saved those precious lives.

A simple Yoga Therapy through Breathing

Here is something you can try out easily

Stand erect and keep the arms in a normal resting position. Rotate the shoulders first clockwise then counterclockwise – five times each.

Bend your head right side, trying to reach the shoulder joint and then to the left side – five times each side.

Now bend the head forward and backward alternatively – five times each way.

Keep the neck erect and while bending forward, press the chin against the neck.

Now close the eyes and let the mind relax. Make it as much light and weariless as possible. Breath normally, remaining conscious to the inhalation and exhalation, feeling the movements of your breathing.

With eyes closed, all earthly sounds banished, a sense of calm will overcome you.

Take the next step now. Imagine that the incoming air is slowly coming upward from the stomach level to lungs level. Similarly, while exhaling, do the same except that now the air is coming from the top to the bottom. Repeat ten times and you will be a new person, alive with the joy of life.

Most of us experience anger at one time or another. Others may get angry with us, justifiably or not. We may become angry at others, sometimes with very good reason, sometimes not. One thing is for sure, it is not a pleasant experience.

We cannot always reason with those that are bitter towards us and sometimes we may need to accept that it exists. To counteract this with retaliation is something that needs careful consideration.

“Consider how much more you often suffer from your anger and grief, than from those very things for which you are angry and grieved.” - Marcus Antonius

Perhaps we are guilty of hostility more than we would like to be. Greater interaction with people should reduce these feelings. Less anger should result in more confidence and less stress.

Is a discussion possible and is it worthwhile? A few words and an exchange of viewpoints might result in one or both sides having a change in attitude. Try to see another point of view no matter how unreasonable it appears.

Consider how you are feeling. It is common, perhaps good advice, to let anger be expressed, to not hold it inside. My personal experience is that sometimes I have regretted this because I was wrong or over reacted. Sometimes the anger still lingered. Avoiding anger in the first place, through conciliation or acceptance, can result in feeling better all around.

Hatred is a prolonged anger towards a fellow human. There are various forms of hatred, motivated in different ways, and mostly without cause. Prejudice, jealousy, gossip, bullying are hard to deal with. This is where friends can be a great help in trying to understand these harmful actions. They can offer comfort and foresight. Be a friend.

“Whatever is begun in anger, ends in shame.” - Ben Franklin (1706-1790)

We all face situations in our lives that cannot be changed and that make us feel helpless and hopeless. Perhaps it is less serious than that, but we are stressed and worried. It might be an event that has happened, is happening, or will happen.

It should provide some immediate comfort to consider that these situations do not directly cause these awful feelings, but it is what we think of these situations. Changing our thoughts can have an enormous effect on how we are feeling. This has been stated by many great minds, over very many years.

“I had the blues because I had no shoes until upon the street, I met a man who had no feet.” - Ancient Persian Saying

By reviewing some of the good things in our lives, past and present, we can feel good even in what appears to be a very disturbing situation. As long as there is nothing we can do to fix a problem, dwelling on the negative aspects of it will only make us feel worse and will do absolutely no good. Since it all depends on what is in our thoughts, we can control this.

“The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven.” - John Milton (1608-1674)

So start listing the things in your life that make or have made you happy. Stuff your mind with other things that make you smile or laugh. Keep it up so as not to let the negative creep back in.

Study babies. They fall and get up and try again and again, and then they walk. They are usually always ready to laugh, at the littlest things. They are constantly interested in new things to learn about, and normally sleep well. If they brood about a bad experience it’s not for long.

“Things turn out best for the people who make the best out of the way things turn out.” - Art Linkletter

The harm that worry causes in our lives has been well documented by health professionals and others. Worry can weaken and sicken us, and make our days unbearable. At the very least, it prevents us from living fully and happily the only life that we will ever have. At its worse, it can destroy us.

“A god, invisible but omnipotent. It steals the bloom from the cheek and lightness from the pulse; it takes away the appetite and turns the hair gray.” - Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881)

It does a lot more than that, Benjamin!

But the worry disease can be cured and it certainly can be reduced. Of course it requires a change in our thinking - how to view and react to situations. Worrying over things that ‘might’ happen can waste large portions of our lives, considering that so often it is for nothing, and almost certainly does no good.

“If you can solve your problem, then what is the need of worrying? If you cannot solve it, then what is the use of worrying?” - Shantideva

Worrying about things that have happened will not turn back the hands of time to give you another try at doing it right. So that is a waste of time too. So many of our anxieties and fears are for nothing. Most of the rest can simply be discarded because worrying just isn’t going to do any good. So let’s spend our time thinking about the good and pleasant things in our lives, and move on in a peaceful and contented state of mind.

“I think these difficult times have helped me to understand better than before how infinitely rich and beautiful life is in every way and that so many things that one goes around worrying about are of no importance whatsoever.” - Isak Dinesen

A program to become knowledgeable on the subject of worry, through reading and other instruction, can help in turning our lives around. A life filled with contentment and lacking stress and worry are the goals to be achieved.

It’s never too late to start eliminating worry.

“Be happy while you’re living, for you’re a long time dead.” - Scottish Proverb

Everyone says, “How the time flies.” The days go by and they are years, and the years finally become our whole life. Each daily portion can be wasted, or it can be a pleasure, before it is gone forever. If a bedtime review of the day concludes that we were too stressed, too busy, didn’t accomplish anything, didn’t have any fun, then it has been another lost piece of precious life.

Perhaps we are putting off our enjoyment until we have more time, or money, or some other improved condition. The trouble with that is that it might never happen, or it may be too long in coming.  It’s so important to accept this time, this very minute, as something of tremendous value that will very soon be gone forever. There are many ways to ensure that we make the best of our time here on earth.

In our daily routine let’s include time to enjoy others and thus ourselves. Look and wonder at the trees, fields and mountains, smell the flowers, hear the birds, and watch the clouds in the sky.

“This world, after all our science and sciences, is still a miracle; wonderful, magical and more, to whosoever will think of it.” - Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881)

Face your problems bravely, confidently, and improve on your situation, no matter what state it be in. Be good to feel good. Be active and improve your mind. Laugh, relax, and sleep well.

Life is mostly froth and bubble;
Two things stand like stone:
Kindness in another’s trouble,
Courage in our own. - Adam Gordon (1833-1870)

Practicing relaxation techniques can help calm our days when they get too stressful. It’s easy to miss out on enjoying a day in our life if our minds are filled with worrisome thoughts and our bodies are tense with stress. A day lived is not coming back and we should not lose it in this way.

For starters, eliminate some things. Avoid running around frantically trying to do too many things. Slow down and move with an easy manner.

If you cannot avoid problems and busy days, get in the habit of pausing to breathe slowly and deeply. Try to continue with easy breathing as you continue on with your tasks.

When tightening up, say at your desk, relax all your muscles. Let them go limp and loose like a soft towel. Don’t try, just let it all go. Consciously let the muscles relax every time you feel them tighten, which might be all day long to start with. It is almost impossible to feel stressed if your muscles are relaxed.

If you can get a short break create a detailed peaceful retreat in your imagination and go there to calm your feelings. Picture it in vivid detail. Perhaps a comfortable room with soft music, a quiet place in the woods, a placid lake, a beautiful garden with flowers, trees, birds. Perhaps such a place already exists. While you are there, let go of everything except where you are.

Create a personal selection of calming words like serene, tranquil, peaceful and repeat them to yourself as you move through your day.

After work perhaps you can have a relaxing pastime such as walking or listening to music.

“There is however, a true music of nature - the song of the birds, the whisper of leaves, the ripple of waters upon a sandy shore, the wail of wind or sea.” - John Lubbock (1834-1913)