Thought replacement: Make the positive habit-forming

Yesterday I wrote about the value of noticing whether your thoughts are negative, wasteful, necessary, or positive. Today I want to share a simple exercise to help you start habitually moving your thoughts in a positive direction.

Each time you find yourself thinking a negative or wasteful thought, stop and find a positive thought to replace it with. The positive thought might be related ("OK, what's good about this situation?") or it might be a complete tangent.

When you do this, you're accomplishing multiple things...

Loop interruption: Negative thoughts have a funny way of taking on a life of their own, feeding on themselves in an endless loop. With this exercise, you stop them cold. You interrupt the loop and replace it with something beneficial.

Awareness: Nothing focuses your attention on what's really going on in your mind like having to take action when it's less than preferable.

Positive practice: Not only does this actively break the negative loop, it also gives you practice finding the positive.

Try this exercise for a day first. Journal about how it went. What did you notice? Was it easy? Was it hard? Are you more positive than you realized? More negative? Was it easy or challenging to find positive replacement thoughts?

If you find the exercise beneficial, commit to doing it for another day. If you find yourself wanting more, commit to it for a week.

Bit by bit, your positive habit will start to grow.

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by Curt Rosengren, Passion Catalyst

Comments

[aarthi]

Curt,
I like this idea and I have to say I have read something on this same lines before and
I have tried to be conscious of my thoughts.
What I do not understand about negative thougts is this...
are these thoughts really negative or is this the reality.. I mean I have a tough time distinguishing between reality and negative thoughts.
Also wouldnt it be a lot of work to work on your thoughts? I mean your mind puts out millions of thoughts trying to control/change/work on them...wouldn't it be energy sapping?
Also is it not possible that the thoughts are actually not negative but they are trying to tell you something that is not right in your life or they are trying to tell you that you are not in alignment with yourself...in that case wouldnt it be more correct to actually respect the negative thoughts?
I don't mean to go against what you are saying... I am just putting forth my thoughts ..
thanks for the post

[Curt Rosengren]

Great questions, Aarthi. Thanks.

RE: Negative thoughts vs. reality

Sometimes it's not so much a question of, "Is this negative element reality or not" as it is, "How much do I choose to focus on this negative element?" The more attention you give to the negative, the more space it takes up in your perception of the world. The more space it takes up, the more negative your reality becomes.

RE: taking a lot of work

Absolutely! If you expect to flip the switch and effectively funnel all your thoughts in a positive direction, you're setting yourself up for deep disappointment. It happens over time. Think of it as a gradually-evolving process, rather than something you can do in one fell swoop.

RE: paying attention to negative thoughts

Negative thoughts definitely have their place. The question is, are they serving a positive purpose, or are they in charge and creating an unnecessarily negative view of the world.

One great way to evaluate how much attention you should pay to those negative thoughts is to take a step back and ask objective questions, like...

- Is that true?
- What can I learn here?
- What is the message here that will help me move forward?
- What is the source of this feeling?
- What could I change to eliminate this negative response?
- On a scale of one to ten, how important is what I'm responding negatively to?

[Aarthi]

thanks Curt
thankyou for taking time to answer..
this does makes things a little more clear and positive:)

[Dali Burgado]

Curt,

Amazing and very powerful information here.

And great points Aarthi.

I've been monitoring my thoughts for a good two years, and it does take getting used to, but the more you monitor them, the better you get at focusing on the positive aspects of "challenges".

I truly believe all challenges are blessings in disguise.

Whenever I find myself in a "funky" mood I just take my "gratitude/appreciation" journal and write all the things I am grateful for. When you come from a place of gratitude and appreciation there's no room for negativity.

Reminds me of an Anthony Robbins quote: "Fear disappears when you are grateful."

Curt, you've just gained a PASSIONATE reader!

I appreciate you,
Dali Burgado