Positive thinking: Reduce stress by eliminating negative self-talk

Positive thinking helps with stress management and can even improve your health. Practice overcoming negative self-talk with examples provided.

Is your glass half-empty or half-full? How you answer this age-old question about positive thinking may reflect your outlook on life, your attitude toward yourself, and whether you're optimistic or pessimistic — and it may even affect your health.
Indeed, some studies show that personality traits like optimism and pessimism can affect many areas of your health and well-being. The positive thinking that typically comes with optimism is a key part of effective stress management. And effective stress management is associated with many health benefits. If you tend to be pessimistic, don't despair — you can learn positive thinking skills. Here's how.

Understanding positive thinking and self-talk

Positive thinking doesn't mean that you keep your head in the sand and ignore life's less pleasant situations. Positive thinking just means that you approach the unpleasantness in a more positive and productive way. You think the best is going to happen, not the worst.
Positive thinking often starts with self-talk. Self-talk is the endless stream of unspoken thoughts that run through your head every day. These automatic thoughts can be positive or negative. Some of your self-talk comes from logic and reason. Other self-talk may arise from misconceptions that you create because of lack of information.
If the thoughts that run through your head are mostly negative, your outlook on life is more likely pessimistic. If your thoughts are mostly positive, you're likely an optimist — someone who practices positive thinking.

The health benefits of positive thinking

Researchers continue to explore the effects of positive thinking and optimism on health. Health benefits that positive thinking may provide include:

• Increased life span
• Lower rates of depression
• Lower levels of distress
• Greater resistance to the common cold
• Better psychological and physical well-being
• Reduced risk of death from cardiovascular disease
• Better coping skills during hardships and times of stress

It's unclear why people who engage in positive thinking experience these health benefits. One theory is that having a positive outlook enables you to cope better with stressful situations, which reduces the harmful health effects of stress on your body. It's also thought that positive and optimistic people tend to live healthier lifestyles — they get more physical activity, follow a healthier diet, and don't smoke or drink alcohol in excess.

Imagine whatever you want is here right now. What do you want?

Imagine whatever you want is here right now. What do you want?

 

The fear that something is missing in you is what leads you to search somewhere else for happiness. You overlook what is already “here” as you chase after “there”; you miss the “sacred now” as you ponder your “next step”; you forget to be grateful for what “is” as you prey after “more.” You search, struggle, and strive, but you never arrive because you can’t get past the thought that something is missing.

Can you see that all your pain comes from the belief that your source of happiness is outside you? This single misperception—this little fear—is what feeds your mental junk, your learned unworthiness, and your “not good enough” stuff. Notice how all your thoughts of fear and lack are reversed the moment you accept that every piece of universal joy rests already in your heart. Feel this, now.

Do you see this?

Your two physical eyes see bits of things. They see bits of the color spectrum, bits of the landscape, bits of the ocean, bits of the sky. They see bits of you and bits of me. But they do not see the big picture. It is only when you look with the heart that you can begin to comprehend the possibility of true wholeness, true beauty, and true oneness.

Imagine whatever you want is here right now. What do you want? Wisdom? It’s already here. Peace? It’s already here.

Inspiration? It’s here already. It’s all here, because you are. This is the big picture. This is what your Unconditioned Self sees.

You are what you seek. This means that whatever joy you hoped “to get” after you found your true partner, got the dream job, bought the ideal home, and earned the right money is already in you! When you search for love, joy, power, money, Heaven, and God; you are really searching for the experience of your Unconditioned Self that is unencumbered by fear, separation, and lack.

You are not here to find happiness; you are here to extend it. You are inspiration-packed, wisdom-infused, made with love, and blessed with joy. And so is everyone else. To be free all you have to do is make yourself wholly available to what is already inside you. Real healing is giving up your resistance to your Unconditioned Self.

Here is some graffiti for the soul. “I am what I seek.” Write it up and stick it in your wallet. Truth is here, inspiration is here, love is here, peace is here, help is here, because you are here. Truth is a pathless land, and happiness is a journey without distance.

Happiness Now!