The Art of Being Positive

There was a man once. He was always positive. Being positive was his second nature. Whenever anything untoward happened, his response would be, “It might have been worse.” So much so that it started annoying his friends. When one is always positive, it can get on the nerves of average thinkers around.

One day, a friend of his came up to him and said, “Last night I dreamed I was driving and that I had a terrible accident. And that every bone in my body was broken. They tried hard to revive me, the paramedics, but they failed. They gave me electric shocks but nothing worked. Ultimately, they pronounced me dead.

The messengers of Death came and dragged me all the way to hell. There I was beaten badly and skinned while I felt excruciating pain. Then they took me and put me in oil heated to the top degree. My body burned and I cried and cried but no one helped me. The pain was like never before. I was scared when I got up. And I am still scared now. This is a bad sign.”

“Oh, well. Don’t be scared,” the man said. “It might have been worse.”
“What do you mean, it might have been worse? How could it have been any worse?!” the friend exclaimed.
“It might have been true,” he said calmly. It might have been true — a statement worth reflecting upon.

Fear is innate in all living beings. Such fear may be instinctive or conditioned, something I will elucidate in the near future. Fears stop one from being positive. They make you weak. If you take a look at your past, you will realize that less than one percent of your fears actually ever came true, and that too, not even fully. This is the key to remember. When you no longer feel positive about your actions or goals because you are afraid that life may just go jelly on you, remind yourself of all the times in the past when you felt the same but each time your fears were proved wrong.

While in high school, you probably looked upon your maths or science teacher as the supreme being, the one who controlled your destiny, but he did not and you still passed. Each semester or each year you were probably afraid of your exams, but you mostly passed, if not always.

When companies were downsizing, and the economy was in depression when the stock markets were going south, you might have been affected but you moved on. The Divine, the One who lives in all, ensured that you were not without food, shelter, clothing, or medication.

Being positive is a matter of mental preparedness.

It is knowing that the world cannot end for you. It is remembering that every day gives you the opportunity to do something new. Everything is interdependent and relative. Positivity is about living in the moment. And above all, being positive is a matter of choice, a conscious choice in fact. You can be positive or you can be negative; in essence, both emotions have no firm basis; they are based on hope, often biased and misplaced.

Whether or not you count your chickens before they’re hatched is not as important as caring for the ones that do hatch. Because ultimately, your satisfaction, peace, joy is going to come from living in the moment. The past is dead, and, the future, unknown.

Gratitude, being grateful for what you have, hope, being optimistic about what you may have, and, discipline, working in the present to get what you would like to have, are the ingredients for a positive life. If you are grateful, hopeful, and disciplined, you will feel positive naturally.

If all your fears, or even a majority of them, came to life in the past, you have reason to be skeptical and negative about your future, about your goals, about yourself. However, if that is not the case, remember that it is your mind playing tricks. Being positive does not mean that you hide in a cocoon and hope that all good things will happen automatically, it is about working towards your goals regardless of what comes your way. You will emerge triumphant, stronger, and a winner. You may want to read the secret of being positive.

Oscar Wilde once said, “All of us are in the gutter but some of us are looking at the stars.”

Go on! Learn to play and play to win but win to enjoy. Do all that positively. Chase your dreams. Today, you have the chance.

Peace.
Swami

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Editorial Note

As you’ve read above, to be positive is a state of mind. The more you are mentally prepared to face life a certain way, the more you can sail through its challenges with ease. 

 

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The following FAQs delve into how one can be more positive, rid themselves of negative thoughts and live a peaceful life.

What can I do to constantly be positive?

How to be positive? I get asked this question a lot. And often when people say they want to be positive, what they are really saying is how do I be happy and hopeful under almost all circumstances?

That, I don’t want to feel frustrated and agitated in the face of adversity, that somehow I want to be at peace.

The truth is that life is hard work and there’s no one singular easy way of being positive all the time. Having said that, we can learn to be mostly positive. Even those who appear naturally positive and confident learned to be that way, consciously or otherwise.

Before I impart my two cents’ worth on positivity, allow me to share a little story with you which will show you how to be positive.

How does one cope with fear and be positive?

We all have fears. Fear of what may happen in the future, of skeletons in the closet, of failing others and ourselves. We fear what would happen if our worst fears came true. Most of our anxiety stems from such fears. We read self-help books that tell us ‘not to worry’ or to ‘be positive’.

But, it doesn’t work most of the time, certainly not every time. Someone asked me the other day, “Is there a way to rise above your fears?”
Well, it depends on the nature of your fears. If you have paranoia, phobias and worries resulting from excessive thinking then surely a calm mind is of immense help. My focus today is not on unfounded fears arising out of the chattering of a restless mind though.

I’ve written and spoken a fair bit on that in the past. Instead, in this post, I talk about genuine fears. Those where a calm mind doesn’t appease your anxiety, fears where all forms of affirmation fails. Only one thing works in the face of such fears. What is that, you ask?

Let me share with you a little story first which will show you how to be positive in life while facing your fears.

How do I stop negative thinking and be positive in life?

Negativity kills your motivation, it makes you weak and almost shuts down your mind. When circumstances are adverse, at that moment, you have a choice to focus your mind on negative or positive thoughts. It is a matter of choice.

If you let negativity become your habit, you will mostly find yourself sulking. Undesirable or unpleasant situations can make you feel low and as you get more negative, such situations go beyond your control further damaging your emotional and mental state.

It is a catch twenty-two situation. Either you need to move out of the situation or your negativity. Both will accomplish the same outcome.

Here are some suggestions that will help you be more positive. They are not mutually exclusive. Try a mix and match, a trial-and-error approach to see what works best for you.

How do I remove negative thoughts from my mind?

One query I receive frequently from many is about how one can live in the moment. Seekers tell me they want to take their mind away from negative thoughts and emotions but are not always able to do so.

In fact, more often than not such negativity or distractions win over them causing turmoil in their inner world of peace and quiet. I had earlier talked about how an attempt to focus on what you dislike brings you exactly what you do not want.

That is how Nature operates. Overcoming negative thoughts is the key.

Continue reading about how to be positive and overcome negative thoughts by training the brain.

How do I increase my positive thinking and positive energy?

Telling yourself to not think negative thoughts or feel negative emotions is not the way to overcome them. Instead, it is to focus on positivity. The following video shows us how to do just that.

Timeline:

• 0:09: The story of the always-positive man
• 1:46: Our fears
• 3:55: The story of the three-legged elephant, the talking frog, and the lame monkey
• 6:12: The fundamental law of attraction
• 7:12: The Native American story of the two bulls
• 9:05: Are you happy in your own company?

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