You don’t need me to tell you that negative thinking can be destructive and absolutely life-sapping.
If you let them take over, you start losing control, you lose hope, you lose confidence, you lose motivation…and you start to accept mediocrity.
You give in to your own fears and the fears of others.
And you find yourself lost…lost in a life that really isn’t yours. It’s not what you wanted, but you accept it because you and everyone around you feels the excuses and the complaints are justified.
If you feel yourself headed down this dark road, you need to stop and turn around. Go down the other path.
You see negative thinking is a limiting factor designed to keep you from reaching and growing. It’s the shackles that keep you from going where you want to go in life, and it’s the ceiling that stops you from rising to your full potential.
You need to squash negative influences on your life so you can be free to live, not just exist, but to live.
So to here are 6 easy ways to squash negative thoughts and take back control of your life:
1. Immediately change your state: Whenever you start to feel negative or down in any way, you need to be able to change your state of mind. Do something immediately to get out of the negative thinking. Distract yourself by being a little outrageous. Jump out of your seat and shout “STOP!”, slap your thigh, thump your chest…anything that will get you out of that rut. I like to thump my chest a couple of times and shout “Get on with it” or “Do it now”. Anything that will get me thinking about something else. Don’t dwell on unproductive thinking, get out of that state of mind immediately and start thinking about constructive, powerful thoughts.
2. Focus on what you want to achieve: You should always be focusing on the goal you want to achieve. By focusing your mind, you’re giving yourself a clear direction for your thinking. You are telling yourself to think constructively and positively. Most times when negative emotions come about, we’re being lazy with our thoughts. We’ve got our guard down and we allow external negativity to influence our thinking. When you are laser focused on your goal, it puts up a barrier around you that repells negative factors.
3. Identify and eliminate what causes your negative thinking: A lot of the negativity we experience comes from external influences. The media feeds us images of destruction and chaos, people around us complain about their situations and difficulties, and even more will project their fears onto us about why something we want to achieve can’t be done. You need to identify what causes your negative emotions and cut them out of your life. You don’t need it. Unfortunately, a lot of the people who will bring you down are those that you are closest to. Does that mean you cut your friends and family out of your life? No. You just need to put less weight into what they have to say, and be more steadfast in your focus and your thinking. Don’t be susceptible to the negative influences of other people. Control your thoughts by being proactive, not passively accepting and reacting to external influences.
4. Ask yourself questions to keep your thinking sharp: When your favorite excuses and complaints about anything start to arise, turn them on their head. “I’m not good enough”, “It’s not fair”, “Why can’t I just get it right?”, “I can’t afford it”, “I don’t have the time”, “It’s too hard”…blah blah blah. These are rubbish thoughts and you need to throw them out. Instead, ask yourself questions that force you to come up with solutions to these opportunities, instead of just giving in to the situation. Ask yourself “How can I make the time to exercise everyday?”, “How can I motivate myself to wake up earlier?”, “What can I do to move me closer to my goal?” Whatever you ask yourself, you will find an answer to. If you don’t ask constructive questions and just complain or give excuses, nothing positive can come out of that. Ask yourself a quality question and you will receive a quality answer. Turn every situation into an opportunity to discover a solution.
5. Install positive influences around you: Think of the things that make you smile, get you motivated, or inspire you to take action towards your goals. The imagery that you see should be things you want to have around you consistently. If you want to go on a trip to an island, have a picture of the island on the wall; put inspiring quotes on post-it notes and leave them on your mirror, on your desk, on your doors; have a screensaver that makes you smile or asks you an empowering question; spend more time with positive people; read powerful, inspiring stories. By having more positive, constructive imagery around you, the more powerful your thoughts will be. When you fill your mind with these powerful influences, you leave no space for anything negative.
6. Be inspired by others: You’re not the only person in the world who has negative thoughts – everybody does. Everybody has their own way for dealing with the various challenges in their lives, and reading about how others overcome their own challenges can inspire and motivate you to make the same changes in your own life. Learn from others. Use their strategies for your own personal gain, after all they are sharing it so others can be inspired by their example. Make a list of sites (just like this one) that inspire and motivate you to improve the quality of your life, and visit them often. Visit them when you are down, and visit them when you are up. Go back and refocus your thinking and discover powerful ways to live a more fulfilling life on your own terms.
Try to use these every day. Use one or use all of them. You might find that one works better for you than others, great! Go with that.
The key is to stay consistent. Make steady progress daily and you will start to see massive improvements.
If these 6 tips aren’t enough, you can also try these daily reflection exercises to really squash the negativity out of your life.
Click here to learn more about how these exercises can really help you eliminate negative thoughts.