Positivity
Description and meaning of positivity and what does positivity mean?
What is positivity?
Positive people generally have a joyful feeling, an optimistic outlook, a grateful way of thinking, and a positive belief system. They experience success, love, joy, peace of mind, and satisfaction in general – they are overall happy and contented with their lives! How much positivity to give ourselves to our lives? Is positivity worth all this? According to Psychology Today, “Positive thinking is associated with better health, lower rates of depression and anxiety, and improved quality of life” (Fernandez, 2008).
Positive thinking has both physical and psychological benefits that can benefit us physically and mentally.
Positive thinking has been shown to reduce the risk of heart disease, obesity, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, stroke, respiratory illnesses, depression, anxiety, and insomnia. Positive thinking also helps us to be less pessimistic about things and to become more active, hopeful, and self-confident.
What is negativity?
Negative thinking is a negative state of mind and emotion that may lead to serious problems such as depression, anxiety, stress, loneliness, grief, loss, and even suicide. It is also known as rumination or negative thinking. Not only do negative thinkers usually make plans to do something wrong, but they often end up doing negative things that bring harm to themselves and others or just cause suffering to themselves. Although negativity is commonly believed to result from personal life and career problems, there has been some research that shows that negativity is not necessarily due to life problems. More likely to have arisen from a desire to stay busy and avoid looking at negative aspects of life. Many adults also feel that if they do nothing for themselves, they will always be able to blame someone else for their problems. As part of developing positivity, we can try:
Pretend nothing happens.
Pretend everything happens positively.
Never complain. Never blame someone else for any issue in your life.
Never take the bait of blaming or punishing yourself for anything in your life. Stay focused on improving yourself! Learn to stop blaming! Take responsibility for your own actions, reactions, results, and so forth and ask for forgiveness! Do not allow negativity to make you miserable, depressed, resentful, angry, bitter, or resentful. You can always learn to forgive better by accepting you are responsible for the actions you take to change things and finding ways to improve yours as well as your partner and children.
How to set your mind toward it and what is positivity?
The first element, no matter how little one considers positivity, which is taking control of your attitude, is to take a few minutes each day to look inward for self-control in our minds – this includes the thoughts and feelings we have about ourselves and those around us, as well as focusing attention inward toward our own attitudes. This can be through paying attention to what is going on inside ourselves, our relationships with other people, and our daily experiences and surroundings. One way you might begin is by focusing the full force of your attention on the present moment. The next element would be setting aside time for gratitude or mindfulness. Next, turning attention inward toward who we are as individuals! To start with, we might want to write down 3 words each day. When these 3 words are written out: I am thankful for… I thank everyone involved in my life for everything! Finally, when we are ready to engage again with some positivity and hope, focusing our attention outward should begin by asking for forgiveness and gratitude for the mistakes we made on other days.
How we can set our minds toward positivity?
Being thankful for God for their blessings in our lives is very important, especially if we are grateful for ourselves as humans. Remind ourselves of why we are thankful for all situations. Forgive each mistake we had made in the past and remind ourselves of its lesson taught in the past. A last reminder to remember how far we have come as human beings are that we should never take the bait of pointing out a fault (as many times are done) when confronted with a good thing because this is not the correct way to approach it. We should go with, “What can I really do to help myself and others in this situation and not just point out faults? Can I forgive them for putting me into something I did not choose and being disappointed?” (Ibrahim, 2003). Setting clear boundaries and boundaries in our relationships with friends and family members could also help in setting the mind toward positivity. If we are still unsure of where our minds are headed with positivity, we can apply cognitive-behavioural therapy: this process helps set the mind toward positivity by shifting focus toward more desirable tasks, behaviours, and activities. Cognitive-behavioural therapy can help with setting and practising positive thinking skills and also helps with self-esteem. With the help of the experts in behavioural therapy such as Dr Robert Cialdini, PhD, we can learn more.
How to get rid of negativity?
Positive thinking does not need to happen by itself. So, how can we get rid of negativity? We can always use the power of positivity through positivity. By giving ourselves positivity, we can do anything we want to! All we do is get a chance to breathe freely, listen to peaceful music and a good playlist, walk-in nature with our hearts open and minds calm, focus on the best that’s within us and get rid of negative thoughts. What’s most important here is being aware and caring about our own attitude and being conscious of what we think. Even though we as humans don’t know how and why we experience negativity, we can use positivity to get rid of negativity. Negativity is actually a part of us, whether consciously or subconsciously: negativity is normal, therefore we can use it for the greater good, even while we still face having to face them. Our brains and body systems already feel negativity and negativity every day. We must accept that there is negativity within us, and when we experience negativity, we only see negativity. We can start by making it our choice to remove negativity from ourselves by getting a break from our environment and allowing this to set our minds towards positivity when we are away from the negativity in question. Also, by letting anger and frustration in the minds of those around us take over. We can also start by listening to positive podcasts or audiobooks. Find something constructive that can build upon positivity. Get creative at this exercise. There is no right answer. However, there are some steps we can take to make positivity a habit:
Find yourself in a quiet place away from technology, noise, and distractions. Make sure you are not on the phone or computer. If you must be in contact with another person while you get distracted, turn off notifications. Try talking with this person when they start calling and ignoring their call/text message. Turn off text messaging notifications on your mobile phone. Check your social media accounts for any negativity. Be aware and watchful, be cautious and never ignore negativity. Avoid negative feelings by constantly reminding yourself of the lessons you learned from your mistakes. Encourage yourself that you have overcome negativity. Remember, we can only defeat negativity if we start by removing it from our lives. We can only overcome negativity with positivity! Never forget about what you learned from dealing with negativity. Practice positivity and let us see what you can achieve with positivity!
How does positivity changes brain functions?
Positive moods can strengthen the brain’s learning and memory and the hippocampus, which is a key part of decision-making that is involved in almost every aspect of our lives, including ours and those around us. That is the reason positivity has been found to stimulate the growth of certain neurotransmitters, such as dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, and glutamate. Brain scans have shown the effects of positivity improve performance across a number of different abilities that demand mental effort, and affect the levels of grey matter, particularly in regions that deal with reasoning, judgment, problem-solving, planning, and creativity’s ability and perception.
Positive Thinking
Positive thinking is associated with happiness, joy, peace of mind, and satisfaction in life and in people of all social groups. Research shows positivity has a significant relationship with reduced depression, anxiety, stress, depression, and sadness, among other things. People who believe strongly that they are experiencing positivity generally feel happier than those who don’t. Those who tend to live and work within themselves rather than those who believe that only the outside world influences their lives do not report fewer stressful events. In fact, when those in the latter group do manage to leave what they consider to be negativity behind, they find more happiness, optimism, joy, and satisfaction than those who rely heavily on external factors like social media. Experts claim to have found that positivity has a significant impact on brain activity.
Positive Thought Processing
Positive thought processing includes the processing of information and emotions that are associated with positivity. Studies show there are three areas of the brain that associate positivity with better thinking, feeling, and performance on various types of tasks, including reasoning and thinking social competence, and verbal skills. Researchers have found that positivity improves task-switching performance in people, as well as reduces response time for complex problem solving and reducing conflict avoidance (Fernandez, 2008). Positive thinking has been shown to be related to higher levels of dopamine in the prefrontal cortex, which plays a role in controlling emotions.
