"Watch your thoughts, they become words.
Watch your words, they become actions.
Watch your actions, they become habits.
Watch your habits, they become your character.
Watch your character, it becomes your destiny."
-Lao Tzu
We all have days where we see the glass as half empty (and leaking). But life is tough if you're negative all the time.
Here are some things you can do to help overcome your negative thoughts:
- Yoga. Meditating or doing yoga brings you into the present moment instead of what's happening in your life.
- Smile. When you pass by a mirror, make a point to smile. Seeing yourself smiling will improve your mood.
- Surround yourself with positive people. When you're stuck in a negative spiral, talking to other people can put things into perspective.
- Change the way you think about things. For example:
- "But I've never done this before." vs. "I have an opportunity to learn something new."
- "This is way too complicated." vs. "I'm going to break this down into simple little steps."
- "I don't have the resources." vs. "Necessity is the mother of invention."
- "I don't have enough time." vs. "Let me re-evaluate my priorities and nix some of the stuff I don't need to be doing."
- "There's no way it will work." vs. "I'm going to find a way to make it work. Failure is NOT an option."
- "This is too big of a change." vs. "This is an adventure."
- "No one talks to me." vs. "I'm going to make an effort to start some conversations and show interest in other people."
- "I'm not getting any better at this." vs. "I'm going to give this another chance because I'm smart enough to get better at it eventually."
- Don't play the victim. You are the architect of your life - take responsibility for it!
- Help someone else. One of the best ways to snap out of your sorry self is to do something nice for somebody else.
- Don't dwell on your mistakes. Everybody screws up, nobody's perfect, and the most important thing about a screw-up is the repair.
