Do you spend precious brainpower conjuring up all kinds of negative scenarios that COULD happen to you, but mostly never do? Are you able to take a small piece of disappointing information or feedback and through your own thinking, turn that into a major scenario of doom and gloom? Do you find yourself practicing how you will respond to negative information, people or situations, even though they will never likely occur that way?
Stop it. You're a grown professional. And you know better.
All that time, all that energy, all of your smarts and creativity could be used instead to anticipate and create the positive in your life --and in the process, create the kind of positive experience that leads to vitality and longer life.
So, setting aside that we do have things (and people) that happen TO us that are negative, if you're a smart and creative person, and you find yourself having a lot of pity parties for yourself, getting down in the dumps on a daily basis, or generally having a negative experience when it comes to your job or your personal life...there's a good chance YOU really are the source of most of your trouble.
Personally, I will often catch myself rehearsing what would be potentially negative interactions with people--interactions that will never occur that way. Except that the rehearsing has the EXACT SAME impact as if I experienced them in reality: my adrenaline is up, I am upset or angry, my view of the person, myself and the situation has shifted --and it's all of my own creation.
I can do this almost anytime I have a free moment to think: when I'm driving, in-between projects, while I'm taking a shower, etc.
The result, if this is unchecked, can be a depressing afternoon, or a really poor start to the day, or, if I'm really creative...a depressing week or month!
Do you know people who can think this way too. Maybe...you?
What can we do about this if we're prone to such dark use of our creative powers?
A couple of strategies (to be used together) to help us out:
(1) Shift from being a worrier to being a dreamer.
In other words, always have positive, aspirational stuff you can be thinking about and rehearsing for the future. Get in the active habit of thinking about THAT stuff, instead of going into your usual pattern of worrying about and rehearsing the negative.
Our minds know no neutral. So if you tend to dwell on the potential negative (worry), you need to have your goals and your dreams at the ready so you can, instead, imagine how those will be, what they will be like for you and how they will unfold in your life. (It's the same process you use to worry, so don't act like you don't know how to think this way...you just aren't used to writing feel good movies as you are made-for-tv disaster movies for you life).
The key to this strategy is actually HAVING dreams, having goals for yourself. If you don't...this must be your first priority. What does your best life look/sound/feel like?
(2) Identify your most "creative" times, and and place cues in your environment to trigger your thinking toward the positive.
If you know you can really start imagining disaster when you have a free moment at your computer, put up some visual cues that remind you to focus on your dreams. If the shower is a creative place for you--go into the shower with something specific and positive to think / dream about. (not as crazy as it sounds)
They key here is to remove your imagination from auto-pilot...especially if it has a tendency to drift toward the negative. For example, if you have your three compelling dreams written on a sticky note on your car dashboard, it will be harder to drift into negative rehearsal (for very long) while you're driving.
Both of these strategies, taken together, can get you back on the road to creating the work and life you want, and to building a better you.
One final appeal for you to seriously shift your thinking I will offer in the way of an explanation: Why are we often caught worrying? I think it's due to mental laziness. We really do have our thinking on auto-pilot and we haven't bothered to harness our tremendous brain power for use in making our goals and dreams for ourselves and this world a reality. It's time to take charge of your thinking!
A long time ago, Napoleon Hill wrote that "whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve." The first step has been and always will be...creating in our minds what we want to be and see in the world. I encourage you to take this step daily.
BOTTOM LINE: If you find yourself worrying a lot, YOU are the likely source of your experience through your own negative mental rehearsal. Stop using your imagination to think negatively and instead focus on your goals and your dreams, imagining them into reality every day.
BE more,
Tom
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POWER QUESTIONS:
1. Where (or when) do I tend to get myself into a funk because of my thinking?
2. What goals or dreams for my life do I have that I could be focusing my imagination on all the time?
3. What do I tend to worry about most (that never happens)? What could I focus on instead?
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