Negative Thinking

Being optimistic can help a person to improve his social life and motivates him of not giving up. With this, failures and setbacks are turned into comebacks and successes.

A person’s thoughts, emotions and behaviors intervene with each other. Each one of this can make possible changes with the other. In this article, we will focus on the significance of our thoughts. How they contribute on helping or bothering us. It will also discuss the actions to be done with a person’s counterproductive thought habits. With the help from the pioneering works of two great psychologists Aaron T. Beck and Albert Ellis we will also discussed derived topics that may contribute to our knowledge on negative thinking.

Factors that provide dramatic evidences for negative thinking:

Some of these factors are the voodoo deaths, faith cures, the placebo effect and hypnosis. Voodoo deaths are believed to originate from great anxiety and hopeless feeling in the cursed person. This is usually caused by a person with overwhelming thought and belief that certain death awaits. Faith cures at some religious regions or charismatic healers are believed to be acquired from serenity, acceptance, confidence and vigor. With this belief, human’s body system reduces helplessness, which makes the person to pay less attention on the real symptoms or problems of the cure. It also helps a person to lessen the seeking of sympathy and attention from other people during sickness. Probably, faith cures are effective in reducing the anxiety and experience of pain. These stated changes and beneficial effects may help relieve and overcome emotional problems as well as the disease processes. Researchers have been studying the placebo effect for decades. It could be described as believing someone gave you an effective cure improves emotional or physical problems. Breakthrough studies showed the potential physiological effects of dummy pills--they tended to speed up pulse rate, increase blood pressure, and improve reaction speeds, for example, when participants were told they had taken a stimulant, and had the opposite physiological effects when participants were told they had taken a sleep-producing drug. The placebo effect is part of the human potential to react positively to a healer. You can reduce a patient's distress by doing something, which might not be medically effective. It's this powerful placebo effect, coupled with the fact that many medical conditions involve a natural course of better and worse periods (arthritis and multiple sclerosis are examples of diseases with flair-ups and lulls), that can make it difficult to know if a health upswing should be credited to a drug effect.

Placebo treatments have been reported to help patients with a wide range of conditions, including pain, asthma, and high blood pressure. The quality of evidence supporting these findings has not been thoroughly evaluated. The majority of reports on placebo have estimated the effect of the placebo as the difference from the baseline in the condition of patients in the placebo group of a randomized trial after treatment, and the effects cannot be distinguished from the natural cause of the disease and other factors. Spontaneous remission and the placebo effect, which are known as nonspecific effects, are significant phenomena that have great impact on consumers and health-care professionals. Recovery from illness, whether it follows self-medication, legitimate treatment, or avant-garde therapies, may lead one to conclude that the treatment received was the cause of the return to good health. Placebo responses can occur in patients with real disorders; the subjective symptoms can resolve while the objective ones remain. Belief in the treatment only appears to explain a portion of the placebo effect. It appears that belief, operant conditioning, and suggestibility all play important roles. In an interesting experiment, a man experienced pain and exhibited marked depression of a specific part of his heartbeat while being monitored by an electrocardiogram (ECG) machine during a treadmill diagnostic test. This occurred at a treadmill setting of 44. For a second test, when the treadmill number was miscounted so that the patient exercised less, he exhibited the same pain and ECG depression as at the setting of 44. This dramatically demonstrates the power of suggestion. Placebos occasionally cause unpleasant side effects: heart palpitations, insomnia, weakness, nervousness, drowsiness, dizziness, dry mouth, headache, nausea, vomiting, rashes, hives, swelling of the lips, constipation, diarrhea, etc. When the patients stop taking the placebo, the side effects disappear.

Hypnosis or Hypnotherapy is also a major contributor to person’s power of thinking. It is a state that resembles sleep but is induced by a person whose suggestions are readily accepted by the subject. However, experts are quick to point out that it's more like daydreaming than sleep. When hypnotized, you're always alert but you tune out the stimuli around you. It's basically like when you're reading a great book -- you simply can't think about anything other than the plot. Your attention is totally focused until you reach some altered state of consciousness. To bring you into this state, a hypnotist will have to make you focus on his voice or an object. What happens next is that your conscious mind becomes less active in the thinking process, because you are so relaxed. This lets your subconscious mind step up to the plate. While you're hypnotized, you're more susceptible to suggestions relating to how you feel, behave and think. As the hypnotist talks to you, your subconscious mind more readily accepts these suggestions. Basically, it's as if the hypnotist gets to speak directly to the decision-maker instead of the lowly clerk. It seems that it never ceases to amaze people the wide range of symptoms and circumstances that can successfully be dealt with using hypnosis and hypnotherapy. However, before hypnosis and/or hypnotherapy can be applied successfully, there are a number of conditions that must be met for this to take place. The therapeutic alliance is paramount to the success of any application of hypnosis, where trust and rapport should be established before any hypnosis takes place. Suggestion therapy is also useful for habit control. Whilst it is necessary for the subconscious to maintain certain habits, such as getting washed and dressed in the morning, it also holds on to all the other habits we have learnt throughout our life, including the unwanted ones. Example of these include smoking, and nail biting, and it is hoped that by the time the suggestion has worn off, a new habit will have been formed, and replaced the old habit of say, smoking. Additionally, suggestion therapy can be useful in improving performance, including sports, exam nerves or driving test worries to name a few, by instilling confidence within the individual.

How To Deal With Negative Thinking People

No one could ever like a negative person. Complaints that we often hear or listen from a pessimistic person or someone who has a doom and gloom attitude can able to drain your energy, provoke your patience’s limit, and impingement your mental and physical health.
If you come to deal consistently with a negative person, you need to do some ways to help him or her change his or her character. This would definitely be very difficult and because you can be able to see effects and percussions of their comments and actions with their career and how it interferes with their interpersonal relationships as well. A negative person in our life can be very exhausting and influential in our environment. Taking actions to help change their character is a right thing to do. Otherwise, if no actions are taken, you will soon find yourself acquired the negative mentality, which is rubbing off on you in several ways making you a cynical and pessimistic person, too.

People with negativity constantly find problems in every situation that they encounter. They are never happy and focus themselves repeatedly on dilemmas and downfalls without enabling to find solutions. They worry and bothered a lot. And usually getting distressed about things that they don’t have control of. They abruptly blame others over certain matters, and classify themselves as victims. They have this certain belief that the world or everyone around them hates or is against them. One of the characteristics of negative people is that they don’t see themselves as being negative. If you currently deal with these people, accept it. As a matter of fact, if you attract your attention to them, they might think you’re after them. Because of this characteristic, there’s a huge possibility that the problem is originating intensely within them. And that they become paranoid, delusional or clinically depressed. With these results, these people might in need of professional or expert help.

As an individual, one can't always change other people’s characteristics. But controlling and assessing your responses to their comments and actions will greatly contribute to help them become aware of it. Seeing how you respond or react could be enough to allow themselves prompt to change and refrain from negativity.

However, it’s still a person’s choice if he or she will become a positive or negative respondent or thinker.

The Power of Negative Thinking

Due to some reasons, it’s easier for most people to think in a negative way rather than in a positive manner. Mainly because, thinking in a positive manner requires some efforts on absolute thoughts while thinking in a negative way is very effortless and uncomplicated. Negative thoughts easily interfere with a person’s mind unwontedly, which are tremendously influenced by some factors such as education and environment. In able to understand how positive thinking works and using it efficiently, one needs to be aware on the power of negative thinking. Being aware is very important.

A person who grew up in an environment with a happy and positive atmosphere wherein success, self-improvement, moral values, and right conducts are significant and practiced, is tend to think positively much easier. Whereas, a person who had been brought up in a poor and difficult atmosphere is developed into a negative thinker who looks forward on expecting difficulties and failures.

At early age, people are usually influenced by external factors that shape their minds as they mature. They picture everything in their mind through their prominent experiences. These thoughts, be it positive or negative, will serve as mirror in their lives and circumstances. If you believe that you are going to fail, you will unconsciously sabotage every opportunity to succeed. If you are afraid of meeting new people or having close relationships, you will do everything to avoid people and relationships, and then complain that you are lonely and nobody loves you.

Do you often think about difficulties, failure and disasters? Do you keep thinking about the negative news you have seen on the TV or read in the newspapers?

Do you see yourself stuck and unable to improve your life or your health? Do you frequently think that you do not deserve happiness or money, or that it is too difficult to get them? If you do, then you will close your mind, see no opportunities, and behave and react in such ways, as to repel people and opportunities. You let the power of negative thinking rule your life. The mind does not usually judge or examine thoughts and opinions before accepting them. If what it hears, sees and reads is always negative, it accepts this as the standard way of thinking and behavior.

The media constantly bombards the mind with a lot of information about disasters, catastrophes, wars and other negative happenings. This information sinks into the subconscious mind, and let the power of negative thinking grow. By occupying the mind with negative thoughts and expectations one radiate negative energy into the surrounding world, thus creating and recreating more negativity, failures and disasters.

The mind can be directed towards positive thinking or negative thinking. The power of thoughts is a neutral power. The way one thinks determines whether the results are positive and beneficial or negative and harmful. It is the same of energy acting in different ways. Persistent inner work can change habits of thoughts. You must be willing to put energy and time to avoid negative thinking and pursue positive thinking, in order to change your mental attitude. Every time you catch yourself thinking a negative thought, change it into a positive one.If you catch yourself visualizing failure, switch to visualizing success.If you hear yourself repeating negative words, switch to positive ones.If you hear yourself saying, "I cannot", say to yourself, "I can".Do you repeat useless and unnecessary negative words and phrases in your mind? Change them to positive ones.

Open your mind to positive attitude, happenings and events. Expect them and think about them, and soon you life will change for the better.

Decide that from today, from this very moment, you are leaving negative thinking behind, and starting on the way towards positive thinking and behavior. It is never too late. Soon your life will turn into a fascinating, wonderful journey.

How To Avoid Negative Thinking

The first step to optimism is to identify the thoughts and beliefs running through your mind after something unpleasant happen. How did you interpret the event? Write out all of your beliefs and read them over. Then separate your feelings from your beliefs, because you won't be challenging your feelings; what you feel is what you feel. Next, write down all your feelings about the event and how you responded. Do this for a few unpleasant situations, such as an argument with your partner, a work conflict, and getting a parking ticket. You might begin to see a pattern in how you interpret and react to events, and this will help you to become aware of and to change patterns. If you do have pessimistic thoughts, it can help just to be aware that you think that way. Next time your thoughts jump to something like "I never get my way," "Nothing ever gets any better," or "People are always mean to me," try to notice that a pessimistic way of thinking is present for you. The next step is to distract yourself from your pessimistic beliefs or dispute them. Disputing pessimistic beliefs will bring deeper, longer lasting results than distracting will, but distraction can also be effective, and sometimes easier. Disputing pessimistic beliefs involves replacing them with alternative, kinder, and more realistic explanations. For example, if you have an argument with your partner, you might immediately think: "S/he never understands me! I'm always the one who ends up apologizing. This isn't working out; we should split up." In the heat of an argument, it's hard to think rationally. But if you step back and think about the situation more realistically, you might find that your thoughts become more positive, and you may even be able to work things out faster. For instance, you might tell yourself, "We just had an argument, and while s/he wasn't very understanding, neither was I. S/he's understood me lots of other times, and will probably understand me again once we've both cooled off. We've always been able to work through our problems before. I know we can again." Maintaining a hopeful, positive, yet real perspective in the face of adversity can be a real challenge - one many are facing right now in the world - but it is essential to living peacefully and happily. Just as it is important to recognize what is unjust and unfair in our lives and the world, it is equally important to see the beauty, love, generosity, and goodness as well. Being gentle and loving with ourselves when we make mistakes, or when bad things happen is key to being hopeful and optimistic. And even if you're not sure it's possible, you can do it!

First, reflect on the feelings you had before you decided to give up. You basically told yourself that the healthy habits you learned before your vacation were all for nothing and that you have to start over. Ask yourself if these feelings are reasonable. Are you really back to ground zero? Of course not. You accepted change and developed a new way of living; these skills are yours forever. The vacation might even have done you some good: everyone needs a break sometimes. Otherwise, you might have felt deprived and not really enjoyed yourself. It's time now to tell yourself: "It felt good eating whatever I wanted and taking a break from exercising; I had a great time. But now I'm going to focus back on the low fat, active lifestyle I was enjoying before vacation. There is no reason to beat myself up; I'll just take it one day at a time." Now you can rethink your previous decision and take action that will move you forward towards more positive change.

As you begin to understand your reasons for negative self-talk, you'll find yourself recognizing it more and more quickly after it occurs. Eventually, as you practice, you'll be able to recognize and stop negative self-talk before it interferes with your decisions.

It is very important to practice positive thinking and to remind yourself that you're a worthwhile person whatever you do. Try to consistently acknowledge that you are making positive changes to improve your health. You should be proud of yourself. Visualize yourself as capable, happy, and confident. These positive feelings will help the process of change.

Every day, we must contend with annoying little problems that we cannot prevent or control: traffic jams, broken parking meters and broken shoe laces to mention only a few. The way we cope with these problems influences how we deal with the bigger problems in life and how we manage our relationships with friends and co-workers.

Positive thinkers tend to cope well with small and large problems while negative thinkers let little problems adversely effect how they handle the more important aspects of their lives.
Remember, there are bound to be times when you're feeling frustrated or depressed. Positive thinkers know that these feelings are valid, and they don't try to ignore them. Positive thinkers acknowledge and try to understand them, but they don't blame themselves for the conditions that lead to these feelings. Good luck, stay positive, and enjoy all the wonderful benefits of a healthy lifestyle!

Written By: Jingky Lascuna