Do you have a brain that just never seems to switch off? I do. Most of the time this is useful. After all, the more thoughts and ideas I have, the more chance I have of having mental breakthroughs in both my personal and professional life. Like the day I realised that Mum’s chicken madras was a ticket aboard the poop satisfaction train. Excuse me whilst I go curry.
Having an active mind helps me research quicker, write essays faster and solve problems more efficiently. I get some of my best ideas when I am out on a walk or a jog, or in the shower – nothing like comforting steam for warming up the ole’ brain cells (or perhaps I think more clearly when I’m naked – yes that’s it). An active mind is a productive mind. Most of the time.
There are so many fleeting thoughts that pass through my mind each day. Some are important. Frivolous. Inappropriate. Humorous. A small proportion are negative. It is the latter that I monitor to remain in my default state of cheerfulness.
Negative thoughts are inevitable – if we didn’t have them we wouldn’t be human. They are useful in that they help us gain knowledge about situations and inspire us to make necessary changes to our behaviour and perspectives.
Example.
I have negative thoughts when I see advertisements of animal cruelty. I become momentarily pessimistic, losing faith in humanity for even considering to support puppy farming or buy caged eggs. However these negative thoughts and my desire to shake of my disempowering state of pessimism inspires me to sign petitions and make donations that will eventually contribute to the demise of such inhumane practices. This uncomfortable state of mind serves a productive purpose.
The trick is not to dwell. If you have a negative thought, either allow it to inspire positive change or accept that there is nothing you can do to change it, so disassociate yourself with the situation and transfer your attention to something more inspiring. If I catch myself wallowing in negativity, I acknowledge the thought, question it’s accurateness, assess whether I can do anything to change it and take action accordingly.
Example.
Thought (in year 11 right before I quit math); “I don’t get this maths assignment. It’s boring and tedious and time consuming! When am I ever going to need to find X anyway?”
Insert vision of me playing hide and seek with a large cartoon version of the letter ‘X’ in a park lined with tall, narrow trees where ‘X’, being a rather robust letter, finds it difficult to conceal himself. Being a fantasy and all, I take ages to find him, until the happy ending where I find him and we link arms and skip merrily into the sunset.
I snap back to reality, and after having a slight chuckle about my merry day dream, I’m back to feeling totally uninspired about solving the problem, because as fun as my little vision was, X is not real and is thus not available for whimsical games of hide and seek. Therefore I will never have to find him – back to square one.
I acknowledge the thought and assess it’s accuracy (self-talk really helps at this point);
“Rach, you’re totally on the money. You will never need to find X and have more important things to do than drawing cartesian planes”.
I then consider whether there is anything I can do in the moment to change the situation. In this scenario, there isn’t, as I’m completely stuck and won’t have maths again until the next day. I take action by planning to talk it through with my teacher at our next lesson and maybe even organise a tutoring session with my dad – ex math teachers represent. In the present, all I can do is close my book and do something more meaningful – like an evening stroll.
My math-induced pessimism manifested into the decision to take a pleasant evening walk. A blessing in disguise that I didn’t understand it. Otherwise I would have spent hours on the assignment that night and probably given myself a stiff back in the process. I sit intensely when I’m deep in concentration. I need to work on this.
Negativity is a state of mind that can be swapped for an optimistic approach. It’s not always easy to see the good – especially on those mornings when you sleep past your alarm and then you realise that you forgot to charge your phone and then you remember that you forgot to refill your ice trays so now your smoothie won’t be cold , and then as you walk outside the weather is grey and miserable.
Lets be objective. Your body thrived off of the extra sleep, you didn’t start the day distracted by Facebook notifications or text messages, you had an opportunity to be creative in the kitchen and find a smoothie alternative. As for the weather, what a great excuse to quickly put the slow cooker on before you leave the house (nothing says miserable weather like tender lamb chops, a soothing broth or a nourishing soup – and you slept in so you’re late anyways. What’s an extra few minutes of chopping veggies going to do?
Watch those thoughts, be gentle with yourself and welcome creativity and inspiration into that snazzy mind of yours. Nothing is good and nothing is bad. Most things are what they are, and require your judgement (either positive or negative) to be labelled.
I’d like to leave you with this thought,
How do YOU manage pessimism?