Change Per Post

This is the first of a seven-part series on the Secrets of Wellbeing. The reason I’m launching into this series is because I’m excited about what is happening in the field of psychology and how new research supports ancient teachings.

A new direction called Positive Psychology has started to take centre stage. Instead of looking at problems and how to fix them, Positive Psychology investigates what allows us to experience life at its best. In this series I’ll discuss what we can learn from this research.

What is happiness?

This question is important for each of us because our view of happiness determines how we live our life.

As Martin Seligman - the founder of Positive Psychology - points out, there are three main ways how people view happiness. Read on to find out which one of these three ways describes the way you see happiness.

The Pleasant Life or the ‘life of enjoyment’:

In this way of life we seek out pleasures and try to avoid pain. The great thing about this way of life is that we truly taste and enjoy the special moments. Like starting a powder run on a snowboard or sharing a laugh with your partner.

But there are some problems with this view of happiness. One is that pain is inevitable in life: relationships end, health can be precarious, and death is certain. This means that if we expect to gain happiness only from pleasure, we are ill equipped to deal with suffering.

The other problem is that the sum of our actual experiences, and how we judge those experiences in retrospect can be radically different. Seligman gives the following example:

When asked about a vacation - so he explains - you might answer, “It was great!”, even though the flow of experiences at the time may have been a series of unpleasant moments, such as sunburn, mosquito bites, upset stomach, scary situations, and a fear of blowing your budget.

I think the same goes for pleasant experiences. I don’t know how it is for you, but after about a week of lying about on a tropical beach I tend to get restless. I miss being creative and productive. So, even though there may be a constant flow of pleasant moments, my overall experience is that of feeling unfulfilled…

(Continue reading this post via Goodlife Zen)

…..fairness, justice, and freedom are more than words, they are perspectives.

If the line above sounds familiar, it’s primarily because it’s a line from the movie, V for Vendetta. (I love that movie, and think its in a class of its own) Let me first say, that the line is more politically inclined.

So what does that have to do with the Law of Attraction? Well, in an odd way of looking, quite a bit really. And hopefully once you’re done with this, I would have conveyed that message that isn’t said in the countless millions of posts that has talked on the ominous Law of Attration.

We’ll start at the beginning….my beginning

For a while now, I’ve been listening Michael Losiers – Law of Attraction audio book. My personal feeling in regard to Losier is one – the guy is sheer Genius.

Oh no wait, I meant “Marketing Genius”. And it ends there.

He took a topic, broke it down into simple lay man English, added a book and Bam, he’s added a bestseller to his credit. I’m still wondering why I didn’t think of it first.

But it was one portion of his audio that clicked some of the pieces for me – his “What do you want” method. Losier’s approach is first determine what you don’t want, move away from it and ask yourself “What do you want” (If you’re wondering, I can hear the voice in my head as I type this)

Now, this was in fact the message was said on The Secret as well, only not very clear. In fact, it was so befuddled, the message was either intentionally obscured or somehow lost.

And that message is – Attraction is a perspective.

(Continue reading this post via Spiritual Drifts from the River of Karma )

Men at work, building under construction, infrastructure cannot be used, that’s what the signboard is trying to tell us.

Today, I’d like to talk about disappointments with ourselves.

Does this statement sounds familiar? “I should not do that”, “I have got that experience before, why didn’t I learn”, “why am I so stupid?”, “every thing’s messed up now”, “I should have said no”. It’s what normally happens when we have disappointments.

You made a mistake, you supposed to learn from it, you made promise to yourself not to do it again, but again you do it again!!! How can’t you say that you’re stupid?

You perform your best, putting all your heart, energy, and even money to something, yet things result in ridicule and mockery!!! How can’t you say that you’re lousy?

Facing disappointments, it’s vulnerable for us to let go our dream, first we are no longer confident that we can achieve the goal and second, we’re afraid of further disappointments. Do not ever let go of dream because of disappointments. Possible with other reasons and enough assessment, but never with disappointments.

Facing disappointments, instead of declaring a war against yourself, rebuking and insult yourself for the mistakes you made, let’s try to visualize the dream under-construction signboard when you’re faced with disappointments. For me, it’s “Leader under construction”, for you, try “[your dream] under construction”…

(Continue reading this post via Reason-4-Smile)

 What exactly is Positive psychology?

Positive Psychology is a fairly new field that has all ready gained recognized from the American Psychological Association. Many stress-control experts are having great success with its principles. In an upturned nutshell, Positive Psychology focuses on finding and promoting the conditions and factors that make people’s lives better. Instead of focusing their energies on things that cause unhappiness, researchers in the Positive Psychology field center their research around the ingredients of a good life. Sound good? Personally, I think it sounds great!

I’ve always been the sort of person who tries to focus on the positive. When my husband and I were first married, we moved from a very large apartment to a much, much smaller one. When writing letters home, or talking about the move, I always referred to the move as being one, “to a cozier apartment.” I came to love that cozy apartment. In fact, it and its 4 rooms are one of my favorite homes ever. The outlook, I’m sure, had a lot to do with moving from an apartment to one that could fit into it’s living room….and thinking that it was a great thing. I also called upon my inner Mary Poppins a few years back when we moved from a large beach house on Pensacola Beach to a small house in Earlington, Kentucky. (Granted I had to call loudly for her, she had locked herself in a closet.) After a few days of what we might as well call shell-shock, I started looking forward to Kentucky’s gorgeous autumns and springs. I even started looking forward to the Kentucky winters that I’d grown up with. I had, honestly, missed beautiful snow and (as it turned out) ran outside to greet it on the first day it snowed. In my pink housecoat, white houseshoes, and morning coffee I’m sure I looked like a complete idiot. But I was a happy idiot!…

(Continue reading this post via Self Help Daily)

“A positive mental attitude is the starting point of all riches, whether they be riches of a material nature or intangible riches.”
- Napoleon Hill

Okay, so there’s no myth that I am a positive person, or at least striving to be one. However, I am aware that I’m not positive all the time. I am continuously working to become conscientious of my choices, thoughts and reactions. I frequently get asked about positive thinking, and I wanted to first clear up some points of confusion.

Positive people are not living like Pollyanna in some dream world with no hold on reality. Positive people may have an attitude like Pollyanna, but they are not necessarily unrealistic. Positive person are very capable of understanding the reality of a cynic. They just change their mindset to see the reality from a different perspective.

With so many myths about positive mental attitude (PMA), it’s important to separate the truth from the fiction. Let’s explore some of these myths and dive into the truths behind them.

Myth #1: Negative thinking is more realistic.

Have you ever heard a negative person say that they aren’t negative; they’re just being ‘realistic’? This myth keeps people locked in a negative reality of their own creation.

A person’s thoughts, whether positive or negative, do have an effect on their environment. If you think negatively, your mind will automatically seek out confirmation that the world is a terrible place. Seeing is believing, and your mind reinforces your belief that reality is negative. See how it’s a downward spiral of negativity? If you expect negative results, you are less likely to take risks and try new things. Negative thinking masks your impressions in fear.

Positive thinking works the same way. With a positive mental attitude, you’ll seek out positive choices and expect positive results. This helps you move past fear and try things that others may believe “can’t be done”. This typically end in positive results.

A person’s thinking helps determine their reality. Negative thinking is realistic for the negative thinker, but only because their thoughts make it true. Ironically, the positive thinking also sees reality, just in a different light. Both types of people see their own reality, and both consider it the reality…

(Continue reading this post via Think Simple Now)

The subject of today’s post is intention. Let’s start with some definitions.This first definition is from www.dictionary.net

A stretching or bending of the mind toward an object; closeness of application; fixedness of attention; earnestness.

The second one comes from www.margaretmccraw.com/glossary.html

Blending strong desire with strong belief to create a deliberate outcome.

John Locke, the British philosopher said:

Intention is when the mind, with great earnestness, and of choice, fixes its view on any idea.

Use Intention to influence the world

I’d like to suggest that setting an intention is a useful tool we can all use to help ourselves get more of what we want. There are lots of ways in which we can use intention but first of all we have to be clear about what we want - we need to be specific about the outcome we want to create. I have written on the blog here before about being clear and specific about our goals and objectives in life. It is equally important to be clear and specific about much shorter term things too. And I’d like to focus on the short-term today…

(Continue reading this post via The Happy and Prosperous Blog)

If you have recently blogged about a topic that fits this theme, learn more about submitting your post by clicking here.

If your post meets the terms and conditions, it will be featured here along with a link back to your original post!

If you would like to suggest a new category for your posts, do so by clicking here.