"Just look at it more positively!" "Flip that switch and see the good sides of life." "Why do you make it so difficult for yourself?" "Can't you see that the glass is half full instead of half empty?"
Well, the power of positive thinking... How many books have been written about that already?[1] And even the various forms of cognitive behavioral therapy, one of the most commonly used therapeutic approaches at the moment, work by converting your negative thoughts into positive ones. And indeed, it works—temporarily.[2]
During the conversations I currently have regularly with Bram, my fifteen-year-old grandson, about whom I have written before,[3] this topic keeps coming up. "Grandma, why do I keep having these negative thoughts about everything and anything? I now realize that it doesn't work and that it only makes me even more unhappy. And I actually want to change them, but I just can't."
No, simply trying won't get you there either. 'Simply' is the word of personality. 'That's just how I am.' 'That just always happens.' 'You just need to do it.' If you simply try to change your thinking—what are you doing it with? With your thinking! And that just doesn't work. You can't change a problem with the same tools that created it. More is needed, otherwise you'll keep going around in circles. To truly change something, two things are necessary. The first is distance, so you can see clearly where the knot is. And the second is insight into how that knot came to be.
"And I actually want to change them." Actually, that's the word of the heart. Deep in your heart, in your own self, you really want to learn to think differently and therefore approach life differently, but how? As I said: by doing two things: taking distance and gaining insight. What does that look like in practice?
DISTANCE = SHIFTING YOUR ATTENTION TO YOUR HEART
Taking distance is something you can do right now. It means: shift from your thinking to your heart. Make space, experience the involved, loving, and non-judgmental distance through which your heart perceives and experiences reality. In other words: shift your attention from your thinking to who you are deep inside. You can do this very simply by focusing on your body and your breath. Just do it. And you will notice: exactly at the moment when you give all your attention to your body and feel it move to the rhythm of your breath, you are out of your thinking and into your heart. The heart, which sees and experiences reality ('ohh, I'm breathing!'), instead of thinking negatively or positively about reality ('I'm breathing well', 'I'm breathing incorrectly').
Then it's about cultivating the art of shifting awareness. You do this by repeating it over and over again until it becomes second nature. I advised Bram to simply practice for five minutes twice a day, whether he feels like it or not. And to make it easier, he linked it to brushing his teeth, something he does twice a day, whether he feels like it or not. So, right before or after brushing his teeth, he lies on his bed or sits somewhere quietly and practices for five minutes (setting the alarm on his phone) shifting his attention from his thinking to his body and his breath, and thus to his heart.[4]
INSIGHT = YOU'LL ONLY SEE IT WHEN YOU GET IT
Insight deepens over time. Insight begins with understanding that negative thinking, seen through the lens of evolution, is simply very common for our personality. After all, a human wants to survive. And survival is achieved by being alert to danger.
In the Stone Age, that danger could consist of an encounter with a wild animal, with someone from a hostile tribe, or from eating a poisonous mushroom if you weren't paying attention. Danger— you had to be constantly alert to it. And, evolutionarily speaking, our oldest brains are still in that stage. That's why our personality is always habitually focused on danger. The fact that it does so is not negative, it just is.
So, it's important to realize that our personality can't help but see the negative (read: danger) in something first, and it can't change this on its own. It needs the heart to see reality clearly and without judgment.
YOU DON'T NEED TO FLIP THE SWITCH—IT HAPPENS AUTOMATICALLY
Suppose you start practicing shifting attention and support it by deepening your insight into reality. Then you no longer need to convert your so-called negative thinking into positive thinking. Because you increasingly realize that you don't need that idea of negative or positive thinking at all! You become more and more capable of seeing reality as it is, without placing judgment on it. You see what is, purely and clearly. And reality is always kinder than our thoughts about it.[5] Now that you no longer look through the lens of your habitual thinking, you see clearly, because you see directly with your heart.
“This is my secret, and it's very simple:
"Only with the heart you can see clearly." [6]
You can trust that practice makes perfect. Gradually, you'll notice that you automatically transform the old "I want to think positively, but I can't" into "I want to see reality, so I look with my heart." And thus, "the switch" is found after all. 😉
[1] It all started with Norman Peale, who wrote the book "The Power of Positive Thinking" in 1952, and is considered the founder of the concept of 'positive thinking'.
[2] See Eva Wolf, The Flower (2022), ch. 5.13.
[3] See blog 6, Life and death.
[4] See My Recipe: 2 x 5 and d.d.d.h., on www.evawolf.nl, listening material / guided meditations No.1, or on YouTube 'debloemcommity'. Also see The Flower, 10.2, 10.5.
[5] This is a quote from Byron Katie (thework.com).
[6] This is what the Little Prince says in the book with the same name by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.