As I write this, it is raining.
I love rainy days. On a rainy day, there are only three things I ever want to do: sleep, watch movies, and listen to sad songs.
Now I’m sure most people would agree with the first two, and you might even agree with me on the third one if you too, are more naturally inclined to like things that are sad and beautiful.
See, I’m not really a sunny person. I doubt anyone in my real life would refer to me as having a sunny or bubbly personality and I am ok with that. I’ve known this fact about myself for quite some time now. I mean, come on, as a child my favorite movie was Titanic (still is) a film about a sinking ship upon which a lot of people died. There was a time I was drawn to things (sometimes people) that were a bit dramatic and dark.
Naturally, I’ve been depressed a time or two in my life. I don’t know of many people over 25 who haven’t had a season of depression. It is very common in the world we live in whether we care to admit it or not. There are so many stressors in our lives nowadays: work, relationships, finances, health, children, technology (which is becoming a huge stressor for this generation due to social media), and the list goes on.
It can be all too easy to focus on the stress and negative things going on and let them outweigh the positive. As I’ve already stated I’m more of a glass-half-empty kind of girl so I tend to turn my attention to the things going wrong in my life over the things going right. I could blame my experiences with anxiety, but anxiety stems from thought patterns. Which means I have to face the truth about myself:
I think terribly most of the time.
I am a worrier, which is contrary to what most people think who see my calm demeanor and think I am never unnerved about anything. I am good at thinking of all the things that could go wrong in a given scenario, which I’ve learned is called catastrophizing in psychology-speak.
Basically I can turn the best of circumstances into a TOTAL catastrophe in my mind. Before anything has even happened. Which of course, creates a tailspin of anxious thoughts about what happens AFTER the catastrophe happens.
This is the life of a worrier.
This is not the life of a newly-turned-30, revamped, living-my-best-life boss chick. The life I am now set on living.
So I have taken it upon myself to find ways to focus on the positives in my life by changing how I think.
This is a big statement for me to make. This is a hard statement for me to make because it relies solely on my power to control my thoughts.
As a matter of fact, I have declared this month my No Complaining, No Gossiping, No Judging 30 Day Challenge Month*.
Here are my 30 Day Challenge Commitments:
I will not complain. Not about how hot or cold I am. Nor how hungry. (My usual complaint.) Plus, I will not mention how I wish the weekend was longer and that I had taken Monday off. Acceptable responses are: I am hungry but I will eat later OR I can handle this.
I will not gossip. Lord knows, there are some gossipers in my workplace. If they try to start, I will not indulge. Acceptable responses are: No comment OR That is none of my business.
I will not judge. Not only others but myself. I will forgive others/myself for past mistakes and I will not forecast catastrophes upon my life. Acceptable thoughts: It is what it is. OR I can handle this.
These are the commitments I am going to hold myself to for the next 30 days in hopes of developing a brighter, more positive outlook on life.
This should be a breeze, right? See, I’m already thinking positive…
How do you think?
Do you need to start implementing more positive thinking strategies in your life? We can do it together!
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*This challenge was inspired by and can be found in The Big Book of 30 Day Challenges by Rosanna Casper.
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