Personal Development Develop a Positive Attitude
Personal Development: Develop a Positive Attitude
Your attitude is the sum of all your thoughts and feelings towards any issue. Your attitudes are important because they affect two things about you:
- How you feel in any given situation,
- How you will respond to any given situation.
If you have positive attitudes, you will feel strong and act in an adaptive way. If you have negative attitudes, then you won't feel strong, and you will act in a maladaptive way.
Your attitudes are based upon your fundamental beliefs about who you are, what you are capable of, your limitations, your place in society and the world.
Your attitudes act as a self-fulfilling prophecy
Your attitude acts as a self-fulfilling prophecy: meaning, if you think you can win, you raise your chances of winning. And if you think you can't win, you are almost guaranteeing you won't win.
So, if you cannot see yourself as being successful in your imagination, then you are severely hampering your chances of realising your success.
If you think about what you have to do next to be more successful, then over time you will tend to become successful.
But if you think all day about how unlucky you've been and how nobody will give you a chance, how unjust the world is, then your situation will have deteriorated.
"....there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so........Nothing is really good or bad in itself - it's all what a person thinks about it." Shakespeare [Hamlet act 2 scene 2]
Why does your mental attitude affects external results?
Your external results are affected by your actions. Your actions are controlled by your thoughts. Therefore, your external results are affected by your thoughts.
Of course, other people and outside circumstances can affect you too, but that does not change the fact that you are in your own life, every day exerting an influence for good or ill on your own results.
If your own influence on your own results is regressive, fearful, and negative, then that will have an accumulative negative effect.
But on the other hand, if your influence on your own results is progressive, fearless, and positive, then that positive attitude will have an accumulative positive effect.
Characteristics of Positive People
People with positive attitudes tend to think along the following lines:
- I am an intelligent person, who is capable of learning whatever I need to, in order to achieve my goals.
- Other people are not really better, or worse, than me. But they have different skill sets. Therefore, they are an asset, to me. They know things I don't and they can do things I cannot do. I will ally myself to other people and work in cooperative ways with them, to achieve shared goals that are in our mutual interest.
- The world is a place that is full of opportunity and risk. It is neither for me, nor against me. The world just IS.
- My job in life is to achieve my goals without violating the rights of others. And I will do that by forming alliances with like-minded people.
- The future is good.
- I am a good person who is willing to help others, in return for their help.
- I will set worthwhile goals, formulate plans and spend each day taking positive actions, in order to achieve my goals for the good of myself, my family, my community and the planet.
Characteristics of Negative People
On the other hand, people with negative attitudes tend to think along the opposite lines:
- I am not a very educated person. I am probably not capable of achieving my goals, since it is not what you know, but who you know, that matters.
- Other people are better than me. They represent a threat to me. They know things I don't and they can do things I cannot do. I cannot compete with others. How can I win when I am against such stiff competition for limited places?
- The world is a place that is full of dangers and risk. It feels like the world and luck are against me.
- The world is unfair and unjust. It is a mean and nasty place.
- My job is to get through the day without getting into too much trouble.
- The future is not looking good.
- I am a person in need, who needs lots of help.
- I will hope for the best.
How to become a more positive person
Read the two lists above and decide which one sounds more like your inner voice. Is it the positive or the negative one?
If it has elements of both, or if it is more negative, then you need to make some conscious changes to your inner monologue.
Learn the characteristics of Positive People repeat them to yourself throughout your day.
It will then become a part of your mental method and will affect how you think, feel and act and will affect the results you get in your life.
Remember: Positive attitude = positive results.
Personal Development Training
Take conscious control of your own attitude, by self-control and self-awareness, see yourself and other people through the lens of a positive attitude.
You can do that by tuning your thinking. Think constantly about the answers to the following questions:
- What do I want to achieve?
- How can I achieve it?
- Who can help me?
- What can I do to help them in return for their help?
A positive attitude requires that you find evidence to support the following beliefs:
- I can achieve my goals, if I do the right things in the right order.
- Nobody can stop me; nobody is trying to stop me.
- If I want things to be better, I must first make my performance better.
- Given enough time, I can do whatever I set my mind to.
- In order to achieve my goals, I must gain the cooperation of other people, so, in order to do that, I will be cooperative with other people.
Never sway to their opposites.
- I can't
- I can't be bothered
- If it can go wrong it will go wrong
- Nobody has given me a chance
How to develop a Positive Mental Attitude
A Positive Mental Attitude can be developed by being mindful of how you are using your mind, in accordance with the following rules:
- Unless there is any evidence to suggest otherwise, simply assume that things will turn out well for you. Pessimists heed the opposite advice: Have you ever heard anyone say, "Don't get your hopes up. Then you will never be disappointed."? This is literally the advice to live in a state of hopelessness.
- If something does go wrong for you, then assume that it is temporary and that you will learn the lessons from the defeat.
- Refuse to entertain any arbitrary fears. An arbitrary fear is a fear based upon a belief that something bad will happen, simply because it is conceivable. But remember that, practically anything is conceivable. Just because it is conceivable does not mean it will happen. Restrict your fearful imagining to evidence-based fears only. An evidence-based fear is one for which there is tangible, credible evidence to suggest it is likely to happen. Positive Mental Attitude means putting definite limits on your fears, and not letting arbitrary, irrational fears stop you.
- Assume that the future will be good.
- Look for reasons to be cheerful.
- Seek out evidence to suggest that you can achieve the goals, that you have set for yourself.
"Fortune favours the prepared mind". Louis Pasteur
About the Author: Chris Farmer
Chris Farmer is the founder of the Corporate Coach Group and has many years’ experience in training leaders and managers, in both the public and private sectors, to achieve their organisational goals, especially during tough economic times. He is also well aware of the disciplines and problems associated with running a business.
Over the years, Chris has designed and delivered thousands of training programmes and has coached and motivated many management teams, groups and individuals. His training programmes are both structured and clear, designed to help delegates organise their thinking and, wherever necessary, to improve their techniques and skills.
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Further Reading in Personal Development
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Four Thinking Styles
Would you like to be more positive and have a better memory? Would you like to say the right thing, do the right thing and feel terrific? The good news is, you can! Develop your thinking and you will improve the quality of your life.
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Overcoming Imposter Syndrome
Imposter syndrome involves feeling that one's true abilities are inferior to their outward image, causing fears of being exposed as a fraud. This leads to self-doubt and anxiety, but it is possible to overcome these limiting beliefs.
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Train Your Brain to Focus on the Future
Train Your Brain to Focus on the Future It is very important to focus on the future. The past is gone and can never come back. Whether that past was good or bad, it can never come back. If the past was bad for you, then it's good to forget. If...
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Striving After an Ideal
You will never reach your own ideal, but trying to strive towards an ideal is a very valuable exercise in self-discipline and personal development.
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Learn From Your Mistakes
Criticism is good for you. Don't get upset when you receive negative feedback, instead use the criticism to make adaptive changes. Learn from your failures and you will be on track to succeed.
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