BALANCE
Positive Mind, Positive Life
T
hink positive, and positive things happen.” For many of us, this has become a fluff statement, something that is thrown around but not really given much merit. But research is
now showing that positive thoughts can actually create more opportunities and help us
build skills that can increase the value of our lives.
What Negative
Thoughts Do to Your
Brain
Negative emotions narrow our
thoughts and cause our brains
to act in a singular way. This
instinctive reaction is useful
if you find yourself in a life
or death situation. If you are
walking down the street and a
giant grizzly bear steps in your
path, the negative emotion
of fear may cause you to run
away. Your brain ignores all
other options, such as picking
up a rock, climbing a tree, or
even calling for help, because
they seem irrelevant. While
running away may be a good
choice if you ever find yourself
toe to toe with a grizzly, if we
constantly live in a state of fear,
anger or worry, we put ourselves in an instinctive flight or
fight mode, which prevents our
brains from seeing the other
options and choices that surround us. Therefore, we can
miss out on all sorts of possibilities.
How to Think Positive
What can you do to promote
positive thinking? Well, any-
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thing that sparks feelings of
happiness, satisfaction and love
will work, but if you are truly
lost as to where to start, you
can try one of these three ideas.
1. Meditate. Meditating
regularly can help to shift
negative thought patterns as
well as improve concentration
and slow the loss of brain cells.
Don’t know where to begin?
Here is the link to a great article that suggests some apps
that you can download to help
you get started.
2. Start a gratitude
journal. A study published
in the Journal of Research in
Personality examined a group
of undergraduate students.
Ninety pupils were divided
into two groups. The first
group was told to write about
an intensely positive experience each day for three consecutive days. The second group
wrote about a control topic.
Three months later, the students who wrote about positive
experiences were found to have
better mood levels, fewer visits
to the health center, and fewer
illnesses. Training your brain to
concentrate on the good things
ZOOM Autism through Many Lenses
instead of the bad can not only
improve your mental attitude,
but also, it may improve your
health.
3. Schedule time to
play each day. We sched-
ule meetings, conference calls
and doctors’ appointments,
but when was the last time you
scheduled time to just have
fun? It’s time to give yourself
permission to enjoy life and allow positivity in.
If you’re prone to negative
thinking, all this talk about
how bad it is may seem disheartening. It’s easy to assume
that we have no control over
our thoughts. After all, they
often pop up out of nowhere,
and once they take hold, it can
be difficult to break their grip.
The good news is that it is
possible to change our thought
patterns and train our brains
to think more positively. When
you make the conscious decision to live a more positive life,
you suddenly see the possibilities for how your past experiences fit into your future life.
ZOOM Autism through Many Lenses
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