In this issue:

Our world needs more positive things such as kindness, grace, love, encouragement. But there is also a growing fear of expressing anything that isn’t positive. In this issue, you'll learn about positivity and why we need to have a balance between true positivity and reality, and how to frame it so we are not suppressing real feelings. You'll also get to know a woman who realized that what she thought was truth turned out to be a great deception, and hear how she's spreading a new message.

 

 

Podcast

Inspired Life: Three Ways to Cultivate Realistic Positivity

I want to talk about positivity and why we need to have a balance between true positivity and reality. Everywhere I look these days there is talk about positivity. Staying positive has become a hallmark of corporate circles—it's in just about every leadership, business or self-help book.

Positivity is a cool thing because our world does need more positive things such as kindness, grace, love, encouragement. But there is also a growing fear of expressing anything that isn’t positive.

What I think is beginning to happen is that we are encouraging people to stuff their feelings and their true situation out of fear of expressing something negative and superstitiously making bad things happen. I say this because there is also a growing sense of superstition that is hiding inside of things that look spiritual. And I am concerned. There. I said something negative. I am concerned.

First, my concerns about positivity. If don’t ever acknowledge a problem, how can change or solutions ever happen? There are two ways to acknowledge a problem. One is negative, and the other is positive. But it’s important to note that the process of stating there is a problem is not negative in and of itself.

Let’s take a look at a problem and see how it can be expressed both negatively and positively.

The problem: I have so much to do, and I am overwhelmed.

Example 1: Negatively expressing it.

I have so much to do, and I am overwhelmed. I am never going to catch up. I will forever be in this condition. Nobody cares about me. I can’t fix this.

Example 2: Positively expressing it.

I have so much to do, and I am overwhelmed. I know I need help and there is someone out there who can help me or show me a system that will work to process through these tasks. I just need to tap into the resources I haven’t yet discovered.

Do you see the shift there? One is that I have a problem and it can’t be fixed. The other is that I have a problem and I am a solution-seeker.

Here is where I have struggled with this in the past and sometimes still. I try to express the problem, but to someone who believes that there is some sort of voodoo in speaking the problem aloud. Instead of being real, someone of this persuasion will ask for a restatement of the problem itself.

Example: I am blessed with an abundance of things to do and I love it.

But the reality is, it doesn’t yet feel like a blessing or abundance. And honestly I don’t love it yet. So what this asks is for a person to stuff his or her true feelings and essentially lie to themselves.

What I propose is that we state the truth, but in a framework that we are seeking a solution and not succumbing to hopelessness. Let’s look at three ways we can make this shift happen where we can be real, but positive at the same time.

* Let yourself feel the feelings. Do you need to have a pity party? Give yourself a time limit on the blues, but let yourself feel something. I have tried to stuff feelings, and do you know what it leads to? All sorts of stomach troubles, disturbed sleep, physical pains, headaches.