How To Win The Loser's Game With Your Mind
I have a thought today. I had a thought yesterday too. In fact, I have thoughts every single moment.
The activity of the restless mind occupies our attention all the time. This moment our attention is on this thought, a few seconds later it is on another one. We spend a lot of energy and attention on these passing thoughts, most of them being unimportant and outside our conscious control.
The human mind does not stop processing — constantly thinking, obsessively thinking. Your mindset is nothing but a series of thoughts that make up your beliefs. Your thoughts and its subsequent interpretations dictate how you respond to a given situation.
If you lack control over your thoughts, it would seem like you are under the influence of an invisible power that is fighting to gain your attention. What follows is a crippling cycle of worry and anxiety that sets you on a downward spiral, plummeting into the dark zone. Pretty soon you would have blown your world into a million pieces, all within the confines of your inner mind.
This all sounds pretty familiar. Our brains are pre-wired to respond to negative thoughts and feelings more quickly. We naturally gravitate towards negative information which leads to greater attention and reinforcement, which causes them to be more frequent. How can you break free if you are stuck in your head and you can’t let go of what seems to be permanent transcripts in your brain?
Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life's coming attractions.
– Albert Einstein
Your Intrusive Negative Thoughts Do Not Dictate Your Life
Just like me, you are taught early on to focus on positive thinking. You’re told that to feel self-assured and confident, you should banish negative thoughts. Kind of like saying goodbye negative thoughts; hello positive thoughts. Simple, right? However, what’s simple is not necessarily easy.
So how are we to take control and mentally empower ourselves to change our thoughts and affect our environment?
We spend much of our time ruminating and replaying what’s not working in life. Negative thoughts are part of human functioning. We hold on to our discomfort in an attempt to figure out solutions to let it go. Our brain uses replays to force us to become fixated on the thing we’re worried about.
There is nothing complicating with wanting to have a positive life. But first, you just have to accept that those intrusive negative thoughts do not dictate your life.
Before you can become the boss of your brain, understand that you are largely at the mercy of your emotions. Thoughts trigger emotions. Emotions help you cope. If you act in response to your emotions, understanding that your worldview is influenced by the balance between your thoughts and emotions will help you towards making wise choices.
If you can focus on rainbows and unicorns all day long, it can affect how you feel regularly. The same is true with negative thoughts.
Your brain does not know the difference between the stories created by your mind in the form of thoughts, imagery, and predictions, or the reality you experience through your 5 senses.
It means that what you imagine to be happening is actually happening as far as your brain is concerned. Everything starts in the mind, through imagination. Your imagination is responsible, to a large extent, for the kind of life you are experiencing right now, and what goes on in your mind now would affect your future.
Live out of your imagination, not your history.
– Stephen R. Covey