The Power of Negative Thinking !!!

       

The Power of Negative Thinking??? Really??? This must be the question that pops in everybody’s head when they read this title. What power could negative thinking possibly have? We have always heard of the power of positive thinking and there are plenty of motivational books that enumerate the advantages of positive thinking. Then what could possibly be the advantage of negative thinking? What could this title mean?

Well, the answer is none. Negative thinking has no advantages but only disadvantages. But what i’m trying to convey here is the literal meaning of the title, in that negative thinking in a person is way more powerful than positive thinking. The very fact that a person has to strive hard to remain positive about everything in life and the fact that negative thinking comes naturally to all of us and comes easily to us, is evidence enough to suggest that negative thinking is more powerful in a human mind than positive thinking. Ofcourse there are plenty of exceptions. There are lots of people who have positive thinking as a way of their character. There are those who keep falling and rise back again with more determination and intensity. You might have heard of such people in the plenty of true life success stories you might have read somewhere or the other. Then there are others who are unfazed by the problems in their life and do not spend much time worrying over spilt milk. If i put it in the present modern terminology, “They just move on” without much regrets in their life. And then there are others who just “play it safe” throughout their life leaving no chance for worries or regrets in life.

But then there are people like us who take the occasional big risks in life, of which some pay off and the others dont. Sometimes none of them pay off. :)

Life is very strange and complex sometimes to those of us. Sometimes we seem to have everything figured out and we think things are coasting along smoothly only to falter and stumble at some point. Sometimes in life when we really want something bad, it never happens. And when we expect nothing from life we get something. I’ve always wondered why life tends to be like that. Is it because of what we call fate and believe that God gives us what we deserve?? Or is it the state of mind, in which when we expect something, things never live upto our expectations and we are disappointed, and when we expect nothing, something or anything that happens to us makes us happy???

Well the consequence of such incidents is that most of us adopt a defensive strategy in our life in which we choose not to expect much in life, so there are no room for disappointments and anything that happens out of the ordinary brings a smile on to our faces. Sometimes we’re afraid to have expectations about something and “dream big” because of the fear of getting hurt and disappointed if our expectations are not met. It is the result of our past failures and disappointments following the heaps of expectations we had for a certain thing in life.

Negative thinking is something that is engraved into our subconscience and we have to keep fighting it throughout our life. At every step we falter, it automatically creeps into our minds without any conscious effort and becomes a part of us. It is such a powerful part of the human mind that one does not even have to try to develop it. Just something has to go wrong in our life and soon, we find ourselves engrossed in weaving a web of negative thoughts.

An example that I would like to quote is the very common superstition that we have in our minds regarding new year’s eve. Most of us have this feeling that if our new year’s eve goes badly, then our entire year is ruined. Even I have that superstition. Particularly because I have had a bad experience in the past where at one new year’s eve things went horribly wrong for me and then the whole year turned out to be pretty bad. But I’ve always wondered if there is any sense to that superstition. Simple common sense should prevail and tell us that just because we had one bad day in a year does not mean that the rest of the days are going to be like that. But because of that experience, I find it very difficult to let go of that superstition and let my common sense prevail. I sometimes wonder if it was my negative thinking that made me get my head stuck in an array of problems and subconsciously blamed the bad new year’s eve for everything that went wrong that year?? Such can be the power of negative thinking in the subconscious mind, it can blind all our senses including common sense.

Most of us live through our lives not paying attention to such minute state of thoughts in the mind and discarding all of this just as “futile philosophy”. But what most of us fail to realise is that our single biggest enemy in life is negativity. What almost always hinders us from success in life, is our own subconscious negative thinking which we don’t even realise that we do. Most often and not, we set ourselves short term goals on which we decide to stay positive and keep working at it. If things work out and results are produced, then well and good. It gives us the extra motivation we need. But there are plenty of occasions where even after slogging out for a while we don’t see results and then we start to doubt ourselves whether we’re capable of completing the task at hand or not. Enter Miss Negativity!!! Then after a while, she gets the better of you and you ask yourself, “Who am I kidding??? I can’t do this...”. Victory to Miss Negativity and as she smiles gleefully in our subconscious minds, we’re left being dejected and disgusted with ourselves.

Positive thinking is something which is very hard to attain in times of trouble and distress, which is why we always commend people who do have positive thinking in such troubled times. There are a gifted few people who can do that and a vast majority of them find success in life. But most of us go into a shell of negative thinking at the first sign of problems in life. It’s something that we can’t help. It comes naturally to us. Especially we Indians who have been brought up hearing about a million superstitions here and there. And most of us try to be positive overnight and pull it off for a few days to months. But then, one negative thought creeps up from somewhere and shakes the entire foundation of our new found positive thinking and then slowly maturely our positive thinking melts away like an ice cube at room temperature.

Which is why I personally feel that it is important that we understand the negative side of us before we try out positive thinking. Ofcourse everyone is subject to their own views. I personally have struggled with negativity throughout my life and I know there are lots of people who do but don’t realise it. It’s not easy to discard away our negative thinking like a snake that sheds its skin. Infact it is extremely difficult. But what I have learnt with age is having a better understanding of my negative thoughts. Its like understanding your enemy before you strike him. So that one day when you do strike him (which hopefully someday i do), you strike him hard and where it hurts him the most. You can't build a successful empire (of positive thinking), without neutralizing your archenemy.

To some this may sound like boring philosophy which makes no sense in practical life. As I said earlier, everyone is subject to their own views. All this kind of sounds easy and good when you’re reading it. Which is precisely why i’m writing about it because as I have figured out, positive thinking is a very hard art to practise in our daily and complicated life. That in itself is a negative thought, isn’t it?? :)