One Negative Equals Two Positives

Lately, I've been quite the Negative Nelly about things. Lots of stuff has gone wrong this past month, and I've found it harder and harder to remain in a happier state of mind. I went to my pastor for advice, since he always seems like a pretty happy guy.

But he didn't answer me- instead he answered with a question- 'How can you change your negativity?' I really hate it when he does that, because I wind up coming up with a really good answer- and he winds up looking really wise and stuff. He knew I had the answer, and just needed a sounding board to figure things out.

My answer was, 'Well, I could turn one negative thought into two positive ones.' He liked that, and gave me some homework to do- for the next thirty days I'm to work on doing that, so it becomes a habit. Having homework ranks down there with cleaning the bathroom, so you can tell how excited I was. But I promised I'd give it a go.

Catching myself was the hardest part, because I never realized just how negative my thoughts were! But whenever I did catch myself, I turned it around to two positives. For instance:

'Oh no...it's raining again.'

I turned it to:

'The flowers will perk up since they needed the water' and 'I like that fresh smell you get after a good rain.'

And you know what happened? I felt better, dagnabbit!

Even the bigger concerns I addressed the same way, with the positive turns along the line of 'I don't have an answer, but God does!' It made the sun shine a little brighter after the rain stopped.

My pastor is a wise man. This is probably one of the top five Life Lessons I will ever learn!

Even if I'm in a bad mood (for no reason, just grumpy), I say to myself 'Okay Grumplestiltskin, name two good things that have happened today', and that usually gets the ball rolling in a more positive direction. So if you're feeling all grumply one day, give this a try- it might just make the sun shine brighter for you too!

God Bless!