Accentuate the Positive

By Donna Shea & Nadine Briggs

What good thing happened today? That is a question that my (Donna) significant other Mike and I are working into our daily conversations. We both come home from long days of the special kind of stress that self-employment can add to life, have families that need a significant amount of support beyond the typical, and as anyone would, tend to start sharing whatever stressful moments occurred that day. It is human nature to focus on the negative.

Life hands us an equal amount of the positive if we just stop to look for it. One strategy is to stop and ask that question. What good thing or things DID happen today? Why were they good? It stops us in our tracks and starts us searching our brains for positive things to share. Maybe there was a great review of one of our books. Maybe Mike was able to save a real estate transaction by calming down a nervous buyer (he’s a home inspector). We may spend time with a grandchild, had a client express appreciation for our work, planned out our next hiking trip, or this week had furniture delivered that we have wanted for a long time.

In all honesty, I’ve had trouble finding the good stuff the last few days as everyone occasionally does. Summer at work can be tough. I have some things going on that I have felt discouraged about. I have been worried about good friends who are going through some tough times. I frequently experience anxiety about family members and finances. So, is it easy to switch your negative thoughts to positive ones? Not always. It’s the same as working out at the gym. You have to keep working your brain “muscle” to develop it into a more positive one.

Sometimes just trying to switch your thinking isn’t enough and your brain gets stuck in a negative mode. There are times when switching your actions is the key to finding the good stuff. We took our granddaughter to Harry Potter paint night. We went for a walk in a downtown area we hadn’t explored in awhile and made plans to go back. We started watching Anne with an E on Netflix. I bought fresh apple cider donuts from the farm stand near our home. Getting in the kitchen to try a new recipe always shuts down those thoughts and creates pleasant ones.

The ability to train yourself to be more optimistic and positive is researched based on the field of positive psychology. You can help children do this too. Teach kids how to go on a “good stuff hunt.” To get started, it’s as easy as looking for three good things that happen over the course of the day, why they were good, and then writing them down at night before you go to sleep. Do it with your child or children.

And if you do find yourself or a member of your family caught up in a negative spin or complaining, let them get it out and then ask, “what good thing happened today?” We know that every day is full of both. Accentuating the positive will increase well-being, decrease stress and make it easier to handle the other stuff life throws us.