Are you someone who manages to see the silver lining in every situation or someone who constantly has a dark cloud hanging over their head? The answer to this question can dictate not just how you live life but also the health of your mind and body. Being a positive thinker can improve several aspects of your life, from stress management and self-esteem to fitness and overall health and well-being.
What is Positive Thinking?
To be a positive thinker is not to look at life through rose-colored glasses or ignore the difficult times. Instead, it is the practice of broaching life’s challenges with a positive mindset. It is the essence of “When life throws you lemons, make lemonade”!
Positive thinking encourages people to find the best in every situation and person, including the positive thinker themselves! Instead of lingering on the negatives, positive thinkers try to find ways to overcome the struggles to get to the other side.
Researchers such as Martin Seligman, a positive psychologist (a branch of psychology), explain positive thinking in terms of explanatory styles. This is how you tend to view or describe events that occur in your life. The two different explanatory styles are as follows:
Optimistic Explanatory Style: Those with this style often credit themselves for positive outcomes and outside forces for negative ones. They also consider adverse events as temporary and out of the ordinary.
Pessimistic Explanatory Style: Those with this style fail to give credit for good things but are quick to place blame on themselves. They tend to think of negative occurrences as long-lasting and constantly worry about unfavorable outcomes.
As one may imagine, the latter can be detrimental to one’s health and well-being. However, humans aren’t one thing at all times, so while positive thinkers tend to fall into the category of optimistic explanatory style, they may veer outside of that in certain particularly stressful situations.
Positive Thinking: Real-Life Examples
Lisa R. Yanek, M.P.H., is a researcher at Johns Hopkins. She and her colleagues reported that people with an overall cheerful disposition were 13% less likely to develop coronary artery disease or heart attack when compared to those who were considered harmful. Astonishingly, this statistic stood true even in those with a family history of heart disease!
Yanek and team used a survey tool to evaluate a person’s positive or negative outlook by looking at their cheerfulness, anxiety, energy, anxiety, and contentment with their overall life. But Yanek says a survey isn’t really needed to tell what someone’s personality is. “I think people tend to know how they are,” she says.
A 2018 study published in the Journal of Aging Research found that positive thinking could reduce mortality over 35 years. Another study that followed 1,558 seniors found that having a positive outlook reduced frailty in old age. This is likely to be linked to more optimistic people being more active, eating a healthier diet, sleeping better, and avoiding unhealthy habits such as smoking or drinking.
Health Benefits of Positive Thinking
Positive thinking has been the topic of discussion on several online platforms as of late. This is thanks to several popular self-help books about it and the general fascination with psychological philosophies such as the law of attraction, manifesting, and positive thinking. There are several health benefits associated with positive thinking, such as:
- Being able to cope with stress more effectively.
- Better psychological health due to lower anxiety levels.
- Better physical health due to being more energetic and active.
- Increased life expectancy.
- Better social skills and relationships.
- Less risk of mental health struggles such as depression.
- Lower risk of death related to cardiovascular disease.
Ways to Cultivate Positive Thinking
Clearly, there are several benefits to being a positive thinker. If you’ve been prone to negative thinking, it’s not too late to groom your thoughts and start approaching life with a more positive outlook. Here are a few strategies that can help you practice positive thinking:
Shape Your Thoughts
Pay attention to the way your thoughts are shaped. If a particular thing isn’t going your way, try reframing it in a more positive way. For example, if you’ve slipped up on your healthy eating plan, try to think of it as a one-time treat you enjoyed instead of beating yourself up about it.
When you’re stressed about a situation that is out of your control, try to find the silver lining. Did rain ruin your plans? Be thankful you have a roof over your head to shelter from the cold. Accept that there are certain things in life that you cannot change and find the positives in them.
Start a Gratitude Journal
One way to remind yourself of all the good things in your life is to write in a gratitude journal. This will help you get a more positive picture of your life, which will help you feel more optimistic.
Practice Self-Affirmations
How you talk to yourself is the single most significant factor in determining your outlook on life. And that’s not just us saying it; studies have proven that shifting to positive self-talk can positively impact your emotions, which influences how you deal with stress.
Just Say “Cheese”!
Here’s another bit of advice that has actual scientific backing. If you want to cultivate a more positive mindset, start smiling more. Even fake smiling helps! Smiling and laughter have the effect of lowering the heart rate and blood pressure during stressful situations, says a University of Kansas study. So, the next time you’re feeling the blues, ask a friend to tell you a joke or watch a funny video online!
Become more resilient
Getting easily worked up is one way to stay negative. If you can train yourself to be more resilient and cope better in unfavorable situations, you can do away with negative thinking. You can do so by accepting that change and loss are a part of life and taking action when things aren’t as you like instead of complaining about them or waiting for them to fix themselves.
Give Back
Helping others has a positive psychological effect on a person’s mind and body. The brain releases feel-good chemicals when you perform acts of kindness. Giving back can also improve self-esteem, belonging, and gratitude. There are several ways to give back to your community: donating money or used items or volunteering your time to help someone in need.
Is There a Negative Side to Positive Thinking?
The benefits of positive thinking are clear, but is it always the right thing? Maybe not. In fact, some research has found that negative thinking can actually help people make more accurate judgments and decisions in certain situations.
Nevertheless, it might be ideal for reaching a middle ground in realistic optimism. This will help avoid misplaced expectations and keep them from falling into negative thinking. Having hopes that are too high and failing to achieve them can be detrimental to one’s mental health.
There is also such a thing as toxic positivity, where positive thinking can cross the line to the wrong side. Here, one is forced to stay positive no matter how dire the situation is. Excessive positivity such as this can damage one’s mental health by making one feel guilty or shameful for experiencing grief or sadness.
