Tag: Have a Positive outlook

When we feel that we want to run away

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All relationships demand that we trust the other person. However, due to our personal history, this can sometimes prove a challenge. Our brains are wired to remember the risks that come from encounters with others, such as those in our childhood. Therefore certain words or situations may trigger deep felt unconscious memories and the brain automatically applies an expectation of danger to them. Our stress and anxiety rises, and we feel trapped. Our instinct is to run away. This happens even though our strengths and resources are greatly different now than what they were when we were little.

Thus it can help if we increase our capacity to see these fears as they arise in order not to be influenced by our automatic reactions to them. A way if doing so is outlined here:

Anxiety, dread, worry and even panic are just mental states like any other. Recognize fear when it arises, observe the feeling of it in your body – watch it try and convince you that you should be alarmed – see it change and move on. Verbally describe to yourself what you are feeling, to increase frontal lobe regulation of the limbic system. Notice how the awareness which contains fear is itself never fearful.  Keep separating from the fear; settle back into  the vast space of awareness through which fear passes like a cloud.

Rick Hanson, Buddha’s Brain

Boost your positivity

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The best way to boost positivity, according to Barbara Fredrickson Ph.D,  researcher and author of Positivity, is to live in the moment.

If you can be present to what you are experiencing right now – whether you are having breakfast, walking the dog, mowing the lawn, driving the car  or attending a meeting –  you’ll significantly increase your chances of feeling positive. “ Our interpretations of our immediate circumstances define our emotions” she says “and we have a lot more choice about those interpretations than we give ourselves credit for”. Turn our focus to the now ( for example, reading this blog post, working at your desk) and you will  have less space in your head for negative thoughts. In addition,  you’ll feel more grounded and creative when tackling the many challenges that the day offers.

Reduce the negative, develop the positive…

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When we are having a tough day, finding the positive side of everyday happenings can be difficult.  It is an even greater struggle for people suffering from depression. But by developing skills to tune into the positive, depressed people can strengthen their overall wellbeing and mental health, a 2009 Ohio State University study found. By staying mindful of the positive elements of daily events, or by documenting each days happiest moments in a journal, a person may lower their stress levels. “Positive emotions build resilience to stress, in addition to having an undoing effect on depression” says Alan Keck, Psychologist at the Centre for Positive Psychology.

He goes on to say that we should consciously build up our positive resilience by really focusing when we are having an experience that we find especially pleasant. This may simply be a good cup of coffee, a special brunch, a visit to friends, a nice meal. To magnify the results, he says, pay attention to what you see, hear, and feel, both physically and emotionally, and smile. Then consciously tell yourself to “remember this” experience for which you feel grateful. Doing this helps the mind store the positive effects of the moment for future use.

Effect of Mindfulness on the Brain

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Richard Davidson, Ph.D, one of the world’s foremost brain scientists and named in TIME Magazine’s as one of the world’s top 100 most influential people, has done considerable research on the effect of mindfulness practices on the brain. As I mentioned in a previous post, he is now the Director of the Laboratory for Affective Neuroscience at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he is researching how the brain can be trained and shaped to be more positive and resilient. In his work he has specialized in research on brain function related to emotion, both in normal individuals and those with, or at risk of, depression and anxiety.

In his research on brain function in anxiety he noted:  The functional M.R.I. images reveal that when people are emotionally distressed — anxious, angry, depressed — the most active sites in the brain are circuitry converging on the amygdala, part of the brain’s emotional centers, and the right prefrontal cortex, a brain region important for the hypervigilance typical of people under stress.

By contrast, when people are in positive moods — upbeat, enthusiastic and energized — those sites are quiet, with the heightened activity in the left prefrontal cortex.

By taking readings on hundreds of people, Davidson established a bell curve distribution, with most people in the middle, having a mix of good and bad moods. Those relatively few people who are farthest to the right are most likely to have a clinical depression or anxiety disorder over the course of their lives. For those lucky few farthest to the left, troubling moods are rare and recovery from them is rapid….

Davidson found  – in research on meditators versus non-meditators –  significant increases in left-sided anterior activation in the meditators compared with the non-meditators, the pattern previously associated with positive affect. He found that regular mindfulness practice over a period of just 8 weeks significantly increased immune system functioning and additionally increased left-brain activity (furthermore, increases in the left-brain functioning directly mediated the increases in immune system functioning).

The overall results from Davidson’s mindfulness research provides evidence for the use of meditative practices to reduce negative mood states – and furthermore shows that positive mood states are more likely to become a part of a person’s natural state if they meditate regularly.

Working with Negative thoughts, Part 1

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All of us, from time to time, worry about things. One thing worry does is increase negative thoughts and talking to ourselves. It tends to be anticipatory, referring to threatening things which we come to believe may happen in the future. These thoughts and self-talk have a significant impact upon our mood, making it more difficult for us to be content in our lives at this moment.

There are a number of ways that we can deal with negative thoughts. One very common one is to identify the thoughts and replace them with more constructive or realistic ones. For example, when a person feels bad after a failed job interview and thinks that they will never, ever,  get a job, the overgeneralizing thought is named and a more constructive one – such as “It did not go well this time, but I will prepare better for the next interview”  – is focused on.

The approach that mindfulness takes is slightly different. It simply starts with noticing that all sorts of thoughts are continually arising and passing through the mind. We do this by taking a short period – say two minutes – to sit quietly and calm the mind, not thinking of anything in particular, and just being aware of our breath coming in and going out, say,  at the nostrils. What could be easier? However, what we very quickly notice is that this is not that easy just to be aware of the breath, that we start thinking very quickly.

This is a really important insight along the way towards becoming mindful and in dealing with negative thoughts. We simply notice that it is in the nature of the mind to continually generate thoughts and that they arise and pass away all the time. Some teachers have compared this aspect of the mind to a waterfall, with thoughts thundering or rushing by. There is nothing wrong with this, so we just accept it with gentleness and non-judgment, while returning our attention to the breath.

This is the first step in developing the practical skill of mindfulness. We will move on to the second step in the next, related, post. However, for the moment we just practice this, noticing how the mind wanders and gets distracted.

Mindfulness, seeing clearly, means awakening to the happiness of the uncomplicated moment. We complicate moments. Hardly anything happens without the mind spinning it up into an elaborate production. It’s the elaboration that makes life more difficult than it needs to be.

Sylvia Boorstein

How our work has meaning

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I came across this nice story set in the Middle Ages: A man sees a worker passing by with a wheel barrow and asks what he is doing. “Can’t you see, I’m pushing a wheelbarrow,” the man replies. Another wheelbarrow man comes by doing the same thing and he too is asked: “What are you doing.” He replies, “Can’t you see, I’m building the Cathedral at Chartres.”

The same activity, but with different levels of insight.

The second man has connected his work to something inside himself or beyond himself – has understood the difference between purpose and meaning – and thereby made his life meaningful.