Flip the Script on Your Mental Narrative

If you’d like to shift to a more positive mindset, begin with that aim. Notice the negative thoughts that go through your mind—especially those that you tend to incessantly repeat. (Ground Picture/Shutterstock)

All day, every day, you are engaged in a constant conversation. It takes place in your mind and it’s between you and you. The nature of this chatter has a significant impact on your experience of life. The question is—what are you telling yourself?

For many people, the voice in their head is harsh and focused on the negative. Naturally, their experience of life reflects that. The thoughts we tell ourselves often run on repeat, habitually programming us to focus on certain things and see the world in a certain way.

While it may feel like these thoughts are stuck and that they somehow represent what must be truth, we can in fact break the habit of negative thinking and train ourselves to aim our focus in a positive direction. We just need to flip the script.

Perhaps the most difficult but important part of doing that is to notice the negative thoughts in the first place. Habitual messages like this seem so ingrained that they are hardly noticeable. Once you decide to look for them, though, you’ll find them. 

If you’d like to shift to a more positive mindset, begin with that aim. Notice the negative thoughts that go through your mind—especially those that you tend to incessantly repeat. 

It’s helpful to capture these thoughts. Take a piece of paper and fold it in half, creating two columns. In list format, going down the left-hand column, write down each negative thought. It may be difficult to look at their concrete manifestations on paper, but fear not. It is important to face these thoughts, and perhaps even helpful to see their simplicity or even silliness. 

Next, in the right-hand column, write the exact opposite of each negative thought you captured. For example, if the thought is, “life is so difficult,” the opposite would be “life is so easy.” Don’t worry about whether or not you believe the opposite to be true. Just write them out.

Next, use scissors to separate the columns and throw the negative one away. Read down the list of positive ideas you’ve just generated. You’ll likely find that there is some truth there and that there certainly could be truth to those ideas if you worked toward either taking in new beliefs or taking action to bring forth new realities. 

If any of these ideas do not align with your fundamental values or you can’t possibly believe them, then change them accordingly, but keep them positive in nature. Using the example above, if you don’t necessarily believe life is easy or could ever be easy, perhaps you could agree that “life is good,” and that might be enough to replace your formerly negative thought.

Hold onto his list and read it daily. Aim to replace your negative habitual thoughts with these more positive ones.

The Stoic philosopher Seneca once said, “Everything hangs on one’s thinking… a man is as unhappy as he’s convinced himself he is.” Indeed, our thoughts have a more significant impact on our lives, the lives of those we interact with, and those we influence than many of us give them credit for. Take charge of your thoughts and begin to notice the positive effect it has on your life.