bythemethod.com blog

It can be really hard to forgive someone, especially if they have hurt someone you care about. Yet, research shows that forgiving is important for good psychological health.

Take a look at this article if you doubt my word.

Here is a four step plan (taken from the same article):

• Acknowledge the pain and anger felt as a result of someone else’s actions. For forgiveness to occur, the situation needs to be looked at honestly.
• Recognize that healing requires change.
• Find a new way to think about the person who caused the pain. What was happening in that person’s life when the hurt occurred? Sometimes, the motivation or causes for the incident have little to do with those most affected. For some people, this step includes saying, “I forgive you.”
• Begin to experience the emotional relief that comes with forgiveness. It may include increased compassion for others who have experienced similar hurt.

Christians have been advocating the importance of forgiveness since Jesus mentioned the importance of it over 2000 years ago. I encourage you to find some forgiveness for others.

When you get up in the morning and pull back your curtains what do you see? Do you notice that there are clouds in the sky and the dark houses the other side of the road? Or do you notice the gaps in the clouds with the sunlight streaming through them? Do you notice the bird flying high in the sky or the cat about to do some business on your front lawn? I could go on but I hope you get the point of what I am trying to say.

If you want to know if you are a pessimist or an optoimist then one of the easiest ways is to take notice of what you see. Do you see the good things that are happening or the bad? Optimists notice the good, of course.

All the time we can either fix our eyes on the bad stuff or we can fix our eyes on the good stuff – it’s our choice. Learning to be content and seeing the good side of things is an important skill to learn. If you want to start being more of an optimist then start to notice the good things.

When you start to do this you will also start to notice the oppotunities that are available to you. This is one of the big benefits of being an optimist – it may not be that better things happen to an optimist but simply that by focusing on opportunities instead of threats the optimist finds more ways to succeed.

There is a great temptation to always think that the worst is going to happen to you. You know the kind of thing – you have to see the doctor, you have to see the boss, your wife tells you she wants to have a talk about something, etc. It’s easy to think that something is wrong and you are about to have your world turned upside down.

Then you discover that in fact your test results were fine, the boss wanted to thank you for doing a good job, your wife wanted to talk about holiday dates, etc.

Pessimists will tell you that it is best to anticipate the worst because then you are ready for it and anything above the worse is a bonus. However thinking this way leads to an increase in stress (high blood pressure – enlarged heart – sleepless nights – and so on). All this stress makes life miserable. The truth is that it is better not to anticipate the worst but the best.

The optimist discovers that they may not be right more of the time (although there is some evidence that suggests they are) but that when they get bad news they think about how they can cope rather than falling apart (a common misconception about optimists – that they go to peaces if they hear bad news).

So teach your self to aniticipate the best and not the worst.

It is all too easy to let a negative view or state stop us from getting the success we want. Even when something bad has not happened we can still create feelings that make us believe that they have. It might be past experience that has made us that way or it might be our inner talk or other people but wherever it comes from it is destructive to us.

However there is a way to break the power that negative thinking has on us. It’s called pattern breaking.

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The way you think will determine the way you act. There can be little doubt in anyones mind that there is a direct link between attitude and success. If you want to be successful you must have the right attitude. If you are not successful yet but want to be more successful then time spent on getting yourself to think in the right ways is time well spent.

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Being positive is always better than being negative – in my opinion. There is always more research coming out on this subject and despite the odd example where being negative helps you more (no doubt produced by negative people) the vast majority of information points to the benefits of having a positive rather than negative outlook.

How then do you get to be more positive?

Make a list of positive qualities

There is a simple technique called positive listings.

We are often very good at knocing ourselves and believing that we are no good. It could be that some time in the past some well meaning (but very helpful) person has pointed out some failing in your life and has made you feel horrible about yourself. This can be worse when it is someone whom you love or respect. Parents, teachers, Doctors, Dentists etc are all guilty of this at some point or another. We may have done it ourselves – and then hopefully later regretted it.

What we need to do is to think about the positive things about us and this will then help us to think more positively about ourselves which will help us to achieve more and feel more confident.

Get yourself a piece of paper, a pen and somewhere you can write where you will not be disturbed.

Write down your positive qualities.

If you struggle to think what they are then think about the following and find the positive qualities that apply (you may find more than one for each or none for some these are just to help you think):

• Relationships
• Talents
• Values
• Qualifications
• Humour
• Creative
• Sports
• Feelings
• Experiences
• Others

Take your list and read through it slowly.

 You need to take some care to read through what you have written. Try to remember the experience that made you write down your list of things. Accept that they are part of you and feel good about them.

Try one of these

The next thing you can do is to write down each thing in the third person e.g. put your name in to the sentence i.e. Chris is kind and loving, Chris is good at walking, Chris has a good sense of humour etc

Then try writing from the 1st person e.g. I i.e. I am kind and loving, I am good at walking.

Try to feel happy that these are your good qualities.

By accepting that these are all part of you, the individual, you can reinforce all these positive thoughts, feelings and perceptions, which then lead to enhanced beliefs.

What things can you say are your positive qualities?

Leave a comment telling us what they are

There are few things more likely to trigger stress than being negative about things. Research has shown that being positive is better for your health than being negative.

If we view every situation as a problem then it will trigger our stress response every time.

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