Are you struggling to stay positive? Do you find yourself battling with your moods and wishing that you could have more control over how you feel? Here are five tips to help you maintain a more pleasant state of mind.
1. Don’t overthink everything. While it’s great to think through things, it’s easy to cross the line into overanalyzing or obsessing, which always leads to negativity, fear, or frustration. Overthinking is like running in circles in your mind — it depletes your mental energy and you’ll find it difficult to concentrate on anything else. And much like a hamster in a wheel, you will generally find that, in the end, you didn’t even make any progress.
2. Don’t catch other people’s bad moods. Moods are highly contagious and if we’re not careful, we can easily let someone else’s crabbiness color our own moods as well. You can probably recall a time when a grumpy person walked in the room and seemed to suck all the joy right out of it. This doesn’t have to be the case though. Guard your own positive mood by consciously choosing to let someone else’s negativity be their problem and not yours.
3. Be a little kinder to yourself. Don’t call yourself names and don’t blame yourself for everything that goes wrong. That will only tear you down and frustrate you. You won’t be able to enjoy good moods if you are constantly tearing down your self-esteem with insults. It’s ok that you’re not perfect. It’s not ok to emotionally abuse yourself. If you want to feel more positive and upbeat, be more forgiving of yourself.
4. Pay more attention to the positives. It seems to be human nature to keep a running mental list of all the things that went wrong in a day. By evening, we have a gripe sheet a mile long, which gives us every reason in the world to be in a bad mood. It’s normal to feel frustrated and discouraged with those things. But we could balance them out a bit by also just taking note of the positive things as well instead of dismissing them or failing to even notice them. Make it a point to look for reasons to smile. Notice what’s going right, what went smoothly, and what was helpful. Make a mental list of those things too and you’ll be much more likely to maintain a pleasant mood.
5. Create an atmosphere to match the mood you want. The music, movies, or television shows that are playing in the background of your life set a tone for your moods. You might need to change the channel. You might also need to let some natural sunlight into your living space or tidy things up and make them look more inviting and cheerful. Incorporate some splashes of color. What you see, hear, and feel around you play a huge role in helping you maintain a positive mood.
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