4. How We See Ourselves.

If you survey people in a shopping mall and ask them, “Are you generous?”, even people who never ever gave a cent to a charity or a panda will tell you, “Sure I’m generous.” Nobody thinks they are mean!

Ask anyone, “Have you got a sense of humour?” Everybody has! When did you ever meet someone who said, “I don’t know what’s funny.”?

And every guy thinks he is a great driver!

We see ourselves as we want to see ourselves.

So if you ask people, “Are you positive?”, most people think they are positive. They say things like, “I’m positive. It’s my stupid husband that’s the problem!”

Negative people don’t think they’re negative. They think they are realistic.

Most of us grew up with worried parents who taught us to worry. They told us what we couldn’t have, what we couldn’t do and what we would never be. The nightly news confirmed that the world is a dangerous place.

How on earth could we become fearless, free spirits?

Negative Rats

Many people seem happy and positive, but we never know their innermost thoughts. How often do we discover to our surprise that a neighbour or a relative was dogged by years of depression, guilt and suffering?

Negative thoughts are like rats. They arrive in groups. One shows up, and before you know it they have taken over.

EXAMPLE: You take a phone call from a rude customer at work. Your first thought is: “I hate rude people.”

Followed by your next negative thought: “In this job I’m surrounded by rude people!”

And your next negative thought: “In this job I’m surrounded by rude people and I’m underpaid.”

And the next: “In this job I’m surrounded by rude people and I’m underpaid and under-appreciated.”

And then: “In this job I’m surrounded by rude people and I’m underpaid and under-appreciated and come to think of it, I’m not appreciated by my husband, either.”

Now the rats are arriving in droves: “In this job I’m surrounded by rude people and I’m underpaid and under-appreciated and I’m not appreciated by my husband and tonight I’ll have to cook dinner. Why can’t he get off his backside? My mother always told me I was making a serious mistake. And now I’ve got a headache. Maybe it’s a tumour!”

Is this familiar? A lone rat becomes a plague.

You need an extermination strategy, and here is the best strategy I know to rid yourself of the rats. The moment you have your first negative thought, you ask yourself, “What’s good about this?”

What’s good about confronting rude people?

• “I’m building character and patience.”
• “I’m developing people skills that will help me in my next job.”
• “The rude people at work help me to appreciate my husband.”

Now you might say, “Let’s be realistic.” HERE’S REALISTIC:

• Lousy things happen.
• Happy people have the habit of saying, “What’s good about this?”

You break your leg. “What’s good about this?”

• “I get to rest.”
• “I’ll learn to empathise with sick people.”
• “I’ll read some great books.”

Your girlfriend dumps you. “What’s good about this?”

• “I can save money.”
• “I’ll see more of my buddies.”
• “I can watch all the football I like.”

“I tried being positive and it doesn’t work!”

Fred has lived for twenty years on hamburgers, doughnuts and Coca Cola. He is overweight and exhausted.

Then he discovers a book that says, “What you put in your mouth matters.” He buys some carrots and beans. He eats salad for four days.

After four days, Fred says, “I feel no better and I’m always hungry!” Fred goes back to burgers.

As almost anyone knows, four days of salad is a good start, but it can’t reverse twenty years of junk!

It is the same with our thinking.

Mary has lived for twenty years with a head full of junk thoughts: “I am useless. I hate my life. I hate my job. I can never pay my bills.”

She has the occasional happy thought, “I love my dog.” But the rest of the time is mostly, “Life is tough and then you die.”

Then she reads an inspirational book that says, “What you think about, you become.” She tries to imagine herself as happy and successful. She tells herself, “I am abundant. I am a winner.”

She sticks with the positive thinking for four days. (Her husband thinks that she has joined a weird cult.)

After four days she looks at her pile of unpaid bills, and says, “My life is no better.” She gives up. “That was too hard and it’s ridiculous.”

Here’s the point: you can’t fix a lifetime of junk eating in a few days, and you can’t fix a lifetime of junk thinking in a few days – or a few weeks.

Before we dismiss the idea that the quality of our thoughts creates our quality of life, we should ask ourselves, “Have I thoroughly tested this?”