The Problem with Positive Thinking

If you were to ask people, "Do you believe in positive thinking?"

Most people would say, "Yes."

Some honest souls would say, "I think it's a great idea! It doesn't work for me, but I know it works for other people."

Logically, positive thinking should work for everyone. But if it should, why doesn't it?

In this book "What to Say When You Talk to Yourself", Shad Helmstetter explained why.

Imagine your mind is like an apartment, with old "furniture" (negative thinking) handed down to you from your parents, friends, teachers and everyone else who has helped programmed your subconscious mind.

Now let's say some motivation guru comes to your mental apartment, and offers to help you get rid of all the old "furniture". He starts moving all your old "furniture" outside and store it in your garage.

The next thing you know, you're standing in the middle of your mental apartment, empty and spotless. You look around and say, "Great! I've gotten rid of all my old negative thinking. Now I can be a positive thinker!"

After spending some time in your empty mental apartment, you start wondering what should you be doing. So you go out into the garage and pull out your old trusty chair to sit. Next you'll bring back the table. And so on so forth.

One by one, you will begin to bring your old trusted and time-worn negative thoughts back into your mental apartment!

Why? Because the motivation guru helped you remove the old furniture, but did not give you any new positive thoughts to replace the old negative thoughts.

Therefore, if you want to replace the old negative thoughts with new positive thoughts, you need to give your subconscious mind new inputs by using Self-Talk.

The right kind of Self-Talk is the key to making all the positive thinking work. Without it, for most of us, positive thinking becomes "wishful thinking". And wishful thinking is nothing more than saying to yourself, "I wish I could...but I can't".

Beware of the things that you say to yourself when you're all alone. Your self-talk programs your subconscious mind in ways that you can never imagine.  :)