For someone that has always called herself a “realist” in order to not admit I was a pessimist, I struggled for a long time to have a positive mindset. I didn’t see the point in hoping for good things when they hadn’t worked out in the past. I always preferred to expect the worst and then I couldn’t be disappointed.
However, this led to a lot of negative thinking, self-esteem issues, and no trust in myself and my abilities. I preached positive thinking with those I worked with but never tried it myself until I quit teaching. Once I quit, I knew I had a long road ahead of me and things would be tough but I began nurturing my positive thinking skills because I knew for sure I would need them.
Quitting a job that provided me with financial stability and going at it on my own by creating a business was hard and it still is to this day as I’m nowhere near the financial situation I had whilst teaching however, I am a lot happier and a big part of that has been because of the positive thoughts I plant every day in my head.
I wake up with hope and go to sleep with hope because I prefer to think “What if things work out?” instead of “This is not going to work out”. I started leaning more into what amazing things could happen instead of what awful things might happen and I can say that it’s made a massive change in the way I go about my day-to-day activities and also the faith I have in myself and my dreams now.
Having a positive mindset was not easy and there are still times when I slip up and go back to my old self’s negative thinking however, I’m learning to move past those rough patches and redirect myself toward positivity. Something that really helped me achieve this was looking at how social media triggered me and what I could do to stop that.
You will always see someone online that is better than you at something, has more money than you, etc and I decided that I just couldn’t start a journey based on positivity toward my dreams with all this negativity caused by social media.
I unfollowed a lot of people (not just celebrities) and pages that triggered me as well as found people to follow that were more aligned with my new goals. Now when I go on Instagram or any other social media platform I don’t feel a sense of dread at what I might see because most of the posts I now get on my feed are positive in nature and actually validate my feelings as well as make me feel like I can achieve anything.
Don’t underestimate the power social media can have over you. If you’re looking to start fresh down a new path and you need encouragement, positive affirmations, and such, make sure your social media reflects that. You deserve to get the best shot at your dreams and other people’s online presence shouldn’t deter you from them or make you feel bad.
Choose to plant positive thoughts every day and in time you will see these seeds grow into amazing things.
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