“Positive thinking will let you do everything better than negative thinking will.”

So a group of us are picking topics to blog about, we all blog about the same things and share what we have come up with.  Today we are starting with the different between negativity and positive thought.  How come it's so easy to see the negative in your daily life and to overlook the positive?

Well here goes my ramblings.  For myself personally I know that I am easily overwhelmed with the negativity in my life.  I tend to overlook the every day blessings and see the things that are going wrong.  Rather than seeing that I have three healthy kids who love me unconditionally I see I have 3 kids who won't take naps, run and scream around the house and make messes in every square inch of the house.  I do the same thing with my husband.  Rather than be grateful for having a husband who provides for his family, the life that we live which includes the ability to stay home with them.  I see the things that drive me bonkers.  He leaves his dirty socks balled up around the house, his ACU's thrown around the house on the floor, is totally and utterly car crazy.  I should be grateful for all of these things.  I should see the positive.  I have wonderful kids.  There is no question about it, they drive me bonkers but I know I do the same to them.  The messes they make are just reminders of their youth and I should embrace their imagination.  As I type this my son is having a sword fight with his Jedi Master and my girls are sitting on the couch enjoying a snack watching a movie.  Instead of fixating on the messes, I need to be thankful for them and look past the need for a clean house.

I should be thankful that the Mister is home to make his messes.  It wasn't that long ago that he was gone and I was wishing he was home and making the messes, working on his car and here to fight with.  See, he should be deployed right now.  When he was red flagged and forced to stay back in the states I was guilty of seeing the negative.  Some who aren't involved in the military would say what positive things can come out of a deployment?  Well I'll tell you.  When your husband trains to do a job for several years, is gone for weeks a time to prepare for said deployment, then at MOB for several months to deploy and WANTS to do his job which is only able to be done during said deployment it's a very upsetting thing to have them unable to deploy.  When a soldier deploys they have a certain amount of honor that they get from doing so.  Being with their comrades, getting their combat patch, and so much more.  And when they can't do that, it's a very hard thing to swallow.  So rather than seeing that after 6 months of being gone he would be coming home, we saw the bad.  I saw the negative.  I didn't see that he was going to come home, that he wouldn't be at risk, that the kids would have their dad home.  I saw that the wives that I had come to get close to would feel like I wasn't part of their group anymore because my husband wasn't gone anymore, that I didn't have this bond any longer.  It was a rough adjustment.  Now that I look back on it I see just how much I fixate on the negative.

So after all of these ramblings I have come to the conclusion that it's so much easier to find the negative things in your life and let those overtake it rather than working a little harder to find the positive in all situations.  I think that in life it's easier to see the things going wrong because those stick out like a sore thumb.  You tend to overlook the things in your every day life that aren't going wrong.  Your kids are healthy, so you don't think about it.  However when your kids are sick, you notice that so you take for granted that for the last 6 months they had been healthy.  Your bills are paid for every month and you don't have to stress about money, you take it for granted until one month you have an unexpected expense come up and you have to scramble to make ends meet.  Then all of the sudden the money situation in your life is brought to the forefront of your thoughts.

Instead of letting those people in your life get under your skin and make you stoop to their level, rise above and realize that they might be going through something you don't understand or they just wish to inflict their negativity on others.  Negative people do nothing but bring down others.  I know that I am guilty of it but I am wanting to make a conscience effort to be a person that appreciates the little things in life and doesn't just vent about what's going wrong.  When you do nothing but talk about the bad things, all you do is see the bad in life.

How about rather than taking those daily things that go right for granted sit back and think about things that you are grateful for on a daily basis.  Be thankful for what you have rather than fixate on what you don't have.  Be grateful for the things that go wrong, if they didn't go wrong it'd mean you didn't have things you cared about.  Be thankful you have a significant other to fight with, for there are those that don't have that joy.  Appreciate your children even when they make messes and are ornery as all get out, there are those that can't have children or have children with serious medical conditions.  Yes, it's harder to find the good amongst the bad but when you do you'll find yourself happier.  When you fixate on the negativity and only see what is going wrong you just end up missing those golden moments that make life worth living and worth all of the madness.