Wednesday, May 16, 2012

The Power of Your Thoughts

As many of you know I am a Cognitive Behavioral Therapist. I describe this to new clients as believing that your thoughts lead to your feelings and your feelings in turn lead to your interactions or reactions to situations and others around you. I truly believe that many of my clients could escape the invisible chains trapping them in depression, anxiety, and fear if they could change their thoughts to more powerful and positive strength based thinking. I have observed my clients make drastic changes in their life as a whole just by changing negative and self destructive thoughts into powerful positive thoughts that are optimistic and hopeful.

There is much research coming out in numerous books and articles on the power of positive thinking. Individuals such as Martha Beck talk of creating vision boards with pictures and words on a poster board that individuals look at daily that have symbolic meaning to what they want in their lives. There are beliefs and research to back up the notion that when individuals focus everyday on things they want in their lives that they are more prone to recognize every day things that point them in that direction and help them achieve their goals. The other belief is that if individuals utilize the words "can't, won't, and messages of doubt" that they will focus on those things around them that support their view that what they want in life is impossible. If you doubt the future of a relationship do not be surprised if it fails, if you doubt your abilities do not be surprised to find you never fully experience the power of your talents, and if you believe your past defines your future do not be surprised to find you never leave the past behind to focus on the positives now in the present. To sum up this concept what you focus on will direct your steps and your path in life. If you do not believe in success then you will pull towards anything that keeps you from achieving success as it supports your distorted view point. If you believe things are possible you will be invested in taking off the blinders of doubt and seeing options that support your success that may have been in front of you all along.

I talk to my clients about tunnel vision and wearing blinders on the sides of their eyes that only allow them to see a small part of the picture in their life. I truly believe many individuals at times want a healthy happy relationship, marriage, financial success, peace, hope yet they have worn blinders so long due to past hurts by others or disappointments that no matter how much they want success in all areas of their lives they fear it doesn't exist for them ( a thought that turns into a belief ). We all have choices in life and we do choose which path we go down in our lives whether it be in believing in love, trust, success, fulfillment, and healing or believing that none of this is possible. Our circumstances and our past do not define our present and our future. Each moment we have the choice to choose our path and determine our future.

As you work on changing your negative view points and seeing life as positive be careful what you speak out loud. To think a negative thought is powerful in itself but I warn individuals to be careful what they speak out loud and claim. Even when you speak negative thoughts you could be creating negative thoughts in others and compound the issue of challenging your own negative thinking. I see this in working with couples when I hear one partner verbalize doubt about love in the relationship or the future of the relationship and you can see how their negative thoughts create negative thinking in the other partner. Another example of this would be speaking negatively about your job and it in turn creates negative thoughts in others about considering you for the promotion. Challenge your negative thinking and begin to speak out words that are hopeful not doubtful and positive and not negative. Thoughts can be changed and when thoughts are changed you will notice your feelings begin to change. When feelings change you will find that you find more strength, your relationships are deepened, your eyes are open to more opportunities and your sails are fully open with you taking charge and sailing towards those things you never THOUGHT were possible.


Recommended Reading: Norman Vincent Peale "The Power of Positive Thinking"
                                     

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