"It is not the place, nor the condition, but the mind alone that can make anyone happy or miserable."
Roger L’Estrange
Can we all agree that happiness is a positive emotion? Or that happiness is something that cannot exist in a negative state? Have you ever been happy and miserable at the same time? I haven’t. It goes back to not having enough room. If our minds are preoccupied with the negatives of our predicaments, where are we going to fit in the positive?
I conducted an experiment in ninth grade. I had been in a funk of negative-ness for weeks. I couldn’t figure out why I was so damn angry all the time. I won’t bore you with all the details; I’ll just say that one of my writing teacher said to me “fake it till you make”. I’m pretty sure that her point was if you fake that you are an author you’ll write, then you’ll get plenty of practice, and then one day you’ll become good and you will be a good write. So I wondered, if that works in the writing world why wouldn’t it in the emotional realm…Far fetched, no? Well I was willing to try.
My goal: Fake a smile 10 times a day. I know, I know, that sound horrible, but that was where I was at. So went around for a good week faking smiles to at least ten of the people I saw. After about a week or so I realized that those ten had become more like twelve. That meant there were a couple of honest to goodness smiles in there. Long story short I worked myself out of quite the icky period. It wasn’t spontaneous. It took quite a bit of false smiles, but I can truthfully say that by the beginning of tenth grade I was a genuinely happy person who genuinely smiled a lot. After years of contemplating why in the hell that would have worked, I understand a lot of the science behind my little experiment. It’s all to do with the endorphins releases when a person smiles. Interesting, no?
Anyway, it’s all about trying to have the whole a glass half full kind of attitude. Which is hard sometimes…Ok, a lot of the time, but the point is that your mind can make or break it. When you catch yourself calling your reflection the mirror fat, or when you call yourself stupid, or worthless you need to tell yourself to STOP!!! Get into the habit of recognizing the negative self talk and flip the switch. Comment on how sexy your hair looks or remind yourself how many people in your life love you. Find a few things positive to counteract the negativity. One day positivity will conquer those negatives, and you’ll be better for it.
