Do you try to control things that are beyond your grasp? Maybe you’re worrying yourself day and night over things you must let go of. There are many things in life that you cannot fix no matter how hard you try, so when you learn how to release negativity and flow with positive thoughts instead, your life will be much better.
Have you ever read the Serenity Prayer? Recovery groups across the country (like AA) use it to help people realize that there are some things they can’t control. The prayer asks for God to help you accept those things you cannot change and help you be brave enough to change what you can. The real key is the power to know the difference, as this matters tremendously.
Twelve Things You Can Control in Your Life
If you were to sit down and examine all the troubles in your life right now, what things do you have the power to change? Upon closer examination, you will notice that you’re powerless to control many things that keep you up at night.
So why are you wasting your time and energy fretting about things beyond your power? If you want to release positive thoughts and create an optimistic mindset to thrive, then worry about the following things you can control.
1. You Do Control Your Expectations in Life
Sadly, you didn’t get a say in where you were born or the family you were born into, but you can be successful at whatever card life has dealt you. Do you know that there are people who would change places with you in a heartbeat?
Think about some of the greats throughout history who received a pretty crappy hand but rose above their challenges to make something of their life. Look at Hellen Keller. According to Live Science, Keller was blind and deaf due to a disease ravaging her body at nineteen months.
Yet, she was a pioneer in the blind community. She learned to thrive against all odds, and Keller even wrote a book about her life story. She was the first visually impaired person to graduate from college with a degree from Radcliffe University.
It would help if you erased the preconceived limitations you put on yourself. Once you learn to accept yourself for how you are, you will start learning your true potential.
2. Whether To Stop or Keep Going
You will encounter obstacles every day in your life. Sometimes these obstacles will be significant, but you must decide whether you keep going or stop. You’ve probably heard the saying that winners never quit, and quitters never win. However, you must use wisdom to know when it’s time to sever ties. Maybe you have a job that’s making you completely miserable.
You choose to stay or go, and only you can make this decision. Sure, you must continue and become more resilient, but there are other times you need to learn when to cut your losses. Sadly, no one will give you a participation trophy just for living each day, but you can build success along the way that makes it worthwhile.
3. You Control Your Choice of Friends and Your Inner Circle
How often did your parents not like a friend because they didn’t feel they were a good influence on you? As an adult, you have more control over who’s in your inner circle. Do the people you hang with enhance your positive thoughts or are they a source of negativity?
When you release negativity in your life, you must also release toxic people who drag you down. If you think these people don’t have much bearing on your life, you should consider a study cited by JAMA Internal Medicine.
The research discovered that negative interactions in close relationships heighten the risk of heart disease. All this stress and pessimism takes a toll on your body and affects your heart.
4. Your Health
While there are many sicknesses that you encounter that you have no control over, there are many parts of your health you do manage. Are you eating a healthy diet without processed and sugary foods, or are you a junk food addict?
You make a conscious choice every time you take a bite of food, and you jeopardize your health when you don’t fuel your system with protein, fruits, and vegetables. Releasing negativity means letting go of those toxic substances you drink and eat daily.
5. Time and Focus Are Within Your Control
You control what you do from when you wake up in the morning until you climb into bed at night. The clock’s always ticking, and it’s a rat race at times, but you’re the one who makes the decisions on what you do with this space.
You can choose to release negativity and have a great day, or you can dwell on all your problems and have a miserable one. The roughly sixteen hours of awake time is a blank canvas for you.
6. Where You Live
You need to move if you don’t like where you live. How often do you hear people complain about their city, the lack of job opportunities, or things to do? You get to say where you live, as this is your choice. How can you think positively and have a good mindset when you’re miserable with your location?
7. How Much Sleep You Get
Unless you have a sleep disorder, you dictate how much sleep you get each night. You will pay the next day if you stay up until two in the morning scrolling social media. Having a set bedtime and getting sufficient rest is part of keeping a healthy system, and in most cases, you get to control whether your energy tank is running low due to a lack of sleep.
8. Your Level of Happiness
You might think that this sounds impossible, but you can be happy. You may feel like the world is crashing around you. However, you have the power to release negativity and set your mind towards positive thoughts. You make a choice every day whether you’re going to be miserable or happy, and what you choose affects you and those closest to you.
9. Your Education
You control your education level. Some folks drop out of school early and choose a life of physical labor. Others decide to go to a university and work with their mind. People often think those that have more money were born with a silver spoon in their mouths.
Conversely, many of these folks worked hard and educated themselves to get where they are today. You change your future when you release negativity and the mindset that you can’t do something. Thinking positive thoughts would remind you that a little bit of hard work will get you ahead.
10. You Control Whether You Set an Environment That Builds Positive Thoughts
Look at the room you’re in right now. Do you like the color of the walls, the carpeting, or the pictures that hang around you? You can change anything in this space you don’t like.
Your environment is essential as it’s the place where you facilitate growth. If you don’t like something about it, then you can alter it to fit your preference. Maybe your space is cluttered, and it’s not helping you release negativity from your life.
You can declutter your space and life by choosing to cut some things loose. Make sure your room is comfortable and conducive to positive thoughts, so you can be the person you can be.
11. Your Presentation
Are you guilty of judging a book by its cover? Society has trained us to judge folks by appearance, but you know you must have a deeper level of acceptance of people. The way you present yourself to the world is entirely within your control.
If you come to work with dirty clothes, wet hair, and no shower, people will not see you as someone successful. However, folks will notice if you come in dressed your best, smelling great, and ready to tackle the day. Remember that people will treat you the way you treat yourself.
12. You Control How You Treat Others
Are you kind to other people, or do you rush through life thinking only of yourself? If you see a senior citizen struggling to put groceries into their car, would you stop to help? Being kind means allowing your positive thoughts to leap into action.
Kind people will go out of their way to help others and don’t care what other people might think. When you release negativity in your life, you will notice that the positive stuff starts flooding within and without.
Final Thoughts on Knowing How to Increase Positive Thoughts and Focus Only on the Things You Can Control
It’s easy to get into your headspace, upset by things you can’t alter in this life. However, the more you focus on how wrong things are, the more it hinders you from fixing them.
When you get into the right mindset and think positive thoughts, you will realize that you can tackle anything life throws your way. If you don’t like something, change it! Life is way too short for you to be miserable.
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