Is your glass half-empty or half full?

Positivity – How it affects your life

How you answer this old but still reliable question about positive thinking may reflect your outlook on life, your attitude toward yourself, and whether you’re optimistic or pessimistic – and it may even affect your health.

Gabriel Andrade from the National Library of Medicine "Positive thinking suggests that to accomplish good things and pursue happiness, human beings must constantly have positive thoughts and prevent negative thoughts from entering their mind."

Did you know that people with a positive attitude have a slightly smaller chance of getting a heart attack or other coronary disease? Some studies have even shown that personality traits such as optimism and pessimism can affect many areas of your physical and mental health and well-being. With a positive attitude, you will less likely have lower rates of depression and stress. When facing a health crisis, actively cultivating positive emotions can boost your immune system and counter depression. Positive thinking has so many benefits example. You will be more creative, handle stress, and have a longer life span. These are just a few examples. There are many more things that you will achieve with a positive attitude.

Positive thinking doesn't mean that you can ignore less pleasant situations in your life. Positive thinking means that you approach unpleasantness more positively and productively. It would be best if you tried to find at least something positive in almost any situation. And positivity doesn't instantly appear in your life. You will need to change your attitude and have a talk with yourself. I'll give you a few examples; you spill half a water bottle on your clothes. Okay, it's not a good thing. Usually, people would swear, and it may ruin their day. But with a positive attitude, you can think example like this; alright, my clothes are a bit wet, but they will dry up, and it was just water, so it doesn't leave any marks on my clothes. So, try to find at least something positive in most things, and it will change your whole attitude to a more positive way. It will affect your entire life in a better way. You will start slowly noticing that you enjoy almost everything at least a bit more than before.

You can see always two sides from things, example: “I've never done it before.” or “It's an opportunity to learn something new.”

“It's too complicated.” or “I'll tackle it from a different angle.”

At some point, you will start seeing the whole world from a different, more beautiful perspective.

The world is full of opportunities! You have plenty of time to decide what you want to do in your life, think wisely and do whatever you like. And you can always change your job or school, even the country where you live.

Because we have been talking only about positivity, we should talk a bit about other emotions. For example, if I get into a fight with someone, my anger, and other emotions might control me to the point where I can't think about anything else since my feelings defeat my common sense.

Or maybe when you are stressed because you have so many things to do on the same day and you will be kind of paralyzed because of all of the things, it can be hard to be positive.

Accepting those bad feelings will be part of everyone's life, and they are occasionally unavoidable, so you should think of ways to make yourself feel better. It depends on what you like to do. Maybe you should eat your favorite food or go home to chill and watch Netflix.

It's up to you. We cannot control the things that happen to us, but we can control how we deal with them. So don't focus on the problem. Focus on the solution.

Jasse Heikkilä:

“I have my own experience of depression and overall bad mood. Those two years of depression were probably the worst time in my life. I lost interest in my favorite things like sports and found it hard to do homework and easy tasks. For me, the cure was just being forced to do more things and leaving outside of my comfort zone and apartment to meet friends and spend time with them, watch hockey games, and find new interests. And of course, when I found a job, it helped a lot too because I had something to do on weekdays, so I wasn't just lying at home. So I suggest that you try something new like reading or playing volleyball, it will probably be fun!”

Ferran Mortés

“From my experience, I have to say that I used to feel a lack of motivation back in secondary school. I used to arrive home after school and take long naps after lunch. It was an overall feeling of “what’s the point?”. So, when I finished school and started doing things I enjoyed and felt passion for, I started to see that my life wasn’t pointless and that I was not doing what I enjoyed the most. After a few years of focusing on my passions, and myself, sports and traveling, I have grown and learned so much. The things I used to hate doing like cleaning, doing homework, reading, and other day-to-day tasks, I have even started to like by just simply approaching them with a positive mindset.”

Jasse Heikkilä

Sources: Better Health: Negative emotions James Clear: Positive thinking Hopkins Medicine: The power of positive thinking WebMD: Positive thinking overview