There isn't really a way to address this without sounding new age or at least like some yoga-hippie type, but it has been quite a central theme for me for a while. Positive vs. negative thinking. I've had problems with negativity for ages, and no, contrary to my favorite motto at certain times, it is not realism, it's straight-up pessimism.
I have had a tendency to visualize future a lot, and for some reason, these scenarios always involve stuff I'm worried about and do not want happening. I don't know why, perhaps I feel that if I try to get used to the thought of this bad stuff happening, I sort of numb my mind to it and it won't be so bad? And this very subconsciously, because anyone can see that logic doesn't work irl. Positive attracts positive, and negative likewise, although more like negative repels everything.
It was about a year ago when I finally discovered a piece of advice I found useful, because it conveys the message so clearly there's nothing to decipher, it's all there: think about what you want, don't think about what you don't what. That brought my attention to the fact I had been concentrating a lot on things I didn't want, for no apparent reason. It makes you feel bad and that reflects everything you do, say and are. Which then affects what happens to you and what doesn't.
I remember the times I've had the most fun in my life. Those were times when I was feeling great, a lot was going on and stuff was exciting. I always thought I felt great because of said circumstances, but maybe the way I felt also had something to do with those circumstances even forming in the first place. It might be a chicken and egg type of question, but negativity had no part in it.
Here's the new age part: in a way, I've started believing that what happens to you is often the direct result of what you were expecting and visualizing, deliberately or not. Source: my life.
The rational explanation for this is, simplified, this: if you don't think anything good will happen anyway, you don't bother doing anything to promote it. Therefore, nothing happens. If you think you might win the lottery, you buy a ticket and may or may not win. If you think you won't, you don't buy the ticket and with 100% certainty, don't win the lottery. This was of course a crude simplification but it illustrates the point.
Even while writing this I had to fight off some completely imaginary and speculative negative thoughts that almost had me in their grip for a second, that is how accustomed I am to this way of thinking. This is simply how it goes: whatever you think about, grows bigger in your mind and takes up more space. You can choose to shut the negative stuff out, which makes it diminish. When I first tried it, last summer, everything seemed completely different in a split second. Apparently I wasn't well-trained enough to maintain that mindset, but here's to another try.
