Marisa Peer explains why humans scan for danger first: it kept us alive. She suggests accepting some negative thinking when it protects you, then deliberately shift to mostly positive thoughts. Tell your mind detailed, present-tense expectations of what you want instead.
Chapters
I know every day we read stuff and hear stuff that talks about positive thinking. Just be positive, think positive, Be positive. Visualize yourself as positive. But here's the thing. You probably haven't been told. You're wired to be negative. You might think, really wired to be negative. Oh, yes. I was in Australia recently and I noticed that every day I had to do two things. When I walked to the pool, I had to stamp my feet really hard en route from the house to the pool so that snakes would hear the noise and slither away. I had to shake out my shoes in case poisonous spiders were in there. So I was being negative. I was thinking about snakes and looking for poisonous spiders in my shoes. And that's why we're negative, because years ago, that's what kept us alive. Now, I've been to Africa many times, and when you go on a safari, you start looking for footprints of lions and lion droppings. And then you're careful. You're always thinking, there could be a lion there, there could be a lion there. You're very careful. You don't leap out of your jeep. You look around. So it's negative. We look for danger. And I still do that today. If my daughter was walking home late at night, if I was walking home late at night, I look at the traffic, I come off my phone, I'm thinking about danger. I lock my doors at night, I put the alarm on when I leave. Does that mean I'm a negative person? No, but it means in order to be safe, I have to think of negative things. Here's an example. You put your seatbelt on to be safe, on a plane, in a car. Are you being negative? Yes. You're thinking about, if you don't, you could be killed. So I'm telling you this for you to understand. It is wired into you to be negative in order to survive. So it's okay to think negative things a little bit each day. But don't get carried away. When you get on a plane, you put yourself seat belt on to be safe. You don't spend the whole flight thinking, I'm gonna get killed. I'm gonna be propelled out of this plane any minute. I'm going to die. We are wired to be a little bit negative to be safe. That doesn't mean you're a negative person. It means it's actually easier to fall back into negative behavior. I knew that would go wrong. I knew that wouldn't work out. I knew I'd messed that up. I knew this was a bad idea. You don't need that kind of negative beh. You can have a little negativity in your day only if its outcome is to protect you. Once you've done that, stop being negative and move into being positive. You see, the problem is we think, well, I'm not positive because I thought a negative thought. Turn that around. Think 90% positive thoughts and 10% negative. And then you won't beat yourself up for not being Ms. Pollyanna or Mr. Pollyanna every day. You'll understand. Oh, I'm doing what my mind wants me to do. Your mind has one job. Here it is. Your mind's job is to keep you safe on the planet against what were once actually not great odds. And for your mind to do its job, you have got to do your job. Tell your mind what you want. Tell it how you want to be. Tell your mind what you expect of yourself every day using detailed, descriptive, positive, relevant, up to the minute language. And when you do your job as well as that, guess what? Your mind does its job as well as that too. And now you have Win, win. You're a winner, not a loser. It's easy once you start. And I know you can do it, because if you do it enough, it stops being what you do and it becomes who you are. And then your life really will. If you'd like to learn more, sign up for my free masterclass with mindvalley, where you are going to learn how to make your mind your best friend, your most supportive ally. And you'll be surprised at how easy it is and how effective it is. I really look forward to seeing you there.
