Once upon a time I was a very negative pessimistic person, I was sad, I spent most of my time feeling sorry for myself. I blamed God and the world for giving me a life I felt I did nothing to deserve. I was 12, and far to bitter and jaded at that young age. In my defense I will say that I was going through a lot of trauma and turmoil with my family. I didn't know how to handle it. If you aren't raised in a healthy environment, if you aren't taught healthy communication, if you don't trust the people around you to protect you from your monsters, you are basically fending for yourself and making it up as you go. I did the best I could to cope with my "life", honestly I didn't do a very good job at all. I began drinking, smoking, and using heavy recreational drugs by the time I was 15 years old, I also started self harming in more ways than one by that age. I used cutting and eating disorders to control my emotions, my environment, and my self loathing. I was also looking for joy in all the wrong places. I felt my entire existence was a sin and that I should feel ashamed. Let me be clear that any negativity I experienced in my relationship with God was man made and not God made, and thank God now I know the difference. This is just a short summary of the person that I was before I chose to be happy, and yes, it was a choice.
First let me state that not all journeys are the same when it comes to finding your happiness but when I was seeking happiness, I had to learn that happiness is not found in another person, as much as I love my fiancé my happiness does not rely on her nor is it her responsibility. Happiness also isn't found in a places or things, I've had a little in life, and I've also had a lot, I've lived out of a car before, I've had a huge house, I was miserable in both because I hadn't yet made the choice. I've known miserable millionaires and happy poor people and vice versa. Yes, money, people, places, and things can be a wonderful distraction from the truth but if you rely on those things for your joy you will find that your joy is as temporary as those people, places, and things can sometimes be. True happiness comes from self awareness, I had to ask myself what things made me happy and what things didn't and simply make changes. Now happiness is a mindset that I choose every morning when I wake up, I continue choosing it throughout the day and I reinforce it every night before I fall asleep. For me I do that through prayer, talking to God, and positive self talk all day, I find that keeps me focused on constantly looking for the good in things, seeking solutions, and thinking of the bigger picture. Others may choose to do it through meditation, cognitive retraining, positive affirmations, visual cue reminders, so on and so forth. Do the research and find what works for you to pull you out of that chronic history of negative thinking.
Are you really aware of how much power your thoughts have over you ? Are you aware that your thoughts directly effect everything down to the way your cells react and heal? Did you know that positive thinking can aid in healing your body from the inside out? It can reduce stress and depression, it improves the immune system, cardiovascular health, and improves all around mental and physical health! It can also aid in healing the people around you. Now, think about how a negative mindset can effect you in the opposite way, could you be making yourself sick, are you negatively thinking yourself into an early grave or exacerbating your symptoms? I definitely was, and I decided I was sick and tired of it. I was tired of making excuses for not changing it, and letting it effect the people around me negatively. We are small in this expansive universe but our impact is enormous. It's the butterfly effect. I decided I wanted to be positive and spread happiness, hope, and healing. I didn't want negativity, sadness, hurt, and pain in my life anymore and I didn't want to put that into the lives of the people around me, do you? Make a decision to be to be happy, to be joyful, to be kind, to look for the solutions and not dwell on the problems in life, choose to have a positive outlook and a positive mindset and nourish that mindset with your environment and the people you interact with, retrain your brain, and start healing yourself and the world around you one positive thought and interaction at a time, make a choice, put it into action and start changing your life for the better. Much Love.