How to focus on the positive without neglecting your problems

I've been into self-help since I was 17.

I obsessed over it because it made me feel empowered:

• the growth mindset and being able to learn or do anything if you put your mind and time to it
• the ability to change your thinking patterns and your automatic responses to certain situations
• becoming more balanced, grounded and compassionate.

I saw it as a tool for becoming all round more satisfied with life.

It felt worthwhile to educate myself in these areas and put them into practice. We have one life, you know, so why not try to make it the best it can possibly be?

Side note: yes, there are some dangers associated with continuously chasing for better and treating yourself as a constant self-improvement project, but let's leave that for another time.

As a result, I obsessively listened to and read anything I could lay my hands on in search for answers on how to live a better life.

I soon realised that there are no one-size-fits-all answers and you must take what resonates and leave out the rest. You then blend the elements that resonate with you to create an approach that works for you.

And one area, which I believe requires this customisation is positive thinking.

On one hand, it makes intuitive sense that learning how to redirect your focus from the negative to the positive elements in each experience would help you be more appreciative and satisfied with life.

On the other hand, though, taking the concept too literally may wrongly put us on a path of ignoring problems and neglecting our emotions.

For example, what should you do when experiencing emotions that are not conducive to positivity? Should you bury them away and layer positive thoughts on top? And if so, with what result?

If you do that, you:

• run the risk of sweeping your issues under the rug only to have them resurface in the least expected moment
• lose the chance to solve any problem as finding solutions and making progress requires a sober assessment of the situation
• miss out on experiencing the full spectrum of emotions and the lessons they can teach you.

So, how can you focus on the positive without neglecting your problems? And on the flip side, how can you attend to your emotions and look at your problems without becoming negative?

These were questions I often asked myself in my early 20s and wasn't sure what attitude to take when things got difficult. It was one of those things where I took bits and pieces from different schools of thought and pieced together something that makes sense to me.

In this article, we will cover exactly that: how to focus on the positive without neglecting your emotions or problems.

A balanced approach: how to focus on the positive without neglecting your emotions and problems

1. Set your definitions straight

It's all about definitions.

Let's say you had a tough day at work, you're exhausted and received negative feedback from your boss. If your definition of positive thinking is enjoying yourself at all times, you will dismiss how you're feeling because it doesn't align with your narrow definition and you'll quickly find a distraction that will help you feel good in the moment.

But, if you define positive thinking as finding something positive in each experience, you might reflect on why you're feeling what you're feeling and learn from it, potentially drawing conclusions that will help you prevent a similar situation in the future.

The same goes for reframing what a negative event or emotion means to you. If you define a negative event or emotion as a symptom of something that isn't quite right and take it as a signal to direct your attention at a specific problem, you will approach it very differently to when you define it as an obstacle to your happiness, which needs to be avoided at all costs.

Adopting the right definitions helped me embed the unpleasant into what positive thinking consists of and made me realise that the two are not opposing concepts but can go together hand in hand.

2. Define your time frame

Your perspective on positive thinking also depends on the timeframe you adopt.

If you expect things to be positive every day, you might resist the events of everyday life because surely they won't all be positive. In my experience, focusing on the short term predisposes to dismissing issues that come up and rushing to transform them into positives. Sometimes, though, you need time to be sad, angry, disappointed or frustrated and experience these emotions fully. Sure, go ahead and draw lessons from these experiences and find positives in them, but be patient with how long this process takes.

On the other hand, if you extend your expectation for positive outcomes to the long term, you let go of the pressure that things should become positive ASAP. You expect things to turn out positively in the long run, yet still realise that in the short term, they will go sideways*. As a result, when things get difficult, I think you are more likely to give yourself room to experience the negative fully compared to the earlier scenario.

3. Treat obstacles as catapults

Instead of thinking about issues or difficult emotions as something to be avoided at all costs, you could reframe them as a sign that something needs to be addressed to get you to that positive outcome you are looking for in the long term.

In fact, isn't achieving your long-term positive outcomes directly proportional to your ability to address your problems, which catapult you to new heights?

I think it is.

So, if a positive thinker is someone who expects positive outcomes, doesn't it imply they must do what it takes to achieve them? Well, it probably doesn't because you can think positively till the kingdom comes without taking any action. But that's not reasonable.

So, a reasonable positive thinker will assess a situation objectively, without shying away from the ugly and either accept it or develop a plan to overcome it so that the positive outcomes they seek have a chance to come to life.

Burying things in the sand won't do you much good in the long term. As soon as a mild storm hits, all the things you buried over time will be uncovered, and you will need to look them in the eye sooner or later.

Don't know about you, but I choose sooner, in doses I can somewhat control and manage.

Conclusion

Wrapping up, I've been on both sides of the spectrum - from suppressing all negativity and getting wrapped up in positive affirmations and the likes, all the way to overanalysing any issue. Now, I try to balance both.

That's about it for this week.

*Morgan Housen talks about a similar concept in his book The Psychology of Money, which he calls growth amidst decay. The context in which he brings it up is different because it pertains to finance but it inspired me to use it in this article.