Challenge #2: Develop a Positive Mindset by Keeping a Positivity Journal

My first 30-days challenge, becoming an early riser, successfully ended yesterday. This month, I’m hoping to develop a positive mindset by keeping a positivity journal. This challenge is part of my resolution to perform twelve 30-days challenges this year.

I have what I would call in pseudo-scientific terms “a realistic mind with negative tendencies”. I enjoy my realistic mindset a lot because I am as objective as possible when I face different situations. The negative tendencies, however, I could live without.

Negative thoughts bring nothing constructive into your life. They only bring you down, make you feel sad and depressed. You want to avoid them to keep a healthy mind. Positive thoughts, on the other hand, bring you well-being and make you happy. You want a positive mindset on your quest for success.

Overly positive individuals turn off some people. I know, I was one of those people. I used to think being positive was futile. I used to think that trying to perceive reality for something it was not was useless. This realistic approach works well in theory, but in practice, it does not. It’s absolutely impossible to have a 100% objective mind. We’re humans after all, not robots. Why not try to change the negative tendencies into positive ones instead?

By keeping a positivity journal every day for 30 days, I hope to develop a more positive mindset. There’s more to it, so here’s how I’m going to do it!

What’s a positivity journal?

A positivity journal is simply a journal I will use to write everything positive that happened to me during the day. I will also perform a post-mortem of the day, where I will reflect objectively on the events that happened and my reactions towards these events. The goal is to try to find ways to react to negative stimuli that would make me happier.

I will probably come up with a simple worksheet to help me write this positivity journal during the challenge and I’ll share it with you once I find a format that works well for me.

Keeping the positivity journal is not the challenge itself

The real challenge is trying to bend my thinking towards positivity. Keeping the positivity journal is only the mean I’ve found to turn it into a measurable goal. Here’s how I hope to achieve a more positive mindset:

1. Learn to identify negative thoughts

For many, negative thinking is a habit inked into our brains and we don’t even notice we’re doing it. The first step will be to identify these thoughts so that I can start improving them. I don’t expect to be able to do this on the spot at first, but it should come with practice.

2. Turn the negative thoughts into positive ones

Once I identify a negative thought, I will try to see its positive side. For example, say I have thoughts about losing my job. I could see losing my job as a very negative, world-shattering event, but there’s another side to it. It could be a great opportunity to sell my house, sell my car and live my secret dream of backpacking around the world for one year. That’s the positive side.  The thought of losing my job does not seem so bad when I see it as a new opportunity.

3. Stay away from people and things that have a negative influence over me

I will try to stay away from the people who sap my positive energy and I will spend more time with positive and optimistic people. In the past, I’ve found that this helped me remain positive during hard times.

What are the rules?

It’s pretty simple: write in my positivity journal every day for 30 days. That’s all there is to it. I will tolerate no exception!

The positivity journal is a journal I must feel good, proud and motivated about when I return to read it. I will not allow myself to write any negative thoughts in it. Instead, I will write down their positive counterparts. Here’s an example:

Negative mindset: “Today there was a huge snowstorm and I have to go outside and waste 2 hours shoveling my driveway. I’m so sick and tired of all this snow.”

Positive mindset: “Today there was a huge snowstorm and it’s a pretty good occasion for me to go outside and do a 2 hours workout shoveling my driveway. It will be pretty enjoyable to listen to my iPod at the same time.”

Keeping the positivity journal should be straightforward enough, right?

How did it go?

Well, I’m just getting started on the positivity journal! I’ll make sure to post updates here as the challenge progresses if anything interesting happens. I’ll add this post to the sidebar so you can refer to it anytime.

What do you think? Do you see another way I could develop a positive mindset? Do you think I will benefit from this positivity journal?