Staying positive in a tough economy

Staying positive is a challenging work for almost all of us whether one is at work or at home.

We are affected daily by too many negative behaviours from others or the environment.

If it happens to be work problems, failure to handle at workplace level, they can affect you even at home and if home issues are not handled properly as well, they can translate to work.

It is easy to be positive in a positive environment or to talk about being positive, yet when things are emotionally draining and negative, your positivity and behaviour is put to test.

When people think of having a positive attitude, they probably think it is just a mere plastering of a smile on their face and trying to be happy, true positive attitude makes your view of life seem broad, full of possibilities even when there seem to be impossibilities.

Most people let external events determine their attitude and its normal, what matters is either you react positively or negatively.

When things are going well, some people are in a good mood and when things go as not expected, they are in a bad mood.

That is a good recipe for failure, because your change of mood during bad times will affect how you behave and definitely, you can easily get trapped.

Many people become negative when depressed and when discouraging things seem to be surrounding them.

Their failure creates a negative attitude, which in turn creates more failure.

We should try by all means not to let events create our attitude and to do that, we must be able to create a positive attitude even in the face of the most difficult of challenges.

The following are ways that can help us to be positive:

Be constructive and positive about everything

Your mind will take on the aspect of the thoughts you have on a regular basis.

Reality is only a ruleset in becoming constructive and by that being negative is choosing to complain about the rules, whereas being positive is accepting the negatives and finding a way to live your best life within them.

On the same note, how you will behave will be influenced by your thoughts, so what we let into our minds should be guarded jealously.

It is advisable that we do constructive conversations that are beneficial. Any person who is constructive is not a time waster.

Always feed your mind with positive input

If you are what you eat holds true for your body, your mind is what you feed it as well.

The mind is the software of human beings and if corrupted, it has the capacity to affect your life.

The more you feed your mind with positive thoughts, the more you can attract great things into your life, and the more you configure your behaviour into positivity.

Listen to positive music and also develop a habit of reading, especially books that are encouraging.

Please note that you do not have to fight negative thoughts that have captured your mind, but the panacea is just thinking about the positive things and the negative thoughts will disappear by themselves.

Stop complaining

Let it be known that complaining does nothing to solve the problems you are facing.

If you are around people who complain a lot, get away from them as it can also affect you.

Complaints are a way of seeing everything negatively without considering any other explanation or without any

hope.

Complaining is just a road which leads to dissatisfaction and it builds up further to stress when you travel in it.

Never talk about your pains or your negative past or present, but always tell yourself you are doing well.

Trust me that if you do so, you can defeat negativity and related diseases that can arise due to stress, which is caused by thinking and complaining on things you do not have solution to.

Hang out with positive people

If you want to be positive, hang around with positive people: Eagles fly with eagles.

Being around positive people can do great wonders in our lives. But the problems with some people is that they do not know how and what it means to be positive.

On the contrary, other people know what being positive or being around positive people is, but they feel they are content with the status quo.

Indeed, we need more optimistic people in our life. It is better to stick to new friends who have a positive attitude than sticking with old friends who always complain and are pessimistic.

You should be able to control the number of negative people in your life.

Find a mentor/coach

Coaches help you to explore where you are in your career, where you want to go, and how you might get there.

The key to cultivating a positive mindset is to find someone you admire, who can teach you how they have done it.

Enduring the consequences of failure on your own can set you back and impact your efficiency.

In hard times, having a mentor will help you keep your head high and become positive about life.

There is no faster and more effective way to learn in life than to find a mentor.

Having someone who practically guides you and shares your worries with you can help you keep reassured that one day you will be successful.

When we allow negative thoughts in our minds, it will eventually translate into our behaviour and normally, our behaviour is shaped by what we believe or think.

When that continuously happens, a negative character will be in the making and obviously, when a negative culture is there, you will definitely become hopeless.

Being positive is an art, which does not always come easily and often has to be learned.

By building a resilient character, it can help you deal with stress, while minimising the impact on emotional, mental and physical well-being.

Being resilient does not mean being invulnerable to stress, but it does mean adjusting to and coping with stressful and difficult situations.

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Paul Kagame is the President of Rwanda. This article first appeared in The Guardian newspaper