In therapy or in coaching, many sometimes encounter the advice to learn Positive Thinking, as a tool for transforming a self-sabotaging and draining negative thinking into something that supports and empowers.
Even if the intention behind this advice is a positive one, there never the less is a risk for an uncritical focus on positive thinking not being helpful at all, but rather that it leads to ignoring problems that may have to be confronted, and / or that it leads to feelings of guilt for thinking in negative terms.
A better term is therefore "True Thinking". This choice of wording points at the fact that negative thinking sometimes can be based on erroneous interpretations of reality, or that one imagines "a hidden meaning", or projects, one's preconceptions / fears / suspicions / interpretations into what one sees and hears from others.
Learning how to just become aware of unrealistic negative thinking is therefore an important first step. What one may benefit from learning next, is how to use both one's brain and heart in order to be able to perceive reality with awareness, in a realistic way, without preconceived judgment. In order to using "True Thinking" for being able to act in a conscious way, sense-fully, maturely, instead of re-acting out of emotional conditioned reflexes.
Watch a short video about the structure of negative thinking, and about True Thinking (8 minutes):
Even if the intention behind this advice is a positive one, there never the less is a risk for an uncritical focus on positive thinking not being helpful at all, but rather that it leads to ignoring problems that may have to be confronted, and / or that it leads to feelings of guilt for thinking in negative terms.
A better term is therefore "True Thinking". This choice of wording points at the fact that negative thinking sometimes can be based on erroneous interpretations of reality, or that one imagines "a hidden meaning", or projects, one's preconceptions / fears / suspicions / interpretations into what one sees and hears from others.
Learning how to just become aware of unrealistic negative thinking is therefore an important first step. What one may benefit from learning next, is how to use both one's brain and heart in order to be able to perceive reality with awareness, in a realistic way, without preconceived judgment. In order to using "True Thinking" for being able to act in a conscious way, sense-fully, maturely, instead of re-acting out of emotional conditioned reflexes.
Watch a short video about the structure of negative thinking, and about True Thinking (8 minutes):
About Negative Thinking, 8 minutes.
(Right-click here to download the video,
right-click here to download a pdf printout.)
For those with a spiritual focus, there is another variant of this video.
(Right-click here to download the video,
right-click here to download a pdf printout.)
For those with a spiritual focus, there is another variant of this video.
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