Do you struggle to stay positive and often have depressing, sad, or intrusive thoughts? There may be some behaviors you can change and some things you can do differently in your life that will make your thought life happier and more positive.
5 Things That Make Your Thought Life More Positive
Here are some of our best bits of advice for how to have better, happier thoughts.
1. Limit News Content
They say that bad news is what gets people interested in reading the newspaper or clicking on the news website. It’s bad news that attracts attention. So, that creates a cycle of negative news stories that tend to fill up most of the news programs and websites. This means you will be absorbing tons of negative content if you regularly check out news sites.
We are not suggesting that you completely stay away from watching the news and reading news websites, but we do recommend that you limit how much time you spend there. Try to keep it to about 15 to 20 minutes a day, and then balance it out with something positive. You’re bound to see several negative news stories in that short span of time, and you need some way to counteract it.
Simply reducing your time spent watching the news will help dramatically with your thought life, allowing you more space to absorb positive content and create positive thoughts. Keep in mind that your thought life is governed by what you watch, listen to, read, and absorb into your mind.
2. Keep a Clean Home
A number of studies have shown that reducing the amount of clutter in your home and keeping your house clean will do wonders for your stress and your anxiety.
If you’re feeling fearful or stressed out, you’re likely to have negative thoughts. Even if everything seems to be going well, if you’re in a stressful environment, your thoughts can be unwelcoming.
You want your home to be a place where you can feel safe and comfortable, and if it is kept organized and tidy, that will help tremendously. This is why we suggest spending time every day to clean at least a little bit in your home. You can even try our recommended maids in New York to get professional cleaning so that you don’t have to handle it all yourself.
Keeping your home clean can make a big difference in your mental health for a lot of reasons. Reducing dust can help with anxiety and just how you feel physically.
You can also sleep better when your home is cleaner, and that helps your mental state too. Keeping things organized and in their place will make it easier to find them and help you with your focus and your stress levels.
3. Intentionally Think Positive Thoughts
This tip isn’t as simple as saying you have to think positive to have positive thoughts. Instead, we want to share with you a few methods you can use to produce positive thoughts and get yourself thinking more positively all the time.
Our first suggestion is to set aside a time each day to list the things you’re thankful for. You can do this mentally, but it will be more helpful if you write them down or say them out loud. Spend about 5 or 10 minutes a day doing this, and you will be surprised how much more positive your thought life is.
It’s also helpful to call or message someone each day to thank them for some way they’ve been a help and a blessing to you. Once again, this centers your mind on thankful, positive thoughts.
You can also set aside time each day to absorb positive content. Watch or listen to things that are pleasing to you and that you know won’t be triggering or negative in any way. Doing this intentionally each day will help with your thought life and will transform it.
4. Get Adequate Sleep
Did you know that your sleep schedule affects your mental health and what you’re thinking about? When you don’t get enough sleep, you’re more likely to be stressed, depressed, and anxious. So, those who are running on a lack of sleep will tend to have negative thoughts.
What we’re trying to recommend here is that you get enough sleep each day, between six and eight hours of sleep every night. Don’t count the time where you’re just lying in bed on your phone or staying awake but trying to sleep. You need to count the hours you actually spend sleeping.
Intentionally getting the right amount of sleep will do wonders for your mental state. You should have more positive thoughts and be more likely to think happy things. You’re going to be less likely to be depressed, lethargic, and sad. Your emotions will be in check more often, so it will be easier to regulate them.
5. Spend Time with Positive People
It is often our friends that bring us down and cause us emotional turmoil. If you have friends who are always unthankful and complaining or who constantly say negative things, you may need to find new friends. It would be wise to intentionally spend time with people who are positive and who say positive and encouraging things.
This will help your mental state and encourage positive thinking from you. We are in some ways a product of our environment, and that environment is partially made-up of our friends.
The people we spend time with, whether on social media, the Internet, or in real life, will affect how we think. If those people are positive, your thinking will tend to be more positive.
Identify the people in your life who tend to have pleasant things to say as well as those who are more negative. Consider how you’re spending your time and on purpose look for ways to spend more time with the positive people and less time with the negative ones. This may take some time to work out, but it will be worth the effort you put into it in order to encourage positive thinking.