Dear Coach Paradise,
I hope you can help me with this, because this is very frustrating to me. I have been studying using the law of attraction, and am paying attention to my thoughts. If I have a negative thought … I didn't invite it in … it just popped into my head soooo … am I supposed to do what I did years ago to try to become more positive, which was when I got a negative thought, I visualized a giant red hand with stop written on it? My massage therapist says not to use this image, but just to let the thought pass through. Am I supposed to deliberately try to redirect the thought? How do I stop the same negative (and destructive) thought from occurring over and over?
Frustrated in Paradise,
Dear Frustrated
Great question! Many people struggle with exactly the same thing and try to resist the thought and then beat themselves up because they are having a negative thought.
Acknowledge the thought and that it doesn't feel good, and don't beat yourself for having it — that's just a double whammy and invites more of the same (negative thoughts and beating yourself up). Treat yourself the way you would treat a child you love who was having a bad day — i.e. with love and compassion. Then, ask yourself how you would rather be feeling and how would you prefer things to be (including having positive, pleasant thoughts).
Remember that jumping from a really depressing, negative place to bliss and yippee is too big a gap to cross all at once. All you have to do is reach for a thought that makes you feel just a little bit better and then a little bit better until what you experience is relief. Sigh. Always reach for a thought that makes you feel a little bit better. If you want a great example of what I am talking about, listen to an Abraham-Hicks tape or DVD (Abraham-Hicks.com) where you get to watch or listen to people who are being helped to "soothe their energy." Your massage therapist is right — it is not about thought control. It's about finding some way to feel better in the moment. For example:
— "Every day in every way I am getting better and better at noticing my thoughts and soothing my energy."
— "Every day presents so many opportunities for me to refocus and I am getting better and better at refocusing and noticing how when I feel better, positive things just seem to happen!"
The secret is really about learning how to feel good and, when you don't, to move back into that place of feel-good, tapped-in, tuned-in, turned-on energy.
From that place, the sky's the limit, and you are headed downstream toward the realization of all that you desire.
To your joyous downstream journey,
Coach Paradise
Editor's note: Coach Paradise (AKA Anne Nayer), Professional Life Coach, is a member of the International Coaching Federation, an MSW clinical social worker-psychotherapist and a medical case manager with 30 years experience working with people of all shapes, sizes and challenges. For further information about her services, call 774-4355, visit her website or email her.