15 Ways To Get Rid Of Negativity From Your Mind
Quite a number of people have constantly searched on Google for stuff like ways to get rid of negativity from their minds. Well, stick around as I show you how to overcome it.
Are you discouraged by the entourage of negative thoughts you entertain every day? Do you feel there are no solutions to negativity?
Studies have shown it’s quite absurd to go on for a long time without thinking about something or anything in particular. It’s a revolutionary characteristic of our kind and an important part of us.
This proves you would always be engaged in a line of thought, be it positive or negative.
When you are mentally positive, you can rest assured of happiness and peace.
On the other hand, when you are mentally negative, you may tend to wallow in anxiety, depression, and distress which becomes of great disadvantage to you socially, emotionally, and otherwise.
This is because your state of mind affects other parts of your life, and it reflects how you see the world and others around you.
Even with all the many odds attached to negativity, you may occasionally find your thought drifting in this direction.
By simply understanding how to keep track of your thoughts and reestablish your focus on something more productive, you can get rid of negativity for good.
It’s that simple and very possible. Below are 15 steps to help you do just that.
1. Identify your negativity triggers
There is no big bang theory to negativity. It all starts with a trigger. Be it emotional, physical, social, etc.
Negativity begins with a thought and thrives when those thoughts are attached to an unfavourable event or happening, an aggravating life occurrence, or even an idea.
They are more of the fuel that kickstarts the wheels of mental negativity and keeps it rolling. To identify your negativity triggers you have to run an honest personal introspection of yourself.
By simply asking yourself over and over again what causes you to think negatively, you would get a load of ideas that would retrace your steps to the very beginning.
Write down those ideas that come to mind and go through them carefully. Then try to work out how any of these ideas are connected to an experience or an unpleasant event in the past.
By doing these you are identifying the root cause of your negativity and making the first bold step to getting rid of it.
As well as discover ways to stop nagging & get what you want.
2. Disconnect yourself from them
Disconnecting yourself from the already identified triggers entails staying away from anything that causes you to think negatively.
Be it the news, the physical location of a catastrophic event, a self-devaluing thought, etc. Detach yourself from them intentionally and completely.
When you do this, the temptation that comes with these ideas popping up in your mind is reduced. Your mind becomes more immune to them, and it becomes much easier to escape the snare of negativity at every point in time.
So, stay far away from your triggers and practice better ways to reinstate your concentration on something else immediately.
3 Find time to meditate
Keeping a keen track of your thought has never been much easier with meditation. Meditation opens you up to a more conscious mood of your existence.
Meditating is a beneficial tip for becoming a better version of yourself every day.
When meditating you become keener on what happening within you, what thoughts are flowing through your head, and what ideas you are entertaining as prominent or important.
This would help you to quickly identify what thoughts are negative and prevent your mind from diving deep into them.
Meditation also has a way of opening you up to a more peaceful and settling mood thereby reducing stress and anxiety; both of which are major progenitors of negativity.
By practising meditation daily, you are bound to become more optimistic mentally and watch your thought carefully.
4. Run a vocabulary reorientation
Words are powerful. They are effective, they are potent and if I was to exaggerate, I would say they are alive.
Words are capable of relaying different messages to your brain depending on which one you use and how you use them.
When you are fond of using negative language on yourself, you create a result of negativity because you have given your brain a reason to retain it and by extension caused you to believe it because you repeat it.
Repeating something has come to be the fastest way to get anything stuck in your memory for a longer time.
Unfortunately, this applies to both the negative and positive information you repeat and most of us are oblivious to this.
So, take out the trash in your vocabulary. Replace words like weak, tired, stupid, failure e.tc with words like strong, smart, winner e.tc. and watch negativity die slowly in the world of your mind.
5. Develop an attitude of gratitude
Constant gratitude should be an everyday lifestyle. It is a positive trigger to being polite and respectful to others.
When you begin to enroot an attitude of gratitude, you are giving attention to the more positive things happening to you like where you are in life, how far you have come, and many more uncountable blessings you are likely to overlook when you complain and grumble.
By also expressing gratitude you are sending a message of contentment to the universe which will return the same energy by bringing desirable things your way.
Choose to be grateful no matter where you are in life today. Refuse the urge to complain and tie your happiness to achieving all your many goals.
6. Change your circle of friends
This is among the fantastic ways to get rid of negativity from your mind, and that cannot be overemphasized.
Friends have a unique way of getting at us and influencing us. They could affect your paradigm of certain things and make you see the world through their glasses.
That remains for a fact and it’s alright to adopt certain ideas from people around us as true. It only becomes a problem when these friends of ours see the world in a negative light.
From their spouse to their boss, their coworkers and to the traffic, they would always find a way to build negativity around everything.
This would become evident in what they say and how they think. By being around these kinds of people you are increasing the risk of falling into negativity because negative energy is very contagious.
You can work out this step by simply being decisive about on much and to what extent people can influence you.
Or better still drop some friends that instigate you to think negatively and don’t be scared to pick up new ones. Remember your peace of mind is what is at stake here and that should be your utmost priority.
7. Observe regular exercise
Recent scientific research into how our minds are affected by our everyday activities has shown that exercise helps reduce stress and anxiety.
When you exercise regularly your body produces ‘Endorphins’, which are vital for mood boosting. With exercise, you don’t have to go through your day restless and stressed out and therefore negativity becomes a question.
Goal setting is a vital part of exercising. By initiating exercise into your everyday schedule, you become more self-appreciating because you would tend to observe every exercise session on time and diligently.
Find out the time today and hit the gym, it could be for an hour or less but it remains beneficial for a positive mind.
Also, Read 50 Daily Success Habits For Exceptional People.
8. Stop chasing external validation
There is a difference between respecting the opinions of ideas of others and believing the opinions of others.
Sadly, many of us don’t see the thin line between both and pay attention to everything someone says about us.
When you do this, you are unconsciously opening the door of your mind to negativity because people are good at finding fault in others. This is yet one of the phenomenal ways to get rid of negativity in your mind.
By listening to their negative opinions, you may tend to constrict your mind to the negativity in those statements which is very unhealthy.
Begin to understand that your opinions are important and even more important when it relates to you. stop placing exterior validation above internal validation and start listening to yourself more.
9. Be generous to yourself
Being generous to yourself entails treating yourself with absolute love, respect, and attention.
It is important to note that there are definitely ways to take control of your life and be happy.
It’s overcoming that silent voice of unworthiness in your head and placing your welfare above all else. By simply doing this, you are telling yourself you are enough and not equal to whatever life throws at you.
So, go on that vacation, visit the cinema, the spa, ask for that break, etc. Anything that would get you feeling good and wrapping your thought about the good things in life.
Being generous to yourself has a way of changing how you perceive your self-worth and kills self-devaluating ideas which is a major cause of negativity.
10. Indulge in creative activities
Distracting your mind from negativity has never been easier with creativity. Creative activities have a way of distracting your mind from the reality of your existence.
From drawing to singing, dancing, painting, and writing, you would find out that your mind becomes more productive because it’s trying to ignite that spark of creativity within you.
Getting involved in extracurricular activities serves as one of the feasible ways to ways to get rid of negativity from your mind.
Thinking negatively requires absolute attention to negativity and thinking creatively surprisingly requires the same amount of mental energy and awareness.
It is left for you to choose one. By going for the latter, you are cutting short the vacancy for the former and building a positive mindset.
11. Practice positive daily affirmation
Research shows that 80 percent of mental negativity stems from a poor self-image and a demeaning valuation of self.
This proves the light with which you see yourself remains very important to your state of mind. When you see yourself in the light of negativity it does not escape your affirmation.
Whether consciously or unconsciously, you become negatively verbal about yourself.
To change the narrative, you have to change the way you see yourself and the best way to do that is to develop an attitude of making positive affirmations about yourself. This can work the magic of rewiring an entire thought pattern and establishing new ones.
Ensure you make it a point of duty today to pay attention to what you say when you refer to yourself and whatever comes after you say “I am”.
These moments are defining moments and go a long way to helping you get rid of negativity from your mind and reminding you of ways to show gratitude to God.
12. Get rid of negativity from your mind by confiding in someone
Communication remains one of the most powerful tools to get rid of negativity from your mind.
By learning to share your thought and feelings with someone else when you feel overwhelmed, you lessen the psychological stress that comes with being a loner and the negativity that steps in as a result of that stress.
Sharing your concerns with someone is definitely one of the great ways to get rid of negativity from your mind.
Also, by being selective with the persons you talk to at trying times like this, you could gain advice and insight on how to handle whatever situation you may be facing at the moment.
So next time you feel overwhelmed and feel the pricking need to share your thought don’t hesitate to find someone trustworthy to talk to.
Remember, there is a difference between building your entire emotional empire around someone and confiding in someone to unburden the weight of negativity you are carrying at a particular time.
Practice this at trying times and begin to appreciate the contribution of your fellow man in enabling you to get rid of negativity from your mind.
13. Forgive and forget wholeheartedly
Life remains too short to carry garbage around. It remains ideal that when you feel you are on the victim side of any wrong, you forgive and forget.
When you do otherwise, you end up unconsciously welcoming negativity to the doorstep of your mind.
You are constantly reminding yourself of everything that went wrong between you and whosoever it was and building a new neural path that would only instigate you to think revenge, hatred, and so many more negatives.
Take out that garbage of malice today and make peace with that person by establishing ways to get over a friendship gone bad.
Ensure you do this wholeheartedly and with an open mind because both define true forgiveness.
14. Keep a journal handy
Getting rid of negativity is no one day’s work. It’s a long-term process and for some a lifetime of work. You definitely would want to keep track of your progress.
Keeping a journal is one of the easiest ways to get rid of negativity in your mind.
By doing so, you are relaying a much more intentional message to your mind that you are serious with the idea of a positive orientation, and you get to appreciate yourself more just by seeing how far you have gone.
When you also keep a journal handy, you can always write down your thought at any point in time.
Enjoy the luxury of going through them to help you identify which one of them is possibly negative and reestablish focus on the more optimistic ones.
15. Focus on your strength
Yes, we are not perfect, we all got flaws. But that doesn’t also mean we don’t also have strength.
We have an arsenal of them but sometimes we just overlook them and focus on every flaw. Your strength is what you are good at and what comes to you with ease.
By focusing more on your strength, you kill self-criticism and begin to love yourself for yourself. Paying attention to our strengths presents you with a new way of seeing yourself.
It gives you a reason to live and give back to society. This alone opens you up to positivity in a whole new light.
Also, Read 10 Journaling Ideas For Self-Worth.
CONCLUSION
There you have it, 15 tested steps to get rid of negativity from your mind.
The idea of an all-healthy mindset initiative aims at ending the mental negativity cycle.
It is also worth noting that the battle against mental negativity is an everyday one.
Only the very intentional can win. Choose to be intentional about a positive mindset today and keep in mind that you are a product of your thought.
