How to Change a Negative Attitude That Is Slowly Destroying Your Life
A negative attitude carries with it a lack of awareness. You’re not necessarily aware of a negative attitude permeating your outlook on life, and because of this lack of awareness, your attitude affects your interactions with other people and your interactions with yourself.
What if you were to become aware? What if, suddenly, you were able to step outside of the thought pattern that creates your attitude, choose a new pattern, and thus, a new attitude?
Changing your attitude is not about stifling or eliminating negative thoughts. It’s about changing your thought patterns through action.
Negative thoughts will arise, but when you brood on them it’s like feeding and rewarding them so that they will come back again and form a pattern.
When you alter repetitive thought patterns, you alter your attitude — it’s a physical process, and with it comes the ability to change the world in which you live. You’ll achieve things you didn’t think were possible before.
To undertake this change, understand what to do with negative or unhelpful thoughts when they arise. This understanding will help you take action towards changing your attitude.
Read on for some quick and easy suggestions on how to change a negative attitude.
1. Dream Huge — but Set Realistic Expectations
This is the truth about your dream: it’s real. What you really want out of life — call it your dream or fantasy or ambition — is a real idea you can and should hold onto no matter what happens.
To set realistic expectations, break your dream down into steps that are achievable in the short-term.
If you believe you’re entitled — you expect everything to fall into place — you will not realize your dream. Even if you’re lucky and successful, it won’t feel like success because entitlement is a bottomless pit.
A negative attitude stems from expectations that don’t line up with reality. Again, your actions are the only thing you control. Science shows you’re not even necessarily in control of your thoughts.[4]
But you are in control of the thoughts you choose to dwell on. Concentrate on your plans. You can expect to follow through when you concentrate on and check off the steps to completing a task. Concentrate on the tasks you need to complete in order to make your dream a reality.
2. Embrace Your Emotions and Release Them Confidently
The moment you experience an emotion, there’s a reason for it; and therefore it’s valid.
Here’s the challenge: you must control what you do with that emotion.
You could hold the emotion in and let it fester, but that leads to things like depression, pent-up rage, and low self-esteem.
You could release your emotion the moment you feel it without thinking, but that leads to relationship issues with other people. Or, you could release the emotion confidently in a way that asserts your self and your boundaries.
- Practice observing your emotions when you feel them on a daily basis. Note what the emotion is and be there with it.
- When you experience a strong emotion such as anger, take time to note your anger, take deep breaths, and calm down.
- Figure out what or who caused your anger, and why.
- Assert yourself. Don’t be mean about it, be confident. Say something like, “I would prefer for you to treat everyone as equals in the group, I can’t speak for everyone in the group, but it’s very important to me.”
- Set your boundaries by repeating “I” statements, such as, “I don’t want you to yell at me, I feel uncomfortable. If there’s a problem, I would prefer to talk about it calmly.”
If you embrace your emotions by processing them — by asking who, what, why, and how — and then you deal with them by expressing yourself confidently, your attitude will remain one of confidence, calmness, and positivity.
3. Amp up Your Positive Self-Talk
Positive self-talk is exactly what it sounds like: these are uplifting statements you make to yourself. Then, you act on them.
The thing about positive self-talk is it’s self-fulfilling. In other words, by concentrating on your strengths and making positive statements about yourself, you become what you tell yourself you are and your attitude changes.
Psychologist Dr. Marie Hartwell-Walker identifies key statements that mentally healthy people make:[2]
- “I am lovable”
- “I am capable”
- “Most other people are lovable and capable, too”
- “Success comes from doing”
- “Challenges are opportunities”
- “It’s only human to make mistakes”
- “I have what it takes to cope with change — and to make changes happen”
Tell yourself these things every day. Note statement number 4, “Success comes from doing.” You want to change your negative attitude. To successfully change your attitude, do things that help you feel good about yourself and others. Volunteer work and community sports leagues are great options.
Action creates change. Make positive statements to yourself, take action based on these statements, and your outlook on life will change.
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