I came across a post today reviewing a comment Deepak Chopra apparently made on the Bill Maher show the other night about how Positive Thinking is stressful because the person who is always thinking positively is working so hard to avoid negative thoughts… or some such thing. If I stumble across the quote, I’ll come back and post it here.

What interested me most on this was that I felt negative emotions reading it.

What the teachings of Abraham-Hicks say to me is this - use your emotional guidance system to get in alignment with the thing that causes you problems.

I do not believe the Law of Attraction teaches us to never think or deal with a negative thought. However, it does teach that dwelling on negative thoughts is bound to have a negative effect on your life - but this does not mean that your aim is to have a 100% perfect life - indeed, they explicitly state that life is all about desire and learning, and you will never be perfect or arrive at perfection.

So the negative emotions I felt were because of a conflict between different beliefs - on the one hand, I believe Deepak Chopra is a wise man who “gets it”, and on the other hand, I have personally witnessed the Power of positive thinking, and believe that following some of these principles leads to a far less stressful life.

I could have chosen to ignore Deepak… but that is not the goal. The goal is to come into alignment - not to run off and put one’s head in the sand and ignore all negative things.

And thankfully, after a short while pondering this conflict in beliefs, I arrived at a much clearer understanding of what I mean by positive thinking, which brought me to understand that it is not the same thing that Deepak was referring to at all.

To me, the choice of thinking about things more positively when that choice is present is simply about being in the moment and going with the flow. When you are going with the flow, you are in synch with the world around you. Things resonate with you. You are NOT resisting that which is.

When you are fighting reality, you are experiencing negative emotions. It is very easy to cling to negative emotions. It is also easy to cling to positive emotions. So it is equally important to LET GO of either kind of emotion… so as to remain in the flow and aware of that which presents itself you in each moment.

Thinking Positively is simply the adoption of the tendency towards positive emotions - such as gratitude, kindness, and love. When you develop these habits, you are paving the way for more Positive moments… and you can let go of each knowing more good moments will come… and when you hit a bad moment, you are still OK, because after all, you realize more good moments are bound to come your way.

It is a way of experiencing the abundance of life that is already in you, and all around you.

If someone picks up the idea that the goal in life is to think and experience only positive emotions and thought, then this person would surely set out to control his or her experience, and may indeed expend a good deal of energy resisting negative thought.

And so here is the trick - resisting negative thought IS negative thought.

I have been very attuned lately to this issue of resistance. In my humble opinion, it is tied to the teachings of Christ. Jesus famously taught us to “turn the other cheek”. Much could be written on this topic… but fundamentally, I believe the teaching is a way of letting us KNOW that when we resist or fight back - we are matching the wave length of the attacker, we are becoming the attacker, and in the end, we are committing the same sins.

My interpretation of Thinking Positively means shining a light on life. It means bring my best to every moment and every situation. It does not mean I ignore the negative. It means I bring my best to the negative.

I am reminded of the Prayer of St. Francis:

Lord, make me a channel of thy peace;

that where there is hatred, I may bring love;

that where there is wrong, I may bring the spirit of forgiveness;

that where there is discord, I may bring harmony;

that where there is error, I may bring truth;

that where there is doubt, I may bring faith;

that where there is despair, I may bring hope;

that where there are shadows, I may bring light;

that where there is sadness, I may bring joy.

Lord, grant that I may seek rather to comfort than to be comforted;

to understand, than to be understood;

to love, than to be loved.

For it is by self-forgetting that one finds.

It is by forgiving that one is forgiven.

It is by dying that one awakens to eternal life.

Amen.

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* After thinking these things a bit today, I also stumbled across an article that gave much greater clarity to some of the different ways Deepak Chopra considers Positive Thinking… I have posted this article to the high Vibe it site here. If you like this article and would like others to see it, be sure to click the “high Vibe it” text under the vibe counter. This will elevate it in the various story lists on the high Vibe it site.