How to Have a Positive Mindset—The First Step to a Better You

This article is an excerpt from the Shortform summary of "The Secret" by Rhonda Byrne. Shortform has the world's best summaries of books you should be reading.

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Have you ever been stuck feeling negative, and wondered how to have positive thoughts? Do you want to change your thinking, and learn how to develop a positive mindset?

Learning how to have positive thoughts is an important part of using the Law of Attraction. Your feelings are the first step to changing your thoughts, and learning how to develop positive thinking.

Why Positive Feelings Matter for Positive Thoughts

Feeling good feelings is the fastest way to thinking good thoughts. When you’re learning how to develop a positive mindset, you have to start with positive feelings.

You know how feelings play a part in the Creative Process. But your feelings are more than just a tool to express happiness about receiving. Your feelings are a gauge for your thoughts, and important for learning how to have positive thoughts.

Think of the relationship between your thoughts and feelings as a cause and effect. Your thoughts cause the effect of how you feel. Understanding what you’re feeling tells you what you’ve been thinking.

It is not possible to feel good and be thinking bad thoughts. The opposite is also true. You can’t feel bad if your thoughts are positive.
When you can pinpoint what you are feeling, you will understand what frequency your thoughts are on.
- For example, if you’re thinking about that dream Porsche, your thoughts are likely positive. You see yourself zipping around turns on a dime. You feel the wind in your hair. There’s no way your thinking these thoughts and feeling bad about not having a Porsche. You are on a positive frequency.
- Likewise, if you’re lamenting how old and broke down your current car is, you are not feeling good about your dream car. If you do think about your dream car, it is only to make you feel worse about your car. You are in the moment of feeling bad. When you feel bad, it means you’re on a bad thought frequency. And you know what happens when you’re on a bad thought frequency — get ready for a lifetime of driving your old car.

Your thoughts create your signal frequency, and your feelings tell you which frequency you are on. If you feel angry, you know you are thinking negative thoughts. By its nature, the Law of Attraction can only attract back pictures with the same frequency. So, what you are calling back to your life with your thoughts is more anger, which is not helpful for understanding how to develop positive thinking.

If you don’t know what you’re feeling, ask “How am I feeling?” When you become aware of your feelings, you are aware of your thoughts. And if you become aware of your thoughts, and they are negative, change your thoughts until you feel better. Not changing your thoughts is like saying, “I love being angry. Pile on more anger.” Not changing your thoughts also sets you up for the feelings trap. So, next you may be wondering how to have a positive mindset.

The Feelings Trap

Changing your feelings from positive to negative helps stop a negative snowball effect, and helps you learn how to think positive thoughts. You know what a bad day feels like. Everything seems to go wrong. You stub your toe, then you’re late for work, then you miss an important phone call, then you get stuck in traffic on your way home. Your thoughts may have been, “Can this day get any worse?” or “With how this day is going, I’m sure I won’t make it home on time.”

When you get stuck on a negative frequency and do nothing to change it, the Law of Attraction dictates that you will continue to stay on that frequency. You will attract more negative situations or events to your life. In order to learn how to have a positive mindset, you must change this mindset.

As your feelings diminish, a chain reaction is created.
You stub your toe, and you think, “Argh, this day is terrible already.” The Law of Attraction receives that signal, so the day continues to be terrible. This will be the case until you make a conscious choice to let go of the anger or frustration and jump on an improved frequency through better thoughts.
When you stub your toe in the morning and feel anger or frustration, become aware of it, and let it go. It’s just one event. It doesn’t have to represent your whole day.

When you let something go and move to a better feeling, stay in that moment for as long as you can. As you stay in that positive place, experience how your thoughts continue to be positive. If a negative thought enters your mind, block it out by feeling good about something. Remember the good you were just feeling, or bring up a new thought that makes you happy. This is one helpful trick for learning how to have positive thoughts.

How to Have a Positive Mindset

You have the power to create whatever feelings you want to feel because you have the power to choose what to think. If you’re not feeling the way you want to feel, focus on your feelings and try to lift them. When you’re working on how to have a positive mindset, it takes focus and discipline to overcome the negative.

Relax with your eyes closed and smile for at least a minute.
Make a list of thought lifters, and keep it at the ready.
- Maybe you really like puppies or the ocean at dusk or reading on a rainy day or volunteering at a homeless shelter.
- Whenever you are stuck in a bad feeling, pull up one of these thought lifters and concentrate on how it makes you feel.
- Different levels of anger or frustration will require different types of thoughts to dissolve them. If something on your list doesn’t work, move on to the next, and so on, until you feel better and are on a better frequency.

Intentionally adding positive feelings to the thoughts of what you want will strengthen the Creative Process. You can have whatever life you choose, but you must be happy about that life. If you don’t want a horrible life, then feel positive about life. That’s the end game you’re going for anyway, isn’t it? Understanding how to think positive thoughts is a huge part of that process.

The Universe Knows What You’re Feeling

The universe tells you what frequency you’re on through your feelings, and can help you understand how to have a positive mindset. As well as being aware of your feelings, trust that the universe is also aware and is sending you signals to inform you about your thoughts. This is your frequency feedback mechanism.

If you feel happy and don’t know why, know that the universe is telling you your thoughts have put you on a positive frequency.
Likewise, if you feel bad, the universe is letting you know you’ve stumbled onto a bad frequency.

This feedback serves as a sign of what you need to do, and helps you learn how to develop positive thinking. For instance, if you experience a bad feeling, it’s the universe’s way of saying, “Bad frequency alert. Abort. Abort. Fulfillment of negative thoughts will commence in 10, 9, 8….” You get it.

When you’re on a negative frequency, you are hindering the universe’s ability to bring you good things.
Adjust your thinking to something positive, and feel the positive feedback from the universe as your feelings begin to improve. When you feel positive, you know you are back on a positive frequency.

Changing your mindset is challenging, and learning how to have positive thoughts is a process that takes patience and self-awareness. Keep practicing and work on sending out a positive-feelings frequency; that way, good things will come to you as you learn how to develop a positive mindset.

How to Have a Positive Mindset—The First Step to a Better You