A Strange “Negative” Strategy That Works Wonders To Bust You Out Of A Negative Rut - When Feeling Grateful Feels Impossible & Ludicrous Do This

 

Once you get your nervous system in order (using part 1), you hopefully feel calmer.

 

But, you may find that feeling grateful still feels like a stretch from the mindset you’re in.

 

Here’s where this week’s tools - “Negative Visualization” and “You’re living the dream life” are very useful. 

 

The purpose of these strategies is to change the mindset you’re in by shifting your perspective, or viewing a situation through a different lens. 

 

Your perception of a situation is vital, because how you perceive something IS the reality it has for you.

 

“If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.” - Wayne Dyer
 

Here’s two ideas to get us started - 

 

Unhappiness is the gap between what you think you want and what you have.

Gratitude is a tool that closes that gap.

 

You can close the happiness gap by wanting what you already have. 

 

“Negative visualization”
& “You’re living the dream life”

are ways to want what you have,

by feeling grateful for what you have,

even when the idea of feeling grateful,

feels impossible or ludicrous.

 

Or as the great Stoic Epicurus said,

 

"Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; remember that what you now have was once among the things you only hoped for."

These strategies come from the ancient Greek and Roman philosophy of Stoicism. 

 

Being “stoic”, if you look at the dictionary definition, means - 

A person who can endure pain or hardship without showing their feelings or complaining. - Oxford Languages

 

To be clear, this is NOT what the ancient philosophy of Stoicism is about. 

 

The Stoics didn’t practice and teach about suppressing negative emotions.

 

The Stoics were all about giving practical ways to deal with emotions that help us to live a good life. 

 

So let’s delve in to these two super useful Stoic strategies - 

 

 

 

- Word of caution -
There’s a big difference between negative visualisation and worry or anxiety. 

Negative visualisation is an intentional, deliberate practice that you do for a short moment and then go back to life. If you suffer from severe anxiety, this may not be the right technique for you. 

 

Here are a few powerful Stoic beliefs that the practice of negative visualistion stems from. 

 

- Stoic belief 1 : No one is entitled to anything -

 

“Misfortune weighs most heavily on those who expect nothing but good fortune”. 

Seneca - Roman philosopher and Stoic.

The Stoics would say to you, “You’re not entitled to anything”. 

 

This can seem harsh, but feeling entitled is a sure path to feeling miserable when we don’t get what we think we’re entitled to.

 

It’s fascinating to think that this idea was born 2000+ years ago, when it was a lot harder for people to acquire the amazing stuff we have today. Simple luxuries that they didn’t have 2000 years ago, today we take completely for granted.

 

The concept, ‘you’re not entitled to anything’ is even more relevant to us today. 

 

We like to think we’re entitled to a decent house, to clean water, to free medical care, to see our children grow up and grow old, to be healthy, to have a good job. We think these things are our rights, when in actual fact they are gifts. These things are blessings, and if we have them, we should be truly grateful for them.

 

 

- Stoic Belief 2 : Everything in life is impermanent -

 

The Stoics based their teachings around the reality that everything in life is impermanent. Everything that you have now will one day be gone.

 

It’s sobering to realise this and it may seem negative and pessimistic. The Stoics were very pragmatic about life, it wasn’t about being positive or negative, it was about what is. 

 

The Stoics taught that by realising how fleeting your life and everything in it is, you can develop a profound sense of appreciation that can bring you real fulfillment.

 

 

- Stoic Belief 3 : Everyone has something they can be grateful for -
 

"Let not your mind run on what you lack as much as on what you have already."

– Marcus Aurelius, Roman emperor 161 to 180 AD and a Stoic philosopher

 

Another powerful stoic belief is that everyone, no matter how dire their circumstances, has something they can be grateful for.

 

If you lost your job, at least you have your family, if you have a dysfunctional family, at least you have your health, if you don’t have your health, maybe you have your eyesight and that’s a truly profound and miraculous thing, if you don’t have your eyesight, perhaps you have the use of your hands or legs, surely that’s something that’s worthy of marveling at... And so on.

 

You get the picture. 

 

It really comes down to the fact that you always have a choice:
To dwell in self-pity, or not to. 

To find something, however small, to be grateful for, or not to.

 

***

Think about what a wonder it is that you’ve literally got several trillion cells in your body that are communicating and cooperating with each other every second, functioning amazingly well, so you can wake up in the morning, and do all of the normal stuff in your day.

***

 

- What is Negative Visualisation? -

 

It basically works like this - 

You visualise yourself deprived of the things that you really value in your life. It could be something that you really strived for in the past, your family, any of your material possessions, your health, your business or career.

 

Imagine that you lost any one of these things that you really appreciate in your life. 

 

When you imagine this, you do it in a rational sort of way, not in a neurotic, anxious way. The idea of negative visualisation is not to dwell in worry, it is to help you build a sense of appreciation for the things you have in life. 

 

What’s powerful about this technique is it works on overcoming a fundamental truth of human psychology - hedonic adaptation. 

 

Hedonic adaptation is the human tendency to get

acclimated to whatever circumstances we’re in.

 

It’s easy to see how this works physically with our sense of touch, sight or hearing. Think about when you get into a hot bath. At first the water can almost feel like it’s burning you and you have to slowly ease yourself in, but after a while your body will acclimate and it feels comfortable. Or when you go out into the bright sunlight and have to squint your eyes, after a while your eyes adjust to the brightness.

 

The same thing happens to us with the stuff we have in life.

 

This has been shown in studies of lotto winners who, after a short period of time, return to their original level of happiness - surprising but true. 

 

Hedonic adaptation makes it hard for us to be really happy in our lives because we’re always going out there chasing stuff - better health, better financial situation, better relationships… we end up on a never-ending treadmill.

 

We think that the things we want are going to make us happy, and perhaps they do initially, but we soon acclimate and return to our set point of happiness. 

 

We can work so hard to get something, and when we do it’s really great for an hour, a day, or a week, and then it just becomes background.

 

This is not saying we shouldn’t set goals and pursue things, but if we want a good life and to escape the feeling of being on a never-ending treadmill, we should develop appreciation for what we have.

 

- How does Negative Visualisation help us develop appreciation? -

 

On the surface, it seems that thinking about being deprived of some of the things you have in your life, like your family, home or job, will make you miserable. But what the Stoics really want to turn you on to is just how much you're taking for granted every day in your life. 

 

- How to practice Negative Visualisation -

 

• Start by making a list. 
   
• Pull out a piece of paper and write down 10 things you have in your life that are absolutely amazing but that you take completely for granted.
  
  Your parents, your family, your kids, your house, the country you live in, your health, having a decent/steady income, the city you live in, your friends or a special friend, your hands, your eyesight, or your sense of hearing.
  
  Create a list of your top 10.
   
• Spend a few minutes every day on intentional negative visualisation.
  
  Choose something from your list and briefly consider what it would be like if you lost that thing. Fill it in with images and visualise it. Only do this for a minute or two, then return to your life.

 

This kind of thinking can really bring you back down to earth and help you develop real gratitude for some of the things that you already have today that you take for granted. 

 

Think about all of the stuff that just five years ago you wanted to create in your life that you now have. This is powerful to think about. These things may have made your life more comfortable on the outside, but because you adapted to them, they’re no longer making you feel any better on the inside. You can change this through negative visualisation.

 

Remember! Negative visualisation is not a license to worry about stuff. 

It’s important to remember the distinction between worry and negative visualistion. On the surface they might seem similar, but there’s a big difference. The Stoics don’t want us to be neurotic, pessimistic, and anxious. Negative visualisation is a conscious, even-minded, meditative technique. Worry happens when our mind runs away on us. It is not a conscious act.

 

Try your negative visualisation practice for a week, just a few minutes each day.

 

See how much stuff you’ve been missing in your life that’s right there under your nose, just ready and waiting for you to appreciate it. 

 

 

The “You’re living the dream life” practice can turn self-pity into gratitude in a matter of seconds. 

 

I heard about this idea from professor and author William B Irvine.

His books include, ‘The Stoic Challenge’ and ‘A Guide to the Good Life’.

 

William says,

 

“You are living the dream life but the dream in question isn’t being had by you, it's been had by someone else, probably a complete stranger.”

 

The idea is that the reason you feel miserable when facing an unwanted situation or circumstance is because of a misguided point of reference.

 

Who we choose to compare ourselves to will greatly influence how satisfied we are. 

 

If we compare ourselves to others we perceive to have more or better than us, we will feel lacking or deprived.

 

If we compare ourselves to those who have less, we can feel deep appreciation for how fortunate we are. 

 

Another way of thinking about this is through the concept of “looking down”.

 

Here’s how Mo Gawdat, founder of One Billion Happy, describes this same concept in his interview on the podcast ‘The Diary of a CEO’ -

 

“If you look down, it’s going to take you a very long time to get to the bottom. There are so many people in the world that are so much less fortunate than you are. It’s almost arrogant, and I’m so sorry to say, stupid, to not recognise that.”
 

 

- How to practice “You’re living the dream”- 

 

1. Consider others living in another place

Consider people living in other places around the world who are less fortunate than you are. You may consider people living in war-stricken or impoverished places.

 

Think about the fact that YOU are living THEIR dream life.

 

Imagine, if they were to have the challenge or problem you are facing, they would welcome that challenge over the challenges they face. The scale of the problems they face are so far and beyond the realm of your reality. If they were in a position to even worry about the problem you are having, for them it would be a blessing. We need to put our problems back in perspective by reminding ourselves that our problems are the problems of a life of privilege.
 

2. Consider others living in another time

We only need to turn on the news to feel like we are living in the worst time in history. But this is simply not true.

 

To illustrate this, here is an excerpt from the book ‘Abundance : The future is better than you think’, by Peter H. Diamandis & Steven Kotler - 

 

Referring to The twentieth century
 

This period also saw infant mortality decrease by 90 percent, maternal mortality decrease by 99 percent, and, overall, human lifespan increase by more than 100 percent. At the same time, the cost of food has dropped thirteenfold, the cost of energy twentyfold, and the cost of transportation a hundredfold. In his book Better Angels of our Nature, Harvard Professor Steven Pinker demonstrates that we are now living during the most peaceful time in human history. Your chances of dying a violent death have dropped five hundredfold since the Middle Ages. But you wouldn’t know that from watching CNN. What has become the Crisis News Network appears mandated to transport every feud and fatality into your living room, in high definition, over and over again.

 

On the economic front, there is no question that the United States and other parts of the world have experienced tremendous upheaval during the past two decades. Yet today, even the poorest Americans have access to a telephone, television, and a flush toilet—three luxuries that even the wealthiest couldn’t imagine at the turn of the last century.

 

You are living the dream life of your great great great grandparents. Take the example that in your pocket you have a cell phone which to them would be an utterly miraculous device, yet you pull it out many, many times a day without even batting an eyelid. Just stop for a moment and consider how unprecedented the things this device allows you to do are in human history!

 

We have it so good, compared to other people living on other parts of the planet, and to our ancestors.

 

WE are living THEIR dream!
 

 

Phew, there’s quite a lot there to process. 

 

I’ve been loving delving into and learning about Stoic philosophy in preparation for writing this Peptalk. I was reminded of my yoga teacher training many years ago when I was also blown away by the wisdom of ancient teachings. I find it so fascinating that their thoughts and ideas have stood the test of time for thousands of years. Even though the ancient teachers were living in such a different reality to us now, their theories and practices are so very relevant and helpful, if not even more so, to our modern times. 

 

I hope you enjoy and benefit from thinking about these ideas, and putting the techniques into practice, as I have over the last week. I'm definitely adding these ones to my mental toolbox for future use too.

 

Yours in gratitude,

Nadine  🤸‍♀️

ps> Late last night before sending this I was having some thoughts about 'being a martyr', or 'faking it'. The concepts shared here could easily be misconstrued and so I wanted to make sure we're clear.

 

We hear people say, "I shouldn't complain", referring to their knowledge that others are worse off than them and they feel they don't deserve to complain. When what this person really wants to do is complain, they are suffering in some way and want to be heard. I want to stress that the above strategies are not meant to encourage you to suppress your emotions, or suck it up, because others are worse off than you. 

 

From the Stoic point of view, as previously mentioned, it was not about suppressing negative emotions, it was actually about removing negative emotions so you're no longer experiencing them (ie. there's nothing to suppress).

 

The intention of these strategies is to bring about a wholesome, authentic, and complete feeling of appreciation and gratitude for your life. Where your heart feels full and bursting with your blessings. From this place of gratitude there are no emotions of anger, or envy, or self-pity to suppress. This can't be faked. If 'negative visualisation' and 'You're living the dream' don't bring you to this place of gratitude, perhaps what you need in that moment is to talk to someone and share your feelings. Then come back to the strategies and try again later. Persevering is really worth it.