The Scenario – You’ve experienced hardship, and you’re struggling to bounce back. The only advice anyone can seem to offer is, “look on the bright side,” which only frustrates you because you can’t seem to find one. Is there any relation between positive emotion and resilience?

 Can a positive attitude help us bounce back in life?

A recent study based on Dr. Barbara Fredrickson’s “Broaden and Build” theory, found that positive emotions cultivate and increase ego resilience, which in turn promotes life satisfaction. Ego resilience refers to the strength and ability of an individual to adequately adapt to different, sometimes uncomfortable, environments.

How does it lead to greater life satisfaction?

1. Produce Positive Emotions

• People with greater ego resilience tend to produce more positive emotions in stressful situations

2. Rebound

• Ego resilience enables people to bounce back from tragedy and hardship more easily than those who have weaker ego resilience

3. Avoid Depression

• The more resilient a person’s ego, the less likely he or she is to become depressed

(Read More)

The Insight – While it’s easier to back down when faced with difficulties, it’s more gratifying to overcome them. Prepare yourself for life’s challenges by strengthening your ego with positive emotions. You will succeed, grow stronger, and develop a sense of pride in your strength and abilities.

How has resilience served you?

By Sheba

www.bySheba.com

Creating Positive Perspectives for Life

The Scenario – You wouldn’t think it takes muscle or strenuous exercise to offer gratitude, but it is definitely strength. Each time we practice gratitude, we strengthen and build our personal character and the esteem of someone else.

How do we assess gratitude?

In his book, Authentic Happiness, Martin E. P. Seligman, Ph.D., lists gratitude as one of 24 character strengths that we may or may not possess. He describes gratitude as a high appreciation for another person’s exceptional moral character, emphasizing the meaning for the Latin root of gratitude—gratia, meaning “grace.”  To measure gratitude, ask yourself:

1.       How often do I say “thank you,” even for little things?

• Measure yourself on a five-point scale, five being very often, and one being never.

2.       How often do I stop to count my blessings?

• Measure your response on a five-point scale, five being always, and one being never.

(Read More)

The Insight – Gratitude is probably one of the easiest strengths to build. All it takes is a simple, “thank you” and not only do you build that strength, but you brighten someone else’s day. Don’t hesitate to exercise gratitude.

Is gratitude one of your character strengths?

By Sheba

www.bySheba.com

Creating Positive Perspectives for LifeSt

The Scenario – You call yourself a “multitasker.” Yet, on several occasions, you’ve found yourself staring at someone while they spoke to you and you pretended to listen when in fact your mind was focused on the notification sounds coming from your computer every time you received a new email. How about listening to someone tell a story that reminded you of something you forgot to do? You let the person continue with the story, but do you remember the story at all? When you do not pay attention to what your brain is focused on, it causes mental discourse.

Is it important to pay attention to our thoughts?

When you do not pay attention to what your brain is focused on, it causes mental discourse. Alex Lickerman, M.D., argues that multi-tasking can be harmful to achieving balance if our attention is divided among distractions as opposed to meaningful work. How so?

Multitasking is…

1.     Detrimental to Memory

• The more tasks we are trying to complete at once, the more our attention is divided making it difficult to retain information for those tasks that may be useful in the future

2.     Hinders Performance

• We cannot put 100 percent of our effort to one individual task when we have more than one to complete, and therefore cannot perform to the best of our abilities

3.     Deters Appreciation for Work

• Since multitasking prevents us from being fully engaged in a task, we are unable to enjoy the task or appreciate the work we produce

(Read More)

The Insight – Mental balance requires that we decide for ourselves what is truly deserving of our attention, and give it to that task, thought or person. We perform better and feel less burdened when we create balance.

How do you find balance?

By Sheba

www.bySheba.com

Creating Positive Perspectives for Life

The Scenario: Mindfulness is synonymous with being in the moment. When you are mindful you are not judgmental, evaluative, or analytic. You accept the thought for what it is and you are grounded or at peace with it.

Is there a process to learning mindfulness?

According to research by psychologist Dr. Scott Bishop, mindfulness meditation assists with aspects of self-awareness; the reality of your thoughts, perceptions, emotions and feelings. Think about your thoughts or develop your metacognitive skill and you will learn to step back from a situation and take an objective point of view.

The mindfulness meditation steps are as follows:

Sit in an upright position.

1. Breathe, be engaged with, and pay attention to your breathing pattern.

2. When a thought occurs, acknowledge it, accept it and elaborate on the feelings or insights that occur in reference to that idea and communicate it.

3. Continue to focus on breathing and let the thought dissipate. Repeat breathing meditation exercise until another thought occurs.

4. This takes place for one hour a week for at least eight to ten weeks according to Dr. Bishop.

The Insight: To understand your thoughts and emotions, what they mean to you, and how you react to them takes practice. Learn to be mindful of your perceptions then work to create a sense of calm or peace when they appear.

Are you mindful of your thoughts and feelings?

By Sheba

www.bySheba.com

Creating Positive Perspective for Life