5 Powerful Changes You Can Make To Relieve Anxiety, Stop Negative Thoughts and Be Happy

From birth to death, people have always been looking for happiness. We often hear this phrase a lot, "I just want to be happy". Have you ever stopped and thought about what it means to be "happy"? Why no matter how hard you try, happiness comes hard for you, and it seems to come easier for others? What is your personal definition of happiness? How can you tell if you're truly happy?

This post will give you a few tips and tricks to be able to change the way you think, just a little bit, that can result in powerful change in the direction of true happiness!

Let's get to it!

Recovering From Failures

The human race has built itself into what it is today using only 1 tool: failure.

A spin off of the Charles Dickens quote in the opening of his book A Tale of Two Cities goes like this: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, truly the best of times". This means that through all the good times and all the bad times there's always a silver lining, a positive aspect that makes it all worth it.

Successful people have also faced many difficulties and failures in which they've turned into strong positive roots moving forward by learning from them and fully appreciating their roles in making themselves into more knowledgeable and better people for it.

Approval Seeking

You may sometimes be unsure if your decisions are the right ones and are constantly looking for approval from others to mitigate the risk of having a negative outcome.

In the end this behaviour may make you seem less confident in your decisions. Make concise and confident recommendations and delegations with positive expectations in mind. This will not only free your mind of the negative burden of stress and anxiety but it will also, with time and experience, make for more successful decisions and help develop confidence.

You may also be seeking the approval of your peers in school or "the popular kids". This, subconsciously, makes other feel as if you are not comfortable with who you are. You are who you are, and who you are is great. By constantly seeking approval you are suppressing your own personality. Show people who you are and remember not to look for validation from them. If you amuse yourself and make yourself happy then you will also amuse other people and they will like you for who you are.

Always anticipate that people will like you, if you really believe it then it will come true because your mind and body will make the adjustments necessary with that confidence to make it reality.

Outcome Dependency

Outcome dependency is very similar to approval seeking. What you want to try to notice when you are showing signs of outcome dependency and make conscious decisions to free your mind of the outcome, be present, go with the flow and anticipate only positivity.

If by chance your school presentation doesn't go well, you do not get the job, or your decision results poorly then you should be happy because you've just learned so much from that experience which will make you better and stronger next time!

If you are OK with learning from failures, you should have no reason to fear the outcome of a situation.

Comparisons & Jealousy

Notice your thinking patterns. You are not alone, many people often compare themselves with others in this manner, some of us may not even be fully aware that we are comparing ourselves at this, or any, extent.

We want to be prettier, happier, have more money and things; this makes us feel bad about our own self and causes us to resent and repel others, you start to miss out on great opportunities, friendships and life lessons.

Instead of comparing your life with others, compare your life only to YOUR life. Think of yourself as the only person you need to impress and prove something to. Have an inner battle with yourself, challenge yourself to be more and do more. Check in with your own progress from time to time and reward yourself for it.

Giving Positivity

Selfless acts in general make you feel positive about yourself and spread positivity to others, the more positivity we have in this world the easier it is to be happy. Compassion is one of the life's most wonderful feelings and gifts. It will make a big difference in your life and happiness.

Here are some ideas of how you can give positive energy or do some good deeds in this world:

Donate to charity

Help a friend in need

Volunteer for something you're passionate about

Buy a gift or flowers for your mother or grandmother

Allow a fellow driver to merge into your lane

Write a thank you note to someone who won't expect it

Compliment others

Hold the door for others

Say hello to others and smile

Pick up trash from the sidewalk

Help someone who seems to be struggling with something

For you to accept positivity you must firstly disarm the power that negativity has over you. Be aware and be the person you want to become.

Source

The Five Ingredients of Happiness

I've been reading The power of Self Discipline by Brian Tracy over the last few weeks, and I just had to share a small extract from the book, as It helped me so much.

The five ingredients of happiness.

A short fall in any of these areas can cause stress, unhappiness and a feeling of being our of control.

1. Health & Energy - The most important element of a good life.

2. Happy Relationships - 85% of your happiness will come from your relationships with other people

3. Meaningful work - to be truly happy you must be truly engaged with life. You must be doing things that keep you active & give you a sense of fulfilment. If you are making a living you must be doing work that you enjoy, do well and for which you are well paid. People are only truly happy when they feel like they are making a contribution of some kind, that they are putting in more than they are taking out. You need to feel that what you do really makes a difference to the lives & work of other people.

4. Financial independence - some of the greatest fears we experience are those of loss, failure and poverty. We fear being destitute without funds and dependant on others.. One of your chief responsibilities to yourself is to work towards financial independence and financial freedom throughout your life.

5. Self- actualisation -This is the feeling that you are becoming everything that you are capable of becoming. This occurs when you feel you are realising more and more of your true potential.

Abraham Maslow is best known for his hierarchy of needs. He determined that people have both deficiency needs & being needs. People strive either to compensate for their deficiencies or to realise their potential.

He concluded that you only begin to evolve & develop to the highest levels possible for you when deficiency needs are first satisfied.

Deficiency needs:
* Safety & survival - food, water, accommodation, clothing
* Security - Financial , emotional and physical
* Belonging - Social situations with others , home and work.

Being Needs:
* Self esteem/ego - feel & like yourself determines your happiness more than any other factor. This comes from being liked, accepted, doing a good job and moving towards your goals.

Exercise

1 Identify the areas of your life in which you feel the happiest and the most in control - How can you expand on them?

2 Identify the area of your life that you feel controlled by other people or factors - what can you do to resolve these situations?

3 Intentify those areas in your life where there's a gap between your current level of accomplishment & what you would really like to achieve - What can you do to bridge these gaps?

4 Identify the most pressing needs that you have today that are not begin fulfilled - How can you begin to satisfy this deficiency need.

5. Identify those activities that give you the greatest feeling of personal happiness - what can you do to increase these moments of happiness?

6 Identify those areas in life that you are the most discontented - which steps could you take immediately that would resolve those feelings of discontent.

7. Define happiness for yourself what does it mean? What would have to happen for your to feel truly happy? what can you do immediately to help create this situation?

I hope it helped you as much as it helped me. I now have a completely new set of action points which Ill be sharing over the coming weeks.


Plus-You Can Now Join Our FREE Mastering Success Facebook Community at www.masteringsuccess.group