The Problem I have with Focusing on The Positive

Hey guys!

I’ve only said so much in the realms of Spirituality, Self-Improvement and a newer section I’ve added, Polymathy. Considering how important these subjects are to me, I want to take some time to write more about them!

Let’s get right into it, Shall we?

You ever hear somebody online who’s trying to help you say, “Just focus on the positive, and Everything will fall into place!”? Have you ever immediately felt like they were pulling your leg deep down or putting metaphorical wool over your eyes when they tell you that?

I sure as heck have.

In fact, I’ve been familiar with that feeling for almost 7 years as of early 2023! It has frustrated me ever since I first heard it, and even more so after I got hip to their game!

I may not have to tell you how annoying this gets after you try it a few times and find those negative thoughts saying, “Hey, I’m still here! What you’re trying to do, it won’t work! Don’t take any risks!”

The worst thing about all this is that when people teach positive focus above all else to others, it just creates more resistance between people and their goals. And the most sinister part of it all is that they preach, “If the negative thoughts are still bothering you, that means you aren’t trying hard enough!”

As if the people seeking y’all out don’t already have low self-esteem from past negative life experiences!

When you tell a person who feels like they already aren’t good enough and who’s trying to be/do better in their life that they aren’t doing good enough at trying to do better for themselves, This just tears them down further. But then they feel as though nothing else is going to help (because they tried everything else), so they keep digging themselves into this self-hatred hole because a part of them is choosing to deny and invalidate another part of them so that that whole person can become better.

And people are teaching them to do this to themselves!

When something like that is going down and nobody is batting an eye, you know you got a problem. 😒

I think y’all are getting the idea, here.

Like I said before, a lot of people seek this out because they think it’s the only way that’ll actually work. And part of the reason they feel this way is because positive focus, when weaponized in this particular way, has a soothing, inspiring factor that artificially gets people back in touch with their motivations and desires in life. And that enriching feeling of being reunited with those things can get really addictive, and addictions have a bad habit of keeping people in the same place, as some of us may know. A place of learning, but never acting on what one learns.

Ever wonder why one motivational or spirituality video is Never enough? 😉

I would like to say to spiritual gurus who convey this as their only (or primary) doctrine, “Get the heck up off your high horse!”

That said, I understand that many of them may not do as I ask. After all, it is currently profitable for them not to. Their misguiding people is allowing them to put food on the table without a typical 9-5 job (Which in and of itself, I admire). But I personally want to make more out of my earnings (That I’ll start getting in time). Namely, I want to help people find their inner shine again while I make a living actually helping them to do that!

And my key to learning how to do that for others is to document how I’m actively doing it for myself (This blog post is helping to do just that!)

So we have a problem. What do I think we should do about it?

I first want to say that there’s nothing wrong with wanting to feel enriched and like you’re back in touch with every ambition/thing you love about yourself (I say slash because society has taught us to liken our personal worth to our occupational output, what we create. That’s a story for another time 😉). There’s nothing wrong with seeking those out. I just get frustrated that people get us to seek those things out, then leave us there to fall back to zero eventually. I’m here to try to get us all to the next step beyond what positive focus alone can do for us!

I didn’t want to dive too deep into any sort of longstanding solution in this post as this is a hot-button topic that I feel needs its own moment. I will say that these points are helping me to get out of that Solely-Positive-Focus Trap.

Try not to focus on the end goal while you’re on the journey.
1. I get it, Everybody wants a good life (even I want that! 😂), and often a good life involves enough money to be financially autonomous and independent. As Earl Nightingale says, “Don’t concern yourself with the money. Be of service, work, build, dream, create.”
I’d amend What Earl just said and would add, Fall in Love with the Process. Do one thing at a time.
1. I’m practicing this one right now by writing a single blog post instead of focusing on any other aspect of my business. Granted, they’re all related to each other, but I’ve been learning that, maybe we can’t multitask and wholeheartedly do all those tasks as well as if we just focused on one. Maybe we’ve all been duped in that right. And bonus tip: If you see what you wish to do as a creative process, it becomes a little easier ya know, to get lost in the joy of doing what you love. And my dad, a businessman, keeps reminding me that the money and the future where my business thrives will come seemingly automatically if you fall in love with the process (So I’m passing it on to y’all, too!) 😉
Try to break that big goal down into sections, and subsections, and more if you need to.
1. Behind number 2, This is the one I struggle with the most! My mom occasionally reminds me to work on things one at a time, but then thinking about how to do that ends up giving me analysis paralysis all over again. Again, I’m still working on this, so after I give myself some time focus in on my next most immediate task(s), I pull out the Reminders app on my phone and go through the steps in my head. Every time there’s a ~~moderately~~ easy step to complete, I write it down as a task. I then do that for every step until the greater task is complete. Then, I (try to) repeat the process for the next task. Bonus Tip: If you’re anything like me, then even as you attempt to focus on one part, you end up focusing on those other related parts and start to add them lower down in the list, probably creating more overwhelm and frustration for yourself! If this is is you, then don’t feel bad, I do it, too a lot of the time still! 🤣😉 Well, first I’d like to commend you on setting the bar of progress so dang high! I am You! My advice is put a tiny bit of that overachieving effort into the list, just enough to get those first one or two (3 tops! 😂) in your reminders and then carry those out! Then once you check those off, You won’t only have felt that palpable sense of satisfaction from getting those two things done, You get another opportunity to practice a goal-setting exercise that, I imagine if you’re here reading, is more sustainable than what you’ve tried before by virtue of being less overwhelming.

And sidenote for anybody who’s a polymath like me, and likes to do so many different things:

This all can apply to you and all your interests and studies, too!

Well guys, I guess that’s all I got for ya today. 😁 Updates on the Blog:

Happy New Year! Been going through a lot since I last posted in August. Gaining and losing a job, losing and gaining a car, and just trying to get better mental health specialists on my team. As you may imagine, I’m still working through a bunch of stuff, but Hey, I’ve made it this far! I made a post!
I don’t think there’s any free or cheap way to make a subscribe button to this blog actually work without an email list, so I’m setting up an email list! It’ll make it easier for us to connect and easier for me to let y’all know when I have Something new to show! Details coming soon!
I think I’m gonna tap into Twitter, y’all! I imagine reading a 1000-word+ blog post can be a lot to ask to fit into your schedule more than once a week (Correct me if I’m wrong!). So, I thought why not take some of this game I’m putting Y’all onto, condense it to its most integral parts and post those little ones onto Twitter? More stuff on that later!

Okay, Love you guys! See ya’ in the next post!

Evan