PMA! (positive mental psychobabble)

[HJuniper]

How much creedence do you give to positive thinking?

T, a friend of our's, and I were talking about stress.  I told him that I can literally *think* myself into a bellyache.  He had the most healthiest reply : "Well, this means you can think yourself OUT of a bellyache."

I like to think I am a positive person.  I think I am a positive person to be around, but when it comes to myself-- I am my worst enemy.

Thoughts? 

[Brighid]

Sorry I'm late on this one, I must have missed it when I came back.
I personally believe wholeheartedly in the power of thought. Not because of a book or books, just because of my own personal experience. It is something I have believed in since I was young. When "The Secret" and similar books came out I ran around saying "see??...this is what I've been saying!!!! I'm sure it was very annoying lol . Of course it was taught in many self-help and new-age books before then, it just had different names. Before this turns into another huge post, yes, I give MUCH credence to positive thinking.
                                  -Brighid-

[HJuniper]

Then you're the perfect person to talk to, Brighid!

I have been reading books about changing thinking patterns. I even have thisa workbook by that Lucinda Bassett woman about anxiety and positive self-talk.  All books say that you have to keep inventory on your bad thoughts, write them down and then come up with a healthier, more positive thought.  Apparently, you keep a log journal and then re-read it at night so that subconcsiously your brain accepts a new way of thinking.

Maybe this confession should be posted under "strange things", but I can literally have one thought pass through my head and it sends out surges of adrenalin and I get goosebumps and anxiety.  Weird.  If I could only stop those thought.  BLAH!

[Lenura]

Actually, the psychology field is very supportive as far as "positive mental psychobabble" is concerned. It's one of the only areas where psychologists and new-age/physicist types can agree, though they don't necessarily agree on the cause of the results of positive thinking.

There's a really great quote in a book written by one of the creators of psychology as we know it today that says that we should "use our nervous system to our advantage". He also said that "nothing is easier than to imagine how, when a current once has traversed a path, it should traverse it more readily still a second time." We as human beings have unique ability to experience an activity or event and create/experience an outcome simply by using our minds. When we receive a good outcome as positive reinforcement, our brains create the desire in us to engage in the activity again, only this time making us more driven and confident in the activity. Since we have this ability to imagine an activity and an outcome, we can effectively "trick" our brains into making it more likely to happen (consciously or subconsciously) by only thinking positively. Even if it's something that we have a low probability of changing, thinking positively can effectively "cancel out" the effect of a negative outcome.

As far as a less-scientifically-supported-although-not-necessarily-less-plausible point of view is concerned, there are many people that believe that we can affect physical matter outside of our bodies by thinking about it. As a matter of fact, a Nobel Prize recipient (in physics) describes it quite nicely in the end of his speech (http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1933/press.html) - see the paragraph that starts "The new quantum mechanics has changed to a great extent all our concepts...".

In my opinion, there's no question as to whether positive thinking can affect our lives and the people around us. To go even a little new-agier (or maybe quantum mechanics-ier?? probably not) I don't think that there's any reason to believe that we can't affect physical matter (and thus outcomes) by the use of our minds. Our little virtual reality that we live in mentally is clearly not physical, so maybe there's some sort of medium in-between where ever our mind is and where ever the 3D physical world is that can affect and be effected by both!

As promised: Sorry for the long post, but the word "psychobabble" makes me just want to... well... psychobabble.

[Brighid]

First, I forgot about this thread...sorry!
Lenura said:
"To go even a little new-agier (or maybe quantum mechanics-ier?? probably not) I don't think that there's any reason to believe that we can't affect physical matter (and thus outcomes) by the use of our minds. Our little virtual reality that we live in mentally is clearly not physical, so maybe there's some sort of medium in-between where ever our mind is and where ever the 3D physical world is that can affect and be effected by both!"- Lenura
 (Ok, I just realized I don't know how to pull a particular quote out of a post yet....sorry  )

Anyway...couldn't agree more Lenura, I also can't say it any better so I'll leave it at that!

HJ- I have a problem controlling my thoughts too! I don't get the adrenaline rush you talked about (which sounds really cool if you could control it BTW), but I do wish I had more control. When I was younger I noticed that the harder I concentrated on something the more likely it was to happen. I use to have all these neat ways of testing it out and would spend hours doing that. The problem I have as an adult is that I tend to drift off to the more negative thoughts. A big issue for one who believes in the power of thoughts. I have never heard of the exercise you mentioned in your post, maybe I should give it a try. I usually just try to catch myself when I notice I'm thinking negatively and try to turn it around. Forcing myself to kinda think the positive version. I'm also pretty good a visualization and meditation so I use that a lot to try and affect an outcome. Wow, for someone who doesn't consider myself into the whole "new-age" thing, I fall into it pretty well huh? I guess I might as well go ahead and give in...denying it doesn't make it less true.....
My Name is Brighid and I'm addicted to crystals.......not the meth kind