How positive do you feel about the things in your life? Most people tend to believe that they are very positive but they seldom take stock of their own thoughts. They figure that since they feel alright, then things must be fine. And fine for many is basically positive.

There is a big difference though between feeling fine and alright and being positive and happy. If you are pretty good at ignoring your mind or have such a busy life that you are seldom conscious of your own thoughts, you tend to figure things are alright and you leave it at that. This would actually be fine if you are able to completely shut off the internal dialogue in your head but that is not ever really the case. The mind tends to work away even when you think you are too busy to notice. Even when you do engage in a concentration intensive task, any break in the work flow gets your mind going again.

I don’t mention these things with the idea to scare you or to make it seem like you have no control over your mind. The fact is that you do and if you do find something that you can dedicate a lot of positive attention to, you can greatly reduce that internal dialogue, whether positive or negative.

What I want to point out though is that your mind and therefore your internal dialogue, is hard to stop. Also I want to point out that its hard for us to really know our mind without self examination. With this in mind I wanted to give you an exercise that you could use to help your thought pattern. This exercise should help you to realize how you feel about many different things. It’s easy and can be fun if you approach it like a game:

I want you to make a list of the top 10 things that you think most about. To do this you might need to do some self examination; trying to pay attention to your thoughts and what you are thinking about throughout the day. But it isn’t a difficult task, most of us think mostly about the following:

1. money
2. clothes
3. car
4. friends
5. career
6. health
7. food
8. pets
9. etc.

Now that you have your list, rate each one of the items on your list seeing how positively you feel about each one. Use a scale from 1 to 10, 1 being the least positive and 10 being the most positive. To do this, take money for example and contemplate it in general and in your life specifically. How to you feel about it, rate this feeling.

Now look at your list and see how you did. Were you generally positive or negative. As long as you do this exercise honestly, you will get a real good idea of how positive or negative you are at the moment. Use this knowledge so that you can begin to better understand your internal dialogue.

Now take an item on the list that you rated as being negative about. On your list, right beside the item, write down a positive picture or thought about the item. For example if you had a low number for money, write down some thought or picture that you could hold when you think about money that would make you feel more positive. And at the bottom in quotation marks, write down an affirmation that you could use to uplift you right away.

For example you could write:
I see myself in an incredibly beautiful and opulent restaurant in Monte Carlo, being served incredible food and drink by a amazing waiter. All around me I see incredible and beautiful things. I eat the best food in the most expensive china and crystal. I am treated like royalty and I deserve the best.
“ I am rich and wealthy, money flows to me naturally and effortlessly.”

If you then use this picture anytime that you have a money thought, you will see that you will begin to feel far more positive about this item on your list. The affirmation can be used at the same time or when you don’t have time to visualize (like when you are driving).

This is a fun exercise that will teach you a lot about your internal dialogue and how positive it is. If you follow the recommendations and create a positive picture for those things that you feel more negative about, you will change your internal dialogue for the better and get more positive.