IT’S NOT MAGIC, IT’S MINDSET
“A man is but the product of his thoughts; what he thinks, he becomes” Mahatma Gandhi.
The power of mindset is what can transform your life. Yes, it is that simple. It has been an excellent catalyst for the transformation and evolution of my mind and heart throughout my journey.
For much of my life, my mood has been high or low. My mental state was affected by my inner monologue constantly speaking to me, which dictated my mindset and how I felt at that moment. My mindset affected my mood, my day, and my life. Sometimes I felt I had a significant mood disorder.
How could I be so high one minute and so low the next?
When I felt aligned, I felt happy and connected, and great things were happening in my life. I was surrounded by people who loved me, and I felt safe; I may have been reading an impactful book or had a planned trip or a concert to attend. I felt appreciated for supporting my community, and I was practicing yoga. In these times, my mindset was positive.
When I felt unaligned, I felt sad, lonely, or frustrated and triggered by other people’s actions or external conditions, and my life felt overwhelming and isolating. My schedule didn’t flow as planned, I would be held up in traffic, and late to a client, I may have experienced a misunderstanding with a friend, all resulting in my whole mood feeling off, and then I would use all these experiences to prove why I was unlucky or unloved. Marinating in this led to a negative mindset.
I remember years ago, as I do now, I would start my day smiling and in a positive mindset. I recall waking up, greeted by my beautiful dog, Kalvin, with a smile and a kiss, going downstairs to have my water with lemon and then a green tea, looking out into nature from my kitchen window, the sun shining, the energy calm. I jump in the car, and my favorite, the Dave Matthews Band, is playing on the way to yoga. I get my favorite yoga spot in the room, say hello to my community, and have a great mind, body, and spirit practice. After class, I head home to do some work, shower and throw on a cute outfit for a lunch date with friends. We laugh, catch up, and I order my favorite chopped salad. All is right with the world.
After lunch, I get in my car to drive home. I pull up to pay in the underground lot. 2 hours free- yay! The woman at the ticket counter tells me I owe money. Hmm, how can that be? She says I’m one minute late. I feel a little annoyed, and my mindset tugs at me. This isn’t fair. Isn’t there a grace period? I had to wait in line behind a few cars, doesn’t that count for something? I decide to pay it; arguing with this strict, moody woman is not worth the energy. I feel agitated as I pull out of the garage. As I started the drive home, I decided to call my mom to see how she was doing. She immediately picks up the phone, huffing, and puffing, on a tangent and venting about all that is wrong with her life.
“Alyson! I have been on hold with my credit card company for an hour. I have a fee on my card, and I have no clue what it is. I’ve been transferred three times. I’ve been hung up on. They are idiots! Then, just as I get off 1 ½ hour call, can you believe it was that long, my friend calls and cancels dinner! Of course, I didn’t buy food yesterday when I went grocery shopping because I thought I was going out, and now I have nothing to eat. Guess what else happened? I had a haircut yesterday, and she cut my bangs too short. And your brother! I am fuming at him. He keeps calling me by my 1st name, and I want him to call me Mom. He is so disrespectful and repeats it every time I ask him to stop!
On and on and on, she goes. She is complaining about everything, continually negative about every aspect of her life, spewing anger, frustration, and annoyance, building herself into a very negative space. I feel my energy slowly start to drain right out of my body.
After 7 minutes of not speaking, I say, “You haven’t even said hello to me or asked about my day?”
“Alyson! It is really not the time. I am in a bad mood. Why did you call right now? I need to call my mechanic and confirm the appt tomorrow. I am in such a mood. Jeez. I have other things to do and no time to talk to you.” Pause.
“Hello?! Why are you not saying anything? Hello! Answer me. Ok, fine Alyson! I’m hanging up. You are so disrespectful. No one loves me. No one cares about me. Everyone is selfish. If I died, no one would even care.”
As I slowly hang up the phone, my mood drops down, down, down. I am now feeling unloved and unheard — did I even talk? — I am suddenly super cranky. I just got yelled at for calling someone to say hello. I feel sad, mad, hurt, and frustrated. I hear a car honk at me. I look ahead at LA traffic not even moving on the freeway. My mind goes negative. Why do I have a mom like this? She continually takes everything out on me. I don’t feel loved. I am her child, not her mother. My mother doesn’t even care to ask how I am. I could be calling her from the hospital to say I am hurt. She didn’t even ask about me or where I was. Wow. I am just a placeholder in her game. I feel used. I am disappointed and sad. My mindset is going negative fast; I am feeling like a victim. I believe all the things my mind is saying to me. My mood and my mental state have now gone to a very negative place.
“This experience illustrates how our external experiences can drag us down into a negative mindset when we are not able to meet our experience with awareness and intentionality.”
As I slowly drive home, I mentally list why I don’t have a good relationship with my mother and why I don’t have anyone in my family who truly loves me. I finally pull up to my house and drive my car into the garage. I am not paying close attention because my heavy mindset weighs me down, so I pull too far in, and I bump the front of the car into the laundry machine. Of course, I do! What else will happen now? I get the mail. An overdue bill? I always pay on time. Now I have to call the company and deal with them. I feel my mother’s energy on me. I feel tired. I feel moody. The gardener didn’t come. Again! Now I have to talk with him. I open my email. My client canceled her first appt with me. I needed that money. What else will go wrong? Probably everything. My life isn’t so fun. It’s annoying. I’m annoyed. There goes my text- BING. Shut up! I silently say to myself. Can’t anyone give me a moment alone?!
Wow, my mindset completely shifted. I had a positive attitude and was having a beautiful day. As soon as I was confronted with a negative experience and a person who was complaining and acting out, my whole mental state got replaced by another. This situation illustrates how our external experiences can drag us down into a negative mindset when we cannot meet our daily experiences with awareness and intentionality. It completely changed my mindset and reshaped how I made sense of the world and myself. My inner thoughts brought me down, deeper and deeper. My negative mindset changed my perception of everything else in my life. I went from having a great day full of connection, consciousness, and love to feeling alone and anxious. I became mad at myself for letting my mother affect my mood and my mindset. Why do I allow her to do that? I have learned from the past not to call her when I am feeling good because this has happened before. I can also quickly get off the phone if I hear that she is in a terrible mood. Why did I let her release her negativity on me? Why did I become negative because of it? Now I am allowing her to control my mood and my day and shift my mindset from positive to negative.
After many moments, I realized that the key to keeping a healthy mindset is to build your capacity to maintain neutral or positive thoughts, even when the mind judges the experience as bad. You can strengthen your mind by being a witness to your thoughts, observing them yet not attaching to them emotionally, or allowing them to change your mood. When you notice your mindset is going negative, and you start to hear your mind making up stories that aren’t true, you are letting yourself go negative. Observe your mind and see if it feels happy or sad and ask yourself, why do I feel this way? Is your current reality dictating your feelings, or do you feel that way independent of your present situation? Did something go wrong, not as planned, or did another person bring negative energy to your space? Did you allow something outside of yourself to influence your state of mind and then build a case for why you are unhappy, unloved, or in pain? Did your mindset shift, take over your reality, and bring you to a negative place?
Mindset is a mental attitude on which you base your current beliefs, thoughts, or experiences. Mindset is what shapes how you make sense of yourself and the world. Your mental state influences how you think, feel, and behave in any given situation.
Our mindset is what carries us into each NOW moment. It dictates the present moment and every moment after that until we change it to a different form. Our mind controls our thoughts, moods, attitudes, feelings, and emotions. Therefore, our mindset affects everything in our lives:
- How we feel towards ourselves, our sense of worth, and self-love.
- How we live.
- How we react to others.
Most people have a positive or negative mindset. Our mindset not only determines our entire outlook on life and how we handle situations, but it also influences our health and the type of people we attract in our life.
For instance, when you have a positive mindset, you are joyful and grateful. You will attract positive energy, positive people, and positive outcomes. I felt calm and happy as I woke up that morning, enjoying the small moments and appreciating my blessed home and life. I was holding a positive mentality and attracted the same. Of course, it’s easy to feel this way when everything is going my way. It supported the mindset that everything is happening FOR me, not TO me.
Everything is happening for us when life is flowing, we get a great parking spot, our favorite table is available at lunch, we get that job we’ve been waiting for, and we have a great date! We can feel at ease and laugh, joke around, and feel grateful for our lives. We can easily let go of things that don’t serve us; we let the little things roll off our backs and not take ourselves so seriously. We have a calm way about us. We take all the goodness in life as a gift, and if something small disrupts our flow, we don’t let it disturb our inner peace. We don’t make up stories, or at least not too many, and we don’t feel bad about ourselves or others. We don’t take things personally; we take each day as it comes. We don’t control outcomes or people, and we adopt a Costa Rica Pura Vida/ Pure Life mindset, a tranquil way of life, not sweating the small stuff, and focusing on what is essential. We let every moment flow, knowing our day is happening optimally and all is set up for us to live our best lives.
Now, when I am in a negative headspace, watch out! I can get easily triggered, annoyed, or bothered by small things or have an intense adverse emotional reaction to something, usually something connected with past trauma or a bad experience. Just as I did in the story above, one phone call to my mother was enough to turn my whole mindset around, and suddenly I was feeling victim to my circumstances, sad, depressed, and alone. It could be anything that causes me to go to that place of isolation. I could receive a weird text from a friend or get frustrated when my cell phone falls on the floor. As mentioned above, when I am triggered, I feel personally attacked, even when a friend jokes with me, thinking they don’t respect me, don’t like me, or want to be my friend again. I make up many stories that don’t serve me, asking myself why everything is going wrong. My go-to childhood story was, God hates me. I was a little girl wanting love, and I figured I must’ve done something wrong, or someone must hate me up there in heaven to give me parents who didn’t love me. I felt lonely and confused, which was my only justification for how I was born into my family. My parents would yell at me for not putting my fork down after every bite at dinner, and then when a friend didn’t invite me over or I missed the school bus, my little girl could only think, it must be because God hates me. Why else would he give me these obstacles to overcome or a demanding family life feeling there wasn’t anywhere to turn? In my adult life, this resulted in me becoming stressed, anxious, sad, huffing, and puffing. I had adopted the belief that everyone was disturbing my inner peace on purpose, especially the girl in front of me at the supermarket checkout line, taking forever to pay for two items, asking myself, what could be taking so long? I was not emotionally balanced, felt angry, and blamed the past for my present and future. When your mind is in a negative thought spiral, you think, “My life is hard. Why is this happening to me? How is anything going to change? I am never going to have what I want; I am sad. I am lonely.”
I wasn’t aware that our inner dialogue has a negative bias. We, humans, have a propensity to give more weight in our minds to things that go wrong than to things that go right — so much so that just one adverse event can hijack our minds in ways that can be detrimental to our work relationships, health, and happiness. This is exactly what happened to me after the experience of calling my mother, listening to her bad day, and getting hung up on because of it.
Louise Hay, the motivational author of the international bestseller, You Can Heal Your Life, said, “I say ‘out’ to every negative thought that comes to mind. No person, place, or thing has any power over me, for I am the only thinker in my mind. I create my own reality and everyone in it.” She is exactly right. And actually, it was her mindset about her thoughts that kept her calm. Her mental state influenced how she thought, felt, and behaved in any given situation. Her mindset operated from her internal dialogue, not the outside world. She thought and lived her life from her higher self, the natural, joyful part of her, and not the external negative thoughts or experiences that could change her perception of reality. She kept herself balanced by knowing she created everything in her reality through her mindset. She stayed centered within herself.
Learning how to work with our mindset is taking responsibility for our thoughts., moods and feelings. Our mind is a mental muscle that needs to be trained to gain strength. Just like our physical shape doesn’t change by simply looking in the mirror or wishing for a different body, we can’t expect our mindset to change by not doing anything. We train our minds to be aware of our thoughts, witnessing where our mind goes in every Now moment. Of course, we all can have a rough day. We get to feel these emotions when we feel happy or sad, angry or elated. Emotions are different than mindset. Britannica defines emotions as a complex experience of consciousness, bodily sensation, and behavior that reflects the personal significance of a thing, an event, or a state of affairs. Mindset is more generalized. It is the sum of investing mental or emotional energy repeatedly associated with a particular emotion (or set of emotions) or when it has been associated with an intensely emotional experience. Mindset is not tied to a specific incident like emotions are, but a collection of inputs where we’re focusing attention and our current emotions.
Allow yourself to acknowledge, process, and release these emotions in the best way that works for you, whether by crying, talking to a friend, or even emotional release; how do you then shift your mental chatter to a growth mindset? Ask yourself, how is this serving me in my life, what lessons can I learn from this, and how can I grow? How can I return to my life’s gratitude and see things from a positive or neutral mindset?
Mindset also directly affects how we feel inside; those inner feelings are our inner compass. That compass is what controls our inner reality. From this inner place is how we view the outside world and respond to others. That is why I believe coming from a place of responsibility, love, and positivity will affect our inner and outer worlds. Having a positive mindset throughout our day, especially when things are not going our way, allows us to practice shifting our thoughts back to a healthy outlook. If we start to go negative, we don’t want to stay in a space where we have nowhere to go. It doesn’t feel good to live there, fester there. Our hearts want us to be in joy, calm and loved. We get to spiral upwards, lifting ourselves out of the dark thoughts and negative mindset by returning to a place of calm and detachment with tools that exercise that mental muscle. This will keep us going in challenging times, and if we are open to it, it’s powerful enough to elevate us to another level!
In my experience, modifying or another word I like to use, reframing our human perception to think positive, setting our intention to come from a place of joy and worthiness, rephrasing our thoughts to view life as happening FOR us, not to us, is a way to live a happy, conscious life. Reframing our perception to come from the most joyful outcome in all that we experience is a direct way to create connection and live our best life! Our mindset affects ourselves, how we are with our family, children, colleagues, coffee barista, and especially OURSELVES! The power of our minds is extreme. It’s up to us to keep our mental chatter in check. Wim Hof, the Dutch extreme athlete and motivational speaker known for the Wim Hof Method breathing techniques, believes that our thoughts are real things that have real power, but many of us do not understand or know how to use this power. He thinks we have the innate capacity to tackle stressful situations and experiences most healthily.
He says, “Our mind is our greatest weapon, but this weapon has been blunted by our relatively comfortable lives, so that when we do face disasters, or negativity in our lives, we are at a loss at what to do and do not know how to handle our fears and anxieties.”
He further explains that when we learn to activate the deepest part of the brain by consciously thinking and choosing, we can connect with different parts of the brain, control our body temperature and manipulate our physiology! This, in turn, enables us to control our mood and feelings so that when we are faced with difficult life situations, we can find peace in the eye of the storm. We can vaccinate our minds and bodies against the toxic effects of stress, fear, and anxiety! As Wim says, “the power of the mind is the future.”
Most people are not aware of the incredible power of their minds. Even the simplest of thoughts can significantly affect your emotions and behaviors. Understanding what the mind is capable of can support you in utilizing its power to control your body and ultimately improve your quality of life in many different ways. How do you start the conversation with yourself to return to an elevated awareness, reminding yourself that things are happening for us, even when it doesn’t feel like it? We all go through these times, losing our keys, getting a rough call from our boss, or having a breakup. We get to CHOOSE, in each moment, where we go with those feelings and what we do with them. Every single one of us has that CHOICE. I believe we don’t put enough emphasis on this great gift we are given as our birthright- we all have the power of choice! We get to choose: negative or positive, healthy or unhealthy relationship, happy or sad mood, take things personally or not, victim mindset or take responsibility. What can you do at this moment to shift? How are you responsible for your happiness? This right of choice allows you to choose. Stop, drop and roll. Or, in this case, stop, become aware, and shift. Pause and notice where your mindset is or where it is heading. When I let my mindset shift based on an outside circumstance and start to wonder if there is anyone in this world who truly cares, I stop, pause, and listen to my inner monologue with myself. I become aware of my mood, mental state, and thoughts are headed or where they have landed, and as quickly as possible, I shift myself out of that state with tools that I have to support me in staying in a neutral or positive mindset. I bring acceptance of what is, becoming aware of how I feel. Then I offer compassion because I know I need to give myself something at that moment, whether it self love, self-care, reaching out to a friend, or processing an emotion. Once I receive that support, I can choose to shift back to a healthy, happy mind.
The Practice
Observe yourself for seven days. How many times does your mind go positive or negative, depending on present outside circumstances, past beliefs, or experiences? Witness how your mindset affects you throughout your day. Does it support your inner peace and mood or negatively influence your feelings about situations in your life? Observe how your attitude and your mindset spread to everyone you interact with throughout the day. See how you can shift your perception of your mind by choosing not to let the external circumstances affect your true inner self. Watch them, observe them, and notice how the outside world affects your reality.
Steps to shift your mindset
- Notice your emotions and observe their effects on your body.
A negative attitude first affects how you feel about yourself. Observe and allow yourself to experience all the feelings inside you. Whatever you think, whether it be fear, sadness, frustration, anxiety, or more, pay attention to the specific emotions that are coming up for you. How do the emotions feel in your body? You may feel anger, frustration, guilt, shame, or pain within your system and judge yourself. My heart gets clenched, my body gets tight, and my phone jumps out of my hand and smashes the ground. My physical and mental thought process gets all jumbled up, I don’t know why I am short-tempered with the sales clerk or the human on the other end of the phone, yet I can’t help it! Observe your emotions, feel them in your physical body, and allow them to be expressed. This can be through journaling, venting to a friend, rage or emotional release, or exercise.
2. Reflect on the impact of these emotions/mindsets.
Ask yourself, “How does my negative mindset affect my day, the way I operate, my relationships, what I say to myself and others, what I hear others say to me, and how I live each Now moment?” Observe and feel the emotions, yet don’t let them become you. How can you bring yourself back to a state of gratitude about the present moment or do something that brings you joy? You can sit in meditation for three minutes, allowing yourself deep breaths in and out of calm to center back to yourself, bringing to mind what you are grateful for in your life. It can be something easy, like a tree outside your window, a cup of coffee, or a person or pet in your life that you feel love for.
It’s best not to allow yourself to stay in a space where you have nowhere to go, letting yourself spin downwards further and further away from your true self. You don’t want to dwell there, stay there, live there. Your heart wants you to be in joy, calm and loved.
Witness how your mind truly controls it all! You get to choose your reality; This is your life. You can take your power back, keeping your mind calm and balanced, or you can choose to let it control your thought patterning and go to a negative space. Ask questions without judging yourself: What lesson am I meant to learn here? What growth is available to me at this now moment? A higher power is creating this experience for your maximum growth. Trust that everything is happening FOR you, reframe your mindset, and remind yourself that this is not happening to you. Everything is either here for our joy or growth. How can you allow this situation to give you something? What can you receive from it?
3. Self-soothe by talking to yourself with the wisdom you know in your heart, with your Higher Self leading.
How do you start the conversation with yourself to return to higher consciousness, a more profound awareness of knowing things are happening for you, even when it doesn’t feel like it? Remind yourself that we all go through times like these, losing our keys, getting a rough call from a boss, or a tough breakup. You get to CHOOSE, in each moment, where you go with those feelings and what you do with them.
Every single one of us has that CHOICE. I believe we don’t put enough emphasis on this great gift we are given as our birthright- we all have the power of choice! We get to choose: negative or positive, healthy or unhealthy relationship, happy or sad mood, take things personally or not, victim mindset or take responsibility. What can you do at this moment to shift? How are you responsible for your happiness? This right of choice allows you to choose. Stop, drop and roll. Stop, become aware, and shift. It’s up to you. How do you genuinely want to feel at this moment? What can you be grateful for?
4. Consider how you might release the emotions.
How can you release these emotions? Can you call a friend, exercise and work it off, take a nap, or do something nice for yourself? Abraham Hicks, whose teachings are based on the idea that your thoughts create what happens in the physical world, always says, “Look for reasons to feel good and if you can’t find any, take a nap.” He believes that taking a nap brings you back to balance with yourself. You leave the negative thoughts when you fall asleep and when you wake up, you can start over again without any momentum building in a less-than-optimal way.
Another powerful way to move through your mindset is to acknowledge that it has been a rough day or a tough week. Have compassion for yourself, draw yourself a bubble bath, nourish yourself with a delicious meal, and see a fun movie. Choosing consciously where your mindset goes, and accepting where you are in this moment, will allow emotions and moods to continue to flow. Like the pendulum, eventually, they come back to neutral.
Publisher Note: The preceding is an excerpt from Alyee’s forthcoming book Reality on Fire.
