Changing Attitude is Difficult but Critical!

Attitude is your response to a situation, circumstance, person or an object.  But the detailed definition of attitude would be; a predisposition or tendency to respond positively or negatively to a situation, circumstance, person, idea or an object. It influences a person’s choice of action and response to challenges, incentives, rewards etc. These are called stimuli. Stimuli are challenges, incentives and rewards. Four major components of attitude are –

1. Emotions and feelings
2. Cognitive – belief or opinions held consciously
3. Inclination for action , spontaneity
4. Evaluative – positive or negative response to the stimuli

The first 3 components influence or determine the 4^th component.

The importance of Attitude can hardly be exaggerated

It controls our lives. This is why it is extremely important. We must also understand the difference between positive and negative attitude. It is important to know what these both can do for us.

Positive attitude brings strength, energy, motivation and initiative.

Person with a positive attitude will ask “How something can be done?”, rather than saying, “It is very difficult. We don’t know whether it can be done or not.”

It gives you power over your circumstances rather than your circumstances having power over you. That’s the power of positive attitude; it gives YOU the power. You control circumstances, rather than  circumstances affecting you or your behavior.

It is also an understanding of the fact that nothing can change until you change. Therefore, everything changes once you change. You have to identify what are your habits, what are the things that are holding you back. And you have to overcome those, and to overcome those, you have to change.

It is necessary to train your mind to see good in everything. To see something positive, so that it encourages you to go ahead in whatever you are trying to do. Life is 10% of what happens to you and 90% of how you react to it. Let’s make it positive.

It will be a good idea, to decide and say it to yourself every morning that you will face everything that comes to you today with a positive attitude. All things about you are important and you should give importance to all those things. Only when you are careful about everything around you, others will give you the respect you deserve.

While positive attitude will help you in every aspect of life, negative mind will never give you a positive life. It will create only negativity. Further, negative thoughts create negative situations.

A bad attitude leads you nowhere. You cannot go very far until you change it. Therefore, if you identify that your attitude needs some enhancement, do it sooner than later. A person with negative attitude sees difficulty in every opportunity. Whereas a positive thinker, sees an opportunity in every difficulty. This is a big difference. How can you change? You have to figure it out for yourself. Because it depends on your habits.

Positive thoughts are good, but they are not enough. They have to be followed with positive feelings and positive actions. Actions are most important. Without actions you cannot have the benefits of positive attitude. Attitude has to be supplemented and supported by respective actions.

The only disability in life is bad attitude. There is no reason why you should live with a disability which is under your control. There are some difficulties we have to live with. But it’s not so with your attitude. Your attitude is something you can change and the best thing is to change it. Whenever you feel pain in your life, think about its full form –

P – Positive

 

A – Attitude

I – In

N – Negative situation

If you have a tendency to self doubt it keeps giving more negative energy to feed on. That means you are actually attracting negativity. One American in his grey years said “my life has been full of misfortunes which never took place”.

Another man had said, “I don’t have time to hate people who hate me, because I am too busy loving people who love me”.

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Courage & Kindness

Yesterday evening we (entire family) went to watch Cinderella. It’s a movie made 50 years ago. Yet we found it fresh and captivating. An oft repeated children fairy tale enthralled everyone, the little children as well as the senior citizens. Cinderella’s inherent kindness with courage to withstand adversity brought for her fortunes.

 

Kindness indeed is a virtue which however small in action never goes waste. It enhances self-esteem, but more importantly, kindness brings happiness. In our morning walkers’ club, often the subject of how to improve the morals in the society is discussed. Though India is known for its tolerance & kindness, yet today it is felt that citizens show scant respect for others.

 

Everyone complains about the conduct of our people. Undoubtedly with the uncanny behavior no one has anything to gain but a lot to lose.

Courage is another aspect of personality which helps you to have a positive attitude. Someone wrote, ‘life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage. How true! A person who lacks courage can hardly live life. They just exist, like other living beings. Life comprises a series of events. Some are to our liking. Others are not so good and certain others very disturbing. The Bhagvad Gita teaches us that all such events good or bad have to be borne by each individual. If you have courage, you may face these without fear. But if you lack courage there could be some horrifying experiences even though the events remain the same.

 

One may belong to any religion, they usually pray before any dire encounter. Prayer has a certain power. In fact courage is not the absence of fear. Human beings when faced with an unexpected untoward situation are bound to face fear. When you decide to embark upon a challenging situation, you are fully aware of the danger involved. You may be struck with fear but you still go ahead. It only means that you have conquered that fear. Courage is not absence of fear. Courage is nothing but conquering the fear.

 

Great success can be achieved by someone who adds perseverance to courage and kindness. When you do that even the most difficult tasks can be completed with ease. In fact lives of all great men clearly illustrate that they had courage, were alwere always kind, and they all persevered.

Thanks for reading.