Shape the quality of your life with this one thing: your focus!
We all desire to have a good quality of life, don’t we?
Our focus is something paramount that impacts the quality of our life. Most likely, we are not even aware that what shapes the quality of our life is actually within our conscious control.
Where are you placing your focus every day?
When you are focused on joy, love, appreciation for your journey, and gratitude for what’s working in your life, how would you imagine your quality of life to be?
vs.
The quality of your life when you are focused on things that are lacking in your life, past hurts and grievances, or things that could go wrong?
We are too good at engaging in things that bring us down.
For example, wether consciously or unconsciously, we tend to focus on things that kill our confidence, our joy, and our positive vibes. Why do we do this?
Our brains are wired to survive. We search for the bad stuff and fixate on the threat. According to psychologist and New York Times best-selling author, Rick Hanson, Ph.D, our brains are like “Velcro for negative experiences and Teflon for good ones.”
Negative emotions involve more thinking and more of a process in our brains than positive ones. Thus, we tend to ruminate more about unpleasant events, because they have a harder impact.
Although all this may be true, we can turn things around.
The remedy?
- Awareness is key.
- Firstly, by becoming aware of our thoughts and knowing that our brain is wired to watch out for the bad stuff we can keep it in check.
- Secondly, it’s not the negative thought that is necessarily the problem, but believing it to be true is when we head down the rabbit hole. Watch out for believing the negative thoughts.
- Thirdly, as you have pleasant experiences in your life, or practice gratitude to create a moment towards happiness, lean into the positive experience. Take an extra 5 minutes to really soak it up, so that it seep into your body viscerally.
Here are 3 joy killers to watch out for:
- Other Peoples “Highlight” Reels
Do you notice that when you scroll through social media, you often find yourself comparing your, behind the scenes, life to someone else’s picture perfect snap of a wonderful life?
We all know how crappy this feels. Comparison in this way kills joy.
What is the remedy?
- Stop scrolling the moment you feel insignificant and shift your focus, or detox social media for a while.
- Focus, instead on appreciating your life and your own journey.
- Healthy Comparison is when we look for ways to be inspired by others rather than jealous.
2. The News
The news is programmed to entertain and engage us. It’s primarily focused on all that’s negative and not working in the world. How do we even know for sure that it’s truth or just stories tailored to draw us into more fear, upset and uncertainty?
We do not get a balanced glimpse into what beautiful things are happening in the world through the news.
What is the remedy?
- Because the quality of your life is determined by where you place your focus, you get to choose how much you want to ingest the news.
- If the news makes you feel downtrodden, kills your confidence and depresses you, then simply detox the news.
- Focus on building your beautiful life instead.
3. Negative Self Talk
We are too easily lead astray into self-criticism rather than self-love and understanding.
You get to choose how you want to treat yourself.
Remember that you determine your own worth, no one else gets to do that unless you give them permission. (Hint)-Do not give anyone the power to determine your worth.
What’s the remedy?
- Flip the script in your head and focus on treating yourself the same as you would your very best friend, with the utmost love and respect!
- Practice hijacking those negative thoughts every day and don’t waste anymore of your time thinking false beliefs about yourself. You really do have better things to do and better things to focus on! Don’t you?
- Remember to shape the quality of your life with this one thing, where you place your focus.
We need to be masters of our focus and perspective so that we can shape the quality of our lives.
You can flip the script anytime. Remember you have control.
The quality of your life depends on where you place your focus, therefore when we master our mind’s focus, while watching out for the pitfalls that kill our joy and confidence, our quality of life improves.
Where will you place your focus today and shape the quality of YOUR life?
*If you would like to unpack any struggles you are having around shaping the quality of your life to the best that it can be….Connect with me, I would love to help.