Positivity - DId you See it?
WATCH THIS VIDEO before reading the rest of this article. If you don’t watch the video, that’s okay, you’ll still get the point. However, it lasts less than 2 minutes and I think you’ll get a lot out of it.
When you have a great experience at a restaurant, how often do you actively seek out the manager to talk about how great the service was, or tell the server directly, or even think about how great the service was? However, when service is poor, how much do you focus on that? Did you know that the brain focuses 20 times more on negative than positive (Hammond, 2015). That is the human fight or flight response in action. It is a biological instinct that we focus on things that may be harmful to our mind and body in order to protect ourselves. However, how necessary is that in today’s world? In these times of a polarized world, it is certainly easy to find the negative.
As in the video above (which you may or may not have watched), by focusing on one thing, you can completely miss something else. Did you see the gorilla? I didn’t. Think of the bouncing basketballs as negative and the gorilla as positive. Unless you practice to train or tell your brain to focus on something else, it diverts to what it thinks it should be focused on. When our brain is hyper focused on the negative, we can often negate positive aspects of things. Arguably, focusing on positivity and happiness is actually more important for our daily lives and ultimate success, than negative. We don’t always need the fight or flight response as much anymore, or at least not in the same way that we used to.
Shawn Achor, the author of The Happiness Advantage (2010), states that focusing on the positive, happiness, and optimism, can lead to a multitude of productive outcomes. Happiness and optimism actually fuel performance and achievement. He goes on to state that positivity can also lead to increased self-efficacy and confidence (2010). I’m not saying that focusing on the positive negates the complexity or issues that need to be addressed in the world today. However, if we don’t actively focus on the positive, our brains may never let us experience it.
When I am doing something I know I should be enjoying, I stop and take a mental minute to actively enjoy it. Vacation is an example of something that is supposed to be positive, but it can also be very stressful. At the start of a vacation, I pause and enjoy the moment and excitement that I feel, or should feel. I think about what I’m looking forward to, what I want to do, and what I hope to feel. Spending time with my children is also one of those mixed feelings experiences. I often get asked to jump on the trampoline with my children and they seem to time their request at the exact moment when I am going to sit down and relax. At that moment, I purposefully think about the fact that they will not ask me to jump with them for the rest of their lives. They will quickly grow older and I may not have these types of experiences with them. That shift in mindset helps me appreciate the moment.
Ultimately, focusing on the positive and the productive thoughts must be purposeful. It is training your mind to see the positive (the gorilla) and feel all the emotions that can accompany that. In theory, that will lead to many other positives in your own life, and others’ too - especially if you share them. Feel free to reach out and share your positivity or appreciation of others. If you want a great tool to have these conversations with your children, listen to the book, Happy Right Now, by Julie Berry.
Pete Kurty, Ed. D
Achor, S. (2010). The Happiness Advantage. Crown Publishing Group.
Hammond, Z. (2015). Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain. SAGE Publications Ltd.
