We have heard men of old times say repeatedly in our ears that “the way a person thinks, he becomes and as he continues to think so he remains.” The quality of our lives depends largely both on what we think upon and how we think. No man will ever be able to rise above his thinking pattern, if a man believes success is meant for certain people in the society then so be it for the man because each time, he is set to take life changing steps, his mindset like a rope tied on the legs of a bird that the owner does not want to go astray, the man will always be brought back to the state of his mind.
There is a subtle mindset that keeps people down, you have heard of the story that we were told while growing up about a lion who always moves around with sheep, he eats like them, runs away from fellow lion because he’s in the midst of sheep, he didn’t just became a ‘lion acting like a sheep' – there has to be first a mental conditioning that made the lion believe he’s a sheep. If the lion was forced into the midst of sheep, he would rebel in no time, but because he grew amidst sheep, and little by little the mindset that made him was eroded and was replaced with a meek mindset of a sheep.
Being a king is more than sitting on the throne with a crown on your head. Behind the head there wears the crown, there is a mindset that powers the king. A slave can place a crown on his head, might even sit on the throne, but will only make a shipwreck of the kingdom because there’s a difference between a ‘slave’ and a ‘king’ and the difference is not the royal apparel or the tattered clothes, the difference primarily is the ‘Mind.’
In the Book, Buttercup: The Butterfly That Would Not Fly, Buttercup faced the challenge of having to confront a mindset that says to him he can’t rise and he can’t fly because he looks different from the rest of the swarm. It took a long time and a lot convincing which are revealed in this book before Buttercup could finally fly.
Examples of Negative Thinking
I am not worth anything This is very common among many people, it’s a thinking pattern that makes someone looks at himself and conclude they are nobody and will never accomplish anything in life. A wise man once said, “If you don’t love yourself, it is a wickedness to want people to love you.” That’s true, if you believe you’re not worth anything and can’t do anything, others are likely to see you the same way. As highlighted in the book, Buttercup: The Butterfly That Would Not Fly, Buttercup believes he can’t fly; he sees numerous reasons why he can’t fly like his mates. There was nothing wrong with his physical ability to fly; it was all in his mind.
Nothing good ever happens for me It’s not very difficult to slide into a pity-party mode. It can be argued that humans love being pitied, but ‘human pity' has never made anyone great in life. Time spent immersed in self-pity is time that could be used to confront and overcome the challenges of life. The mindset that “nothing good ever happens to me” must be jettisoned to move with greater ease toward our goals.
Fear of many ‘unknowns' The reason many people fail to take positive steps in life is the fear of the unknowns. Some people are afraid of failure, but they have forgotten that you can only fail when you try, it’s impossible for someone to fail if he/she hasn’t tried out anything. Others are afraid of what people will say, some are afraid of being criticized. Whether you move forward or stay in the same position in life, people will always have something to say about, negative, or positive, it doesn’t matter, their mouth must utter something.
Examples of Positive Thinking
Identifying negative thoughts is not enough but replacing the negative thought with the positive one every time you realize you are thinking the negative thought. Repeating your positive thought over and over to yourself, out loud whenever you get a chance and even sharing them with another person if possible.
Believe in yourself You must believe in yourself, it’s a nonnegotiable recipe for success at any level. Roy T. Bennett writes in his book Light in the Heart that:
You’re braver than you think, more talented than you know, And more capable than you imagine and that the only limitation is the one placed upon oneself.
Buttercup had an identity issue; he didn’t believe himself enough to try to fly, but as revealed in the book, he was able to overcome his fears after learning the keys and being assured of the supported needed to overcome any type of negative thinking.
Buttercup is available on Amazon.