By Abhishek Agarwal -

Take for example, the cell phone that has become an indispensable gadget for every one all over the world today. It too once used to be an impossible dream, however, it was the positive attitude and will of one single individual that made it possible and accessible to billions of people today. If the inventor was pessimistic and had gotten depressed with the numerous failures he might have encountered on his way, we would not be talking to our dear ones on a handy and mobile phone today. It clearly manifests the applicability of the principle that what the mind can visualize, the human body is capable of achieving it.

Ones Psychology and Positive Thinking play a crucial role in countering negative tendencies

The feeling of joy born out of a positive and healthy existence is unbeatable. Ones life condition becomes such that one feels lively, happy and capable of taking on anything in this world. The future looks all bright and brimming with hope and fulfillment. One feels the thankfulness of being alive from ones core. Life just looks perfect – flawless!

In reality, however, it all sounds to good to be true. The people nowadays are surrounded by so many worries and fears stemming from various issues related to relationships, finance, career, family life, office etc. that taking out time to think positively becomes a rare activity. Positive thinking by its very meaning is all about the state of one?s mind rather than one?s actions. Of course the state of mind eventually gets manifested in the form of actions, but it all starts from ones brain. You must firmly believe and be confident about the fact that you are endowed with all sorts of capabilities, health and attitude to taste success. This is also known as positive affirmation.

A synonym often used for positive affirmation is self-suggestion. However, self-suggestion refers to the method by which one can rid oneself of all the negative thoughts that stop him/her from thinking positive. Subjecting oneself to repeated self-suggestions can work wonders on the individual by leading him/her to a life state full of positive thoughts.

You can even opt for the strategy of recording all your self-suggestions and positive affirmations on a CD with a background music score and playing it regularly while driving to work or when relaxing. This method helps immensely in driving certain thoughts home and ensuring their absorption and manifestation in a very successful manner.

Positive Thinking – A Self-Learning Process

It is often commented in the psychology parlance that what the mind visualizes, body is capable to achieve. It is the mind that is the center of ones existence and determines all the actions of a person. Thus, if you are able to visualize success in you mind, your body and your surroundings start working towards the accomplishment of that goal in a very spontaneous manner. The more positive thoughts you feed your mind with, the more positive results you will see in your environment.

It is very important that you do not confuse positive thinking with daydreaming. Positive thinking is much more rooted in the reality of our day-to-day existence as compared to dreaming. It instills in us the ability to respond to the situations in a positive manner, thus helping us change the circumstances for better.

Another great benefit that you stand to gain from the habit of positive thinking is that it will help you through the difficult times of your life. So even when the tides are not in your favor, you will be able to derive the strength to keep pushing on and emerge victorious over yourself.

Abhishek is a Self-Development expert and he has got some great [http://www.Positive-You.com/689/index.htm]Positive Attitude Secrets up his sleeves! Download his FREE 87 Pages Ebook, Positive Attitude For Unlimited Success from his website http://www.Positive-You.com/689/index.htm. Only limited Free Copies available.

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In the early days, psychology was mainly about research. They wanted to understand how reflexes worked (touch a hot stove… Ouch! Move your hand away), perception worked (I see an old lady… now I see a princess…) and how behavior worked (dog sees food… it salivates). When psychology started it had 3 aims: treat and cure mental illness, support ‘creative genius’ or prodigies which back then may have been mistaken for mental illness, and help every day people live better lives.

Mental illness became a popular topic after WWI and WWII. Psychologists who used to play in labs and give lectures all day had new career opportunities. They could treat people who were coming home from war plagued by mental illness. And poof… A lot of funding and money poured into studying how to fix what was wrong with people. Well in 2008, we now know A LOT about what is wrong with people. We have treatments for most mental illnesses and even some cures. We also know a lot about creative genius, but as a whole psychology did not know a lot about your every day Joe. So in 1998 Dr. Martin Seligman created a new field in psychology… positive psychology.

Seligman spent most of his life studying depression and proved that depression is learned. Then he asked, what about optimism? For a long time, psychologists thought that if you took a person who was depressed and took their depression away, you’d have a happy person. But that’s not true. Just because you don’t have a cold, doesn’t mean you are optimally healthy.

Just because you aren’t depressed doesn’t mean you feel vibrant, joyful and love your life. The field of positive psychology, sometimes referred to as the science of happiness, uses the same scientific rigor that has been applied to studying what’s wrong with people and how to fix them, to understanding the breadth of human potential.

Positive psychologists conduct research on things like optimism, resilience, grit, hope, joy, awe, strengths, happiness, flow, prayer, and humor. Anyone can apply the research that has come out of positive psychology into their lives and careers. Practitioners such as psychologists, therapists and life coaches, use positive psychology to find what is already working with clients and help them build their strengths, find engagement and meaning in their life.

They help them feel happier and more fulfilled. Positive psychology is different than “happiology”. We are not advocating people be happy, happy, happy all the time. It’s extremely important to feel angry, frustrated and sad when it is appropriate. Positive psychology is about what Dr. Tal Ben-Shahar calls, “the permission to be human.”

That is, feeling all the emotions that human beings feel as opposed to trying to tell ourselves we should be happy all the time. It’s about allowing yourself to feel all emotions as they come up without getting stuck. For a long time, psychology did not give people the permission to be human. The field was heavily skewed on the side of mental illness, positive psychology is about evening out the scale.

Bringing as much focus to the positive side of life as we have to the negative. The research coming out of positive psychology is fascinating. Never before have scientists ran double-blind placebo studies on things like happiness, gratitude and optimism. Now, you might be thinking, why bother conducting a research study to find out that doing good things for others can help you feel better? I completely agree with you. Inherently we know those things are good and we should do that. But, how many miserable or slightly unhappy people do you come across in your life? How many people do you know that go out of their way to do something nice for someone else?

Even better, go out of their way for a complete stranger? Research shows that you can dramatically and instantaneously improve your happiness level just by doing something nice for someone else. These people are happier, have better relationships, are more liked by others and feel better about themselves. Yes, we know that doing these things can benefit our lives. But we forget. Or we don’t realize the impact it can have on us. Sound scientific research is powerful stuff. A study showed that sales people who learn skills on becoming more resilient and optimistic were three times more successful than their depressed counterparts.

If you’re a company owner, that’s a big deal. Research shows that engaging in work that enables you to use your strengths and what you are naturally good at not only enables you to be happier but also more effective. Makes sense right? But how many people do you know that actually get to do what they are good at and love to do every day? Positive psychology is unique from self-help and pop psychology.

Its founder Martin Seligman is very clear that positive psychology should be descriptive, rather than prescriptive. Meaning, rather than doing research about what increases happiness and then telling people what to do with their lives, positive psychology should describe the research on these topics. According to Seligman, people conduct sound studies on topics such as resilience, gratitude and prayer, figure out how these things affect people and the mechanisms by which they work.

Then they educate people on what the research shows. For example, studies show that expressing increases your experience of positive emotions and reduces symptoms of depression. Grateful people are more optimistic about future events, feel more connected with others and even report better quality sleep. As scientists conduct these studies they aim to understand the mechanisms involved in gratitude: how does it work? Why does it work?

Positive psychologist say, “show people the research, help them make informed decisions about what would work best in their life.” This is powerful and profoundly different from prescribing or telling people how to live their lives. As a positive psychology based life coach, I combine both a descriptive and a prescriptive approach. I describe positive psychology based approaches for creating the positive change clients want to see, and I make suggestions based on what has worked for me and others.

As a field, positive psychology has taken off. Just Google “happiness” + “study” and look at how much happiness has been in the media recently. Try words like resilience, joy, humor, strengths, grit, life satisfaction and you’ll see that positive psychology is rapidly expanding. The formal definition of positive psychology, a la Wikipedia, is “the scientific study of the strengths and virtues that enable individuals and communities to thrive.” Every month there are more and more fascinating studies coming out in the field. We have barely scratched the surface of what we understand to be these strengths and virtues, nevertheless, positive psychology is transforming people’s lives worldwide.

Emiliya Zhivotovskaya, MAPP, RYT, is an international life coach, speaker and founder of Flourish, Inc., an organization dedicated to enabling individuals and organizations in unleashing their potential using positive psychology, yoga and alternative therapies. She holds a master’s degree in Applied Positive Psychology from the University of Pennsylvania where she studied under the founder of the field, Martin Seligman. Emiliya is the featured success coach for the National Society of Leadership and Success, a former Penn Resilience Program Facilitator, contributing author for Positive Psychology News Daily, and holds additional certification in Vinyasa Yoga 200-hr, Reiki, Laughter Yoga, Thai Massage, Brain Gym, and Yoga Education. Sign up for a free weekly newsletter and receive a free copy of Fix Your Thoughts, Change Your Life at http://flourishwithemiliya.com/Test/gen-step1.php

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Emiliya_Zhivotovskaya

By Emiliya Zhivotovskaya -

In the early days, psychology was mainly about research. They wanted to understand how reflexes worked (touch a hot stove… Ouch! Move your hand away), perception worked (I see an old lady… now I see a princess…) and how behavior worked (dog sees food… it salivates). When psychology started it had 3 aims: treat and cure mental illness, support ‘creative genius’ or prodigies which back then may have been mistaken for mental illness, and help every day people live better lives.

Mental illness became a popular topic after WWI and WWII. Psychologists who used to play in labs and give lectures all day had new career opportunities. They could treat people who were coming home from war plagued by mental illness. And poof… A lot of funding and money poured into studying how to fix what was wrong with people. Well in 2008, we now know A LOT about what is wrong with people. We have treatments for most mental illnesses and even some cures. We also know a lot about creative genius, but as a whole psychology did not know a lot about your every day Joe. So in 1998 Dr. Martin Seligman created a new field in psychology… positive psychology.

Seligman spent most of his life studying depression and proved that depression is learned. Then he asked, what about optimism? For a long time, psychologists thought that if you took a person who was depressed and took their depression away, you’d have a happy person. But that’s not true. Just because you don’t have a cold, doesn’t mean you are optimally healthy.

Just because you aren’t depressed doesn’t mean you feel vibrant, joyful and love your life. The field of positive psychology, sometimes referred to as the science of happiness, uses the same scientific rigor that has been applied to studying what’s wrong with people and how to fix them, to understanding the breadth of human potential.

Positive psychologists conduct research on things like optimism, resilience, grit, hope, joy, awe, strengths, happiness, flow, prayer, and humor. Anyone can apply the research that has come out of positive psychology into their lives and careers. Practitioners such as psychologists, therapists and life coaches, use positive psychology to find what is already working with clients and help them build their strengths, find engagement and meaning in their life.

They help them feel happier and more fulfilled. Positive psychology is different than “happiology”. We are not advocating people be happy, happy, happy all the time. It’s extremely important to feel angry, frustrated and sad when it is appropriate. Positive psychology is about what Dr. Tal Ben-Shahar calls, “the permission to be human.”

That is, feeling all the emotions that human beings feel as opposed to trying to tell ourselves we should be happy all the time. It’s about allowing yourself to feel all emotions as they come up without getting stuck. For a long time, psychology did not give people the permission to be human. The field was heavily skewed on the side of mental illness, positive psychology is about evening out the scale.

Bringing as much focus to the positive side of life as we have to the negative. The research coming out of positive psychology is fascinating. Never before have scientists ran double-blind placebo studies on things like happiness, gratitude and optimism. Now, you might be thinking, why bother conducting a research study to find out that doing good things for others can help you feel better? I completely agree with you. Inherently we know those things are good and we should do that. But, how many miserable or slightly unhappy people do you come across in your life? How many people do you know that go out of their way to do something nice for someone else?

Even better, go out of their way for a complete stranger? Research shows that you can dramatically and instantaneously improve your happiness level just by doing something nice for someone else. These people are happier, have better relationships, are more liked by others and feel better about themselves. Yes, we know that doing these things can benefit our lives. But we forget. Or we don’t realize the impact it can have on us. Sound scientific research is powerful stuff. A study showed that sales people who learn skills on becoming more resilient and optimistic were three times more successful than their depressed counterparts.

If you’re a company owner, that’s a big deal. Research shows that engaging in work that enables you to use your strengths and what you are naturally good at not only enables you to be happier but also more effective. Makes sense right? But how many people do you know that actually get to do what they are good at and love to do every day? Positive psychology is unique from self-help and pop psychology.

Its founder Martin Seligman is very clear that positive psychology should be descriptive, rather than prescriptive. Meaning, rather than doing research about what increases happiness and then telling people what to do with their lives, positive psychology should describe the research on these topics. According to Seligman, people conduct sound studies on topics such as resilience, gratitude and prayer, figure out how these things affect people and the mechanisms by which they work.

Then they educate people on what the research shows. For example, studies show that expressing increases your experience of positive emotions and reduces symptoms of depression. Grateful people are more optimistic about future events, feel more connected with others and even report better quality sleep. As scientists conduct these studies they aim to understand the mechanisms involved in gratitude: how does it work? Why does it work?

Positive psychologist say, “show people the research, help them make informed decisions about what would work best in their life.” This is powerful and profoundly different from prescribing or telling people how to live their lives. As a positive psychology based life coach, I combine both a descriptive and a prescriptive approach. I describe positive psychology based approaches for creating the positive change clients want to see, and I make suggestions based on what has worked for me and others.

As a field, positive psychology has taken off. Just Google “happiness” + “study” and look at how much happiness has been in the media recently. Try words like resilience, joy, humor, strengths, grit, life satisfaction and you’ll see that positive psychology is rapidly expanding. The formal definition of positive psychology, a la Wikipedia, is “the scientific study of the strengths and virtues that enable individuals and communities to thrive.” Every month there are more and more fascinating studies coming out in the field. We have barely scratched the surface of what we understand to be these strengths and virtues, nevertheless, positive psychology is transforming people’s lives worldwide.

Emiliya Zhivotovskaya, MAPP, RYT, is an international life coach, speaker and founder of Flourish, Inc., an organization dedicated to enabling individuals and organizations in unleashing their potential using positive psychology, yoga and alternative therapies. She holds a master’s degree in Applied Positive Psychology from the University of Pennsylvania where she studied under the founder of the field, Martin Seligman. Emiliya is the featured success coach for the National Society of Leadership and Success, a former Penn Resilience Program Facilitator, contributing author for Positive Psychology News Daily, and holds additional certification in Vinyasa Yoga 200-hr, Reiki, Laughter Yoga, Thai Massage, Brain Gym, and Yoga Education. Sign up for a free weekly newsletter and receive a free copy of Fix Your Thoughts, Change Your Life at http://flourishwithemiliya.com/Test/gen-step1.php

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Emiliya_Zhivotovskaya

By Gardner Wilkinson -

Positive psychology is the study of those virtues and qualities that enable people, groups and institutions to thrive and be successful. In short, it is a study of what makes life worth living. This branch of psychology has come to the fore in just under 5 years. The aim of positive thinking is to make the average person more successful by nurturing the innate talent in them. As a part of this quest, the practitioners of these psychology undertake and promote research, education and training in this psychology.

The basis of this  psychology is the belief that every individual wants to lead a fulfilling and happy life by nurturing what is best within themselves and increasing fruitful experiences at work, love and social gatherings.

At the core of positive psychology lie three main concerns:

-  Positive emotions
-  Affirmative individual behaviors
-  Constructive institutions

The first of these is positive emotions. An important part of positive thinking is to understand the feelings of happiness humans feel within themselves. Happiness, according to positive psychologists, is important because this alone can contribute to highly successful individuals. People who are happy are more productive, are better at converting opportunities, are generally more successful and are also constructive in spreading happiness. So, in order to understand the basis of positive emotions, positive psychology studies how individuals can create happiness in the present and faith in a successful future. However, in doing so, positive psychology does not deny the importance of the distressing and negative aspects of life. psychologists agree that human nature is filled with strife, selfishness and negativities. They only seek to explore the other side of the coin.

Positive individual behaviors are what contribute to feelings of happiness. So, they are an important part of this psychology. Some of the most common individual behaviors studied by this psychology include the capacity to feel happiness, courage, strength, convictions, ambitions, creativity, self-knowledge and self-control.

Positive angel also seeks to understand and encourage the existence of social institutions that foster cooperation, social justice, leadership, teamwork and tolerance.

In a nutshell, the objectives of positive psychology are

-  To foster primary institutions that help children to flourish and succeed
-  To foster a culture in workplaces that enhance productivity and success
-  To set up communities that improve cooperation
-  To encourage a state of mind that is conducive to all things positive

Positive thinking has immense importance in our social and cultural life. This kind of a science helps psychologists understand why individuals and groups break down and why people are unable to achieve the kind of success they dream of. It also seeks to learn why negative events have a deeper impact on our psyche than positive events. By doing this, it seeks to understand how positive events can become more powerful. In this way, positive psychology teaches people to uplift the quality of their lives. Positive Psychology – At Happier.com, our mission is to make people happy. We provide you with tips from experts which will help you to find happiness in life. Visit us now for more information.

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