Thinking Positive
Last week a friend of mine who is a great, positive, upbeat guy, came down with the flu. When ran into him last week I gave him a hug. His cheek burned into mine. I said, “Charlie, you have a 102 fever!” He said “Naw. I’m fine.”
This, of course, is the way we are taught to think positively about illness and not acknowledge that we are ill because doing so will make it reality. This is how anything with the potential to be viewed as “negative” is dealt with in the world of positive thinking. Ignore it and it will go away. Focus only on the positive things that you want and that is what you will get.
I’m a “positive thinker” from way back
Understand, I am a positive thinker from way back, but there are some obvious flaws in this type of thinking. I believe that we should always focus on the positive and use affirmations and picture what we want. This keeps us focused on our goals and helps us realize them.
Rescuing ourselves
But what I have come to recognize is that the practice of ignoring the problems that occur is a way of “rescuing” ourselves from the consequences of our choices. It helps us to keep ourselves from feeling the pain of what has occurred in our past and from feeling the results of our choices. It also prevents us from learning from them and healing them.
This is what we do when we pretend that hurtful things don’t exist or choose not to “dwell on the past”. These are words and practices that help us avoid dealing with the feelings about what has happened.
A lot of people rush to the practices of positive thinking because it will help them continue to avoid feeling pain. It is painful, sometimes, to face the consequences of our choices and to process through the pain of what has happened to us in the past. Our old wounds don’t go away simply because we don’t focus on them, no matter how much we desire it.
The consequences of ignoring wounds
Ignoring our emotional wounds is like continuing to walk on a broken leg, insisting that it’s not broken. Actually, it’s even worse than that, because emotional wounds fester in subversive ways that prevent us from functioning in our lives the way we want. Emotional wounds that are not addressed result in corrupted thinking and distorted emotional responses to others and ourselves. They end up sabotaging our every intentional positive thought. Our unconscious feelings and thoughts always override our conscious ones.
Treasure hunting
Inside every painful emotional wound lies a treasure. Each wound holds a piece of our personal power and our preciousness. Without being willing to open up those wounds and explore their meanings and discover their gifts, we are forced to be a Victim.
Any time someone is wounded they are a “victim” (as in the terms “shot victim”, “bite victim”, “rape victim”, etc.) until these wounds are healed. Carrying around unhealed wounds keeps us stuck in being a Victim.
Ignoring them using “positive thinking” as an excuse to avoid them is using “positive thinking” to become your own Rescuer.
Uncover the pockets of power
Making the choice to work through the wounds allows you to uncover the pockets of power buried there. This works in exactly the same way as the methods proposed by Robert Scheinfeld in “Busting Loose from the Money Game” (available in the Unity Book Store). In this book, Scheinfeld encourages readers to expand upon feelings as they come up and to deeply explore what the feelings are all about before letting them go. In doing this, he claims, you unlock the power to have everything you want in your life.
Unlock your full potential by allowing yourself to have full access to all the power hidden inside your wounds. Change everything by no longer hiding from the power you hold back by being your own Rescuer.
What do you think, am I crazy?
Can feelings really hold the power to your unconscious will? Can you really discover the secret to having everything you want by simply allowing yourself to process through your unprocessed wounds? Or have I gone off my rocker? Tell me what you think. Comment below!