Positive thinking can make a difference
Listen to this articleMy fiancé turned to me today and said, “I’m going to do something. I’m going to try not to be negative for at least 24 hours.” I thought it was a pretty good idea, so I decided to try it along with him. We’re pretty big fans of trying different challenges (see my previous blog about the Satan diet we tried – and failed) so it seemed like another fun one for us to try.
We were not very successful. It was Friday, so we were both at work, and both very anxious to get the weekend started. I’ve been dieting for our wedding in September, so I’m pretty much hungry all the time, and Awesome suffers from tension headaches after looking too long at various electronic screens. We both tried hard not to complain, and when I said I didn’t like something on a website I was using, I told Awesome that I was “just commenting.”
For the wedding, we’ve both been trying to get into shape, and our approaches are very different. While I like to think positively, Awesome tends to berate himself into working out and eating well. I’ve tried to tell him about the power of positive thinking but he doesn’t think it works for him. All the times before when I’ve tried to lose weight, I used to beat myself up if I didn’t do my full workout, or if I ate a brownie and went over my calorie intake for the day. Now instead, I say to myself, “I’ll try harder tomorrow.”
recently did a study demonstrating the effects that positive thinking had on weight loss. The study followed 84 cleaning women – half were told that their jobs met the requirements for exercise as set by the Surgeon General, and the other half weren’t given any information about their activity level. Researchers found that in a month, the women who were given the exercise information lost weight even though they hadn’t changed their diet or exercise regimen. The group who wasn’t given any information lost no weight.
We are still trying to think positively — not just for weight loss purposes, but with our life in general. If good thoughts help people lose weight who aren’t even trying, think of what it could do for our entire life – or yours.
Emily Campbell is a perpetually single, 20-something girl-around-town who loves Shakespeare, old movies, Natty Boh, and of course, long walks on the beach. A sales manager by day and freelance writer by night, she was recently forced into a life of involuntary celibacy when her last relationship fizzled out over a text message. She’s tired of settling for second – or tenth – best, and she’s ready to find Mr. Right. Or, Mr. Nearly Right. No one’s perfect…which she has learned the hard (but hilarious) way.