“The more you praise and celebrate your life, the more there is in life to celebrate.” ~ Oprah Winfrey

Positive Provocations is 5 years old!!! Woohoo!

I’m a sucker for celebrations. I truly am. I look for things in everyday life to celebrate…So why shouldnt my piece of heaven aka Positive Provocations turning FIVE years old be any less?

In order to truly celebrate this blog and all it has grown up to BE.. I must share my story of how positive thinking came into my life. Its this seed of positivity that led to the conception of Positive Provocations!

My Chance Encounter with Positive Thinking

Very often I get asked this question: “How come you’re always so positive about everything? Dont you ever get down? Dont you ever feel sad? Is your life so perfect?”

Hmm..you tell me…what do you think? Am I not a thinking and feeling human(e) being? Ofcourse, I am. So its only natural that I do feel down, sometimes. I do get upset, sometimes. I do get agitated sometimes too. But, does that stop me from thinking positively about the situation at hand> NO!

Do you know why? Its just as simple as- I’ve been on the other side. I’ve been on the negative, self-centered, self-torturous, self annihilating and most of all destructive Side. And believe me, its not a very pretty side to be. Everything on this side is dull. Its gloomy. Its pitch black. You cant see where you’re going. You can’t feel what you’re feeling. You are just technically alive, but living dead. All this cause I was thinking negatively about every little thing that came my way. This time of my life was so clueless. You think you know what you’re doing, but in its reality, when I think about it now, I had no idea how I was truly functioning.

Discovering positive thinking all by accident
I think fate brought positive thinking right in front of me. The incident that led to this was so simple yet so profound for me:
At the age of 21, when I was stuck in a rain storm, soaking wet, wondering how I am going to get home…I opened my purse to check how much money I had to actually catch a cab to go home. The wallet wasn’t in my purse! It was no where in my ginormous purse. I looked for it for nearly 10 minutes in that pouring rain and didn’t find it. Which simply meant it was stolen on the way and that I had no money. No money for anything. No cab, No bus, No train, Nothing! If youre wondering why I didn’t call someone…well this was the time when cell phones weren’t an everyday thing. I literally sat down on the sidewalk, and started wondering “I’m in the middle of pouring rain, no money to get home, no way to call anyone, its late. I’m going to remain here forever, who’ll notice me gone? Who is really going to miss me …blah blah and blah”…the negative thoughts had taken over. Which was actually pretty normal for me then, considering the kind of person I was at that phase of my life.
After sitting on that sidewalk for like an hour, my thoughts just took an absolute U turn! How? I dont really know. I did feel like a Divine force whispered to me that everything is going to be alright…Thinking about it now, I think my mind and my being was just so tired of thinking and feeling negative, that it was just led to find a way. Suddenly, I had thoughts, new thoughts. Thoughts I felt happy with. Imagine that…crying, soaking, dripping wet, alone, robbed, no money, almost 3 hours away from home- I was feeling fine. I felt like I and only I was in control. And that my darlings, is a beautiful feeling.

What changed in that split moment?
You might be thinking, she is going to reveal this big, huge technique or secret she used to get out of the negative thinking trap. But, on the contrary, its a very simple NOTHING! Yes, Nothing! I stopped thinking cause I was so so tired of all the negatives that were coming in front of me. I went blank. And in this blank, out of somewhere came good thoughts, happy thoughts, parallel ideas of getting home and hugging Mum(who must be worried about me). I caught a cab and went home..made the cab driver wait out till I grabbed some money from home and paid him. Just that simple.
The change was I let my brain rest, by shutting down and being tired of all the negatives, I let my inner-self, my heart emerge. I let that true simple, innate self take over. IN that take over, I was gifted with Positive thinking. I didn’t know it was positive thinking till I read and researched about it later.
That was my moment of epiphany! It was a very small situation, but it taught me to be ME. I realized that my over thinking and constantly worrying about everything attitude was literally harming me and holding me back.

So, What is Positive Thinking really???
By Definition- “It is an inclination to put the most favorable construction upon actions and events or to anticipate the best possible outcome.”
But, By experience and understanding it is your Guide. Your true self, your heart self, your soul guiding you to live life happily no matter what.
Our constantly pushing our minds to over think, to over analyze has led to our true heart centered self to be buried in the rubble of pain, anger, agitation, loneliness, hatred, confusion…..
We cease to exist. All that exists is negativity. We need to get rid of that negative rubble from over our true self and shine!
We are all born to Shine. We are all precious, perfect and priceless.

Positive thinking helped me heal.
It made me see the best of the world. It made me more aware. It made me hope. It made me live soulfully. Love deeply. It made living happily so simple. It is my only savior in my most trying times.

Hence, I am an unwavering positive thinker. An Optimist. When I can be happy, love life, LIVE life, feel life….why would I want to go back to the other Negative side?
I’m an optimist. No negative side exists for me. Only positive all the way :)

Immense Gratitude!

As I step into another NEW year here on Positive Provocations, I am delighted and happy to share it all with YOU the beautiful reader on this blog. Its because of YOU that this blog is what it is today.

I’m immensely grateful to each and every one of you, for reading, for sharing, for being here. Your energy here every week catapults me into action to write more. Your countless loving emails and messages full of how much the writings here have helped you make my heart sing.

I heal, I grow and I understand with so much depth, beacuse I write here for YOU. And I will happily continue to do so…

Thank you from the bottom of my heart!

Now its YOUR turn to share…Are you a positive thinker? Have the articles here helped you? How do YOU keep yourself positive in the most stressful situations? Share your story, tips and thoughts in the comments. I’d love to learn from you.

p.s. I have shared this story before, in the first year of the blog…but it fits perfectly with all that Positive Provocations and I stand for :)

♥♥”Thank you SO much for reading! Please, Share this article on your favourite social networks. Every share, like or tweet makes me reach more people who need a positive healing nudge in their lives. I appreciate you!”♥♥

With Immense Love & Gratitude,
~Zeenat~

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