"No one can go back and make a new beginning, but anyone can start today and create a new end.- Maria Robinson

When I was younger – in my teens and early twenties – I was a prisoner. Not physically but mentally, by some destructive thinking called pessimism.

This negative thought poisoned what could have been a happy and full childhood, adolescence and adult life. Pessimism created barriers and walls where there were none.

Throughout this period I was driven by pessimism, it was part of my life. In hindsight, it was just a mess.

If you recognize yourself as a pessimist, know that you do not have to remain so all your life. This is what I did, learning to replace my negative thoughts with optimism.

In this article, I will explore nine positive habits that have helped me go from being a pessimist the majority of the time to being an optimist almost all the time. I recommend that you do not try to practice everything at once, but choose one and practice it for 30 days so that it becomes a habit, before moving on to another.

On the program of this article :

1: Ask yourself the right questions at the right time

This is the simplest but perhaps most essential of the habits I discovered by being open-minded. The questions we ask ourselves when we are negative, experiencing difficulties or uncertain situations in our lives.

A pessimist asks himself these kinds of questions :

"Why does this only happen to me ?”
"Why do bad things happen to me all the time ?”
But an optimist asks himself questions that open up new perspectives or possibilities in his mind. Some of my favourite questions for taking an optimistic view :

"What is the positive point (s) of this situation ?”
"What Have I learned from this situation ?”
"What small step can I take today to start resolving this situation ?”

2: Create a positive environment to live in

The people with whom you spend your time and the information to which you are exposed greatly influence your state of mind, which will have a great impact on your attitude and view of things.
So choose from
Spend more time with people who cheer you up and make you positive. And less time – if at all-with people who push you into being negative and critical.
Only let in the information that supports you. Spend less time listening to / reading negative and hurtful media for your esteem, and spend more time reading blogs, constructive and positive books, watching motivating movies, listening to inspirational songs, and hearing audiobooks or podcasts made by optimistic people.

3: be grateful for what you have (and for what you are too)

A quick and easy way to boost your positive energy is to tap into gratitude.
This is what I do by asking myself several questions :

How can I be grateful for my life today?
Who are the three people I can be grateful for in my life and why?
What are the 3 things I can be grateful for about myself?
Take just 60 seconds or a few minutes of your day to ask yourself one of these questions and thus reap wonderful benefits.

N°4: do not forget your body, it is your pillar

Being optimistic is not just another way of looking at things. It is also to preserve the physical part of our being.

I noticed that exercising a few times a week, good quality of sleep and eating healthy had a hugely positive effect on my mood.

If I mismanage these few points then negative thoughts spring up more often and I become more pessimistic, cutting myself off from the opportunities and possibilities I might have in my life.

So do not neglect these fundamentals. Take care of your body, this is the best way to save yourself a bunch of hassle in your life.

5: start your day optimistically

The way you start your morning can set the tone for the rest of your day. For example, a relaxed morning often lowers your stress level for the rest of the day.

How can I be in an optimistic mood during the day?

A combination of three steps that worked very well for me: asking myself a question of gratitude during breakfast, followed by reading positive information online or a book very early in the morning and finally getting it all followed by a little physical exercise.

It allows me to be in the right state of mind and fills me with energy for the day.

6: focus on the solutions to be applied

A sure way to feel pessimistic about a situation is to sit back and do nothing about it. Instead, use the questions I shared (point # 1) and open your mind to see the possibilities you have in this situation.

If you have trouble acting, ask yourself the question :

What is the smallest step I can take today to sort this out?

Then perform the next step. As small as this step may seem, it will have great effects on your mood and thoughts. If this step is too big or it just makes you procrastinate, then ask yourself :

What smaller step can I take to move forward today?

The most important thing is that you always move forward, even if you move forward in small steps.

N°7: reduce your worries about the future

Being worried constantly is a powerful destructive habit and can paralyze anyone's mind. It was one of my biggest obstacles to optimism and especially to move forward in life.

Two effective steps that have helped me and still help me to this day reduce my anxiety are :

Ask yourself: how many of my fears and worries have really come true? If you are like me, you will find that the answer is: very little. Many of the things you fear during your life will just never come true. These are just nightmares or fictional monsters in your own mind. This question will help you get back in touch with reality, and to reassure you. So that you finally realize that you just created another imaginary scenario.
Focus on solutions and actions. Worries grow all the more in a misty mind and an inactive body. Then use the questions in points # 1 and # 6 to change your fears into resolutions.

8: Don't let ideals ruin things

A common mistake of people, when they change their attitudes, is that they think they need to be perfect and do everything perfectly all the time. This then prevents them from being positive.

Change and become positive must be gradual. While you may fail and go back, keep working on your optimism and over time your positive outlook will strengthen more and more.

But if you put the barrier too high and think you have to go from pessimistic to always optimistic, you're going to have a hard time holding on. And you will probably feel incapable and void. You will be angry with yourself. And you risk abandoning this change of habit to return to negative thoughts.

Instead, focus on gradually changing. If you are optimistic 40% of the time now, try to progress to be optimistic 60% of the time. Then, increase to 80% when you get used to this new way of living, and so on up to 100% if you can.

Focusing on gradual evolution is much more affordable, and is more likely to succeed in the long run than trying to directly achieve a state of absolute perfection.

N°9: finally, a reminder to help you not give up

I would like to end this article with a powerful and timeless thought that comforted me and encouraged me to continue when everything seemed very difficult and dreary to me.

This thought Is: "it is always darker before dawn“.dawn

This thought helped me hold on and carry on while my social and love life were at their lowest. This helped me to continue my articles when everything seemed to be against me. It helped me put one foot in front of the other when the world seemed very dark.

I found this thought very right. Why? Because when everything seemed to me at a low point, whether it was for my blog, my business, my love life or my life in general, something positive always ended up springing up. It's probably because getting to the bottom forced me to change the way I do things.

But maybe life always finds a way to put things in order when you make the effort to change. By acting rather than giving up, something good and positive will always appear.

Just seeing this thought operate in my life, strengthened my will to remain optimistic, to act. To continue to advance whatever thorny path I have to cross.

If you liked this article, do not hesitate to share it with your entourage:)!