How Do You Look For The Good Things In Life?

I don't watch the news very much (aka really ever) because I find it very depressing. I still manage to be well aware of government shutdowns and what is going on globally, but I choose to remove myself from having to hear about the worst examples of human behavior on a daily basis. I find myself wishing we had news channels devoted to all of the kind and touching things that people do for one another. A place to hear about all of the helping hands that are reached out, the heroic acts that occur all the time, and even the daily accomplishments of me, you and your neighbors.

I would much rather hear about the good things that people do for one another than how a celebrity treated their daughter poorly or who is divorcing who. There are so many more grand acts of character and happy endings occurring than we end up going through our days believing. We can easily get caught thinking that the world isn't a safe place and that people aren't good when that's where our focus is turned to on a constant basis.

It seems somehow we get socialized to look for what is wrong with things. One of the best examples I've heard Abraham-Hicks give (and I paraphrase) is the story of the woman who visited a new town for the first time.  A town filled with great shops and cool buildings and a palpable energy, but that had a pothole in the road which she drove her car over and that ends up being the thing that sticks out for her so when she tells people about the town the description becomes "well it's full of potholes."

We aren't taught to look for the good in things. We aren't reminded everyday to think and talk about the positive aspects of our jobs, our friends, our spouses, our homes, our health! The norm is to complain, to pick out what we don't like in others because they're not like us or doing things the way we think they should be doing them. We are not educated on how to allow others to live their life experiences as they desire to and then expect others to let us do the same. We measure our own actions on whether they will be acceptable to others so people will like us. Doctors don't remind us to be sure to talk about how well our bodies work too.

I am not saying that life is only full of rainbows and smiles or that bad things don't happen and that things can't be improved upon. But when the negative is what we habitually see first, it can make the way we look at life seem a lot darker than it is or has to be. If we can exercise the muscle of looking for what works, for what feels good in our bodies, for complimenting and appreciating others for the things they do, for noticing the beauty in our surroundings, then those things become what we see first.

There will always be room for discussion on improvement. That is not going to stop because we live in a growing and expanding universe. But we can make ourselves aware of deliberately looking for the positive aspects in everything around us first. We are intelligent beings, we know when there is something flat out harmful that we label as such. But we are not going to be unsafe when we look first for what is good. Imagine how you would feel turning on the television and hearing only of good news for a change. Take the challenge and for the next few days notice and talk about only the positive attributes of the things in your life. What you think and talk about expands what you have in your life, so being conscious of making that what's best in your life can bring about some wonderful things!