Negative thinking requires prophecy

in #life7 years ago

I am a veteran and former negative thinker. I used to find something negative to think about every day. Decades of introspection, therapy, support groups and tons of reading got me to this point: I am agnostic about everything. Not just God. Everything.

When people think of the word, "agnostic", they think that it means neither believing or disbelieving in God. We can be agnostic about anything. There have been serious debates about the nature of reality, what is real and the meaning of life. Humans have pondered the purpose of their existence since at least the dawn of recorded history.

I'm not a big fan of prophets. Maybe it's just me, but prophets really dig negative outcomes. Just ask Nostradamus. Seems like everything he predicted was negative, bad or just plain awful. Where are the positive prophets? But for me, negative thinking and prophecies go together.

I found, at least for me, negative thinking comes from my predictions about outcomes. In my distant past, everything had a negative outcome and that meant I wasn't going to get what I wanted. I was attached to the outcome and it was all negative. I even figured out that happiness isn't getting everything you want. It's knowing what to do when you don't.

I found that once I was able to let go of the predictions, to be willing to watch the world turn without me trying to impose my will upon it, I was happier. This may sound like a shameless pitch, but it's not - if you read some of my earlier blog articles, you'll see this in my writing.

I do what do I do not to make things happen. I do what I do to see what happens next. And if I'm not making predictions about what will happen next, my mind is open to the possibilities. To do just that, I must accept everything exactly the way it is, without reservation. I tend to have better days that way.

It is this sort of detachment, a way of using the lightest touch on the day, that I find I have better days, too. Years ago, I learned something from scientists: you cannot observe an experiment without having some sort of influence on the outcome. To put it differently, just by observing an event, you can influence the outcome.

If that is so, then what we are thinking can have an influence on the events we witness. This is true down to the way we choose to think about an event. The words we use in our mind act as a filter for reality because words are simply abstractions for reality. The word "flower" doesn't even come close to describing a flower, because complexity is built into the universe. You can't even know everything there is to know about say, a chair. The universe comes on a need to know basis.

So I use the lightest possible touch as I move about my world. I'm quiet in the morning to let everyone else sleep. I close doors gently, even when people are awake. I'm gentle with my possessions, the people I love, the people I know, everyone I interact with. I use the lightest possible touch with everyone to see who they are with minimal influence on my part. I use the lightest possible touch with everything I own because it is all a gift.

And the moment I realize that it is all a gift, who am I to predict a negative outcome?





Other articles you might enjoy by @digitalfirehose:



Plan B for Humanity

A basic guaranteed income in the context of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

A sort of political movie review: Star Wars: Rogue One

Happiness isn't getting everything you want - happiness is a skill

The opposite of love is not hate, it is apathy

Fate, impunity and altruism

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Beautifully said! I absolutely love your last paragraph...

So I use the lightest possible touch as I move about my world. I'm quiet in the morning to let everyone else sleep. I close doors gently, even when people are awake. I'm gentle with my possessions, the people I love, the people I know, everyone I interact with. I use the lightest possible touch with everyone to see who they are with minimal influence on my part. I use the lightest possible touch with everything I own because it is all a gift.
And the moment I realize that it is all a gift, who am I to predict a negative outcome?

yup, you'll never know what might happen. It might be a good thing!

yup,you are right....

Nice article, i will love to read more from you

nice content you have. it hits me, it's like it's me.
I agree with you,thanks for this

Hey, just wanted to let you know I gave you an upvote because I appreciate your content! =D See you around

The human being is much simpler than we think, maybe we want to know everything but in the end we realize that we all want only one thing: Happiness. King Solomon by divine inspiration said: "All have the same outcome, the righteous and the wicked, the good and the unclean, those sacrificing and those not sacrificing." The good one is the same as the sinner; one who swears an oath is the same as the one who is cautious about swearing an oath This is a distressing thing that happens under the sun: Because all have the same outcome, the heart of humans is also full of bad; madness in their heart during their life, and then they die! .There is hope for whoever is among the living, because a live dog is better off than a dead lion ". *
This expresses the futility of the situation of man without divine intervention. Pure vanity!

Positive prophets? For me the greatest and greatest of the prophets that has trodden the earth is Jesus Christ, he came to give us good news about what God will do for the planet and for humanity. It will cleanse the earth of all evil and turn it into a paradise where calm people who love peace will reside. And also that we can be there. Is not that positive?
~Conclusion: A life with expectation of the good of God, that is, hope, gives us the confidence to see the future with a smile drawn on our faces every day~
Thank you for sharing your negative thought, that if you think about it in the end it is not so negative. Greetings

My article was intended to be rather positive, and I think I managed to accomplish that.

While I agree with you that happiness is something to be desired by all human beings, I am not altogether sure that I agree with you about how we arrive at happiness. I am not even sure that I agree with you as to your claimed simplicity of human kind. Considering the complexity of the human brain and the scant understanding that we have of it, I don't think we're that simple, especially if you believe that Man was made in God's image.

A prophecy implies an expectation. An expectation of anything from God reduces Him to a servant of man. That expectation is contrary everything that I have read about God and that says that it's the other way around - Man is the supposed servant of God. So I prefer to live my life without expectation of anything. As Steven Winwood once said in one of his songs, "Take it as it comes".

This is not merely to say I am right and you are wrong about God. I just don't think there is a single human being capable of comprehending what God is, and no one knows for sure if God exists. If we could prove God exists, would we still need religion?

As to the claim of paradise, you raise an interesting point. If God gave us free will, and he plans to turn the Earth into a paradise, will we still need interpersonal skills to get along in paradise? Or will God remove free will and only allow us to be nice? Am I nice to people because I have an expectation to go to Heaven, or am I nice to people because I enjoy how I feel when I am nice to other people? I tend to the latter because I want to live without expectation.

You are free to believe what you want to believe. You can be positive or negative, for that choice is entirely up to you. However you would like to proceed, thank you for commenting on my blog post. :)

It is true of the complexity of the brain and so many organs of the human body in terms of things that can be achieved by themselves or through stimulation and it makes sense that man was created as a masterpiece, I mean that the human being is simple in terms of the things you need to be happy, and satisfied with yourself even when we ourselves think that we need many things, sooner or later we realize that with the simple was enough.
God owes nothing to the human being, but we owe everything to him, that makes me want to be at his service. However, like every father, he wants good things for us. Love for others does not reduce anyone but the opposite.
I understand that for you the bible does not have the same value that it has for me, it is your choice, but in it God has put a treasure and wishes that we all find it, I will not quote it but you can look for it if you wish, Proverbs 2 : 1-6
God will never take away our free will, it would be like having robots programmed only to always do what we want and not even human beings want that, when we create a robot we look for them to be as autonomous as possible, hence the artificial intelligence, etc.
Something is certain, to live in a land where peace and harmony reign, the human being must have certain qualities. Are we ready to live in paradise ?. The vast majority do not, but we can prepare ourselves as someone who is going to live in another country prepares. What I am going to say may seem contradictory but it is not, although I have the hope that God will fulfill his promises, I do not live my day to day counting on that I will be there, it is something that I would like with all my strength but That does not depend on me but on the mercy that God has for me, in turn that will depend on what God finds in my heart. Nobody can cheat him. Just be good? That is a good question.
As you say we are all free to believe what we want, I am not trying to convince you of what I decided to believe, I just thought that you felt regret for the uncertainty of the future and that is why I decided to tell you what God will do for the obedient humanity. Regards!
PD: The text is translated with google, English is not my native language and maybe I have not understood everything well what you say or vice versa, I'm sorry.

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