Last week I was explaining the meaning of “optimist” and “pessimist” to my 12-year-old. I guess I had been throwing those words around lately and in our conversation she wanted to use the word “pessimist” but couldn’t quite remember what it was.
Which are you?
Do you look at the glass as half empty or half full? My tendency is to look at it half empty. There are a few reasons for this, one being that my basic personality make up leans to the slightly melancholy and introverted —I am more likely to turn inward both to recharge and lick my wounds. Though this can be a strength, it also can be a weakness because I can get stuck in my head and my world can slowly shrink. Also, through childhood conditioning as well as my basic genetic makeup, I lean toward perfectionism, having impossible standards for both myself and others. While I have achieved much with this trait, it also can suck the life out of me when the anthem going through my head is, “You’re never good enough” and “the job is never done.” This attitude can quickly spin me into a spiral downward where eventually I just don’t do the thing because I can’t do it perfectly.
When I take a few minutes to redistribute my energy into “glass half full” energy, I start to blossom and see other possibilities of whatever I’m stuck on. This takes practice, as does every mindfulness skill, but it has the power to shift my entire perspective and shift the energy in my body, mind and emotions to a productive and energized state rather than one of a paralysis, and negativity.
If you are a “glass half empty” type, below are three exercises you can try, that I have been working with in my own life, to shift the “glass half empty” energy into “glass half full” energy. These ideas were taken from a beautiful meditation by Tony Robbins that you can find here.
- Reflect on three things you are grateful for, but go deep with this. I want you to put yourself in the circumstance and be there. Feel it with all of your senses. You are reliving it and letting it wash over you. These things can be as big or small as you wish. Who was there? What were you doing? What were the expressions on faces? What emotions did the situation evoke? Be there. Smell it, taste it, touch it, hear it, see it.
- Reflect on three things you will accomplish. It may be things today, this week, this month, this year. Again, be there. See these things happen. Feel it with all of your senses. You have achieved these things. What does that look like and feel like? Soak in the pleasure, the accomplishment, and all of the accompanying emotions.
- Imagine a healing ball of energy moving from your head all the way down to your feet, healing, solving, strengthening, softening. Envision the ball moving up slowly from your feet to your head. Let the healing ball move down and up your body several times as you breathe deeply. Really be there with that healing ball.
The longer I live, the more I realize that life looks according to what lens you see it through. For myself, I am simply not content living in a state of half emptiness, and it takes effort for me to shift my perspective. The payoff is huge, though, both for myself and those closest to me. Will you join me in the effort to move from half empty to half full?
Until next time,
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