What is your dominant emotion?
Take a moment and reflect on how you usually feel when you think about your goals, aspirations, desires i.e. those things, circumstances or experiences you want and which really matter to you. If you find it difficult or are feeling mixed emotions, pick one particular situation or circumstance which is not working out for you. What would you say is your dominant emotion around it?
I know it’s not always easy to find the words that best describe how we feel about something. But stop for a moment and imagine you are taking an emotional stock-take which relates to what you want. What would you say is the ONE dominant emotion you have been feeling over the past few months or even years?
To make it easier, pick one of the following words from the below emotional scale that best describes your overall dominant feeling. Do yourself a favour and be honest with yourself.
- Joy/Empowerment/Freedom/Love/Appreciation
- Passion
- Enthusiasm/Eagerness/Happiness
- Positive Expectation/Belief
- Optimism
- Hopefulness
- Contentment
- Boredom
- Pessimism
- Frustration/Irritation/Impatience
- Overwhelment
- Disappointment
- Doubt/Disbelief
- Worry
- Blame
- Discouragement
- Anger
- Revenge
- Hatred/Rage
- Jealousy
- Insecurity/Guilt/Unworthiness
- Fear/Grief/Depression/Despair/Powerlessness
Well done! Unlike so many of us, you have just taken time for yourself to determine on which emotional level you are, versus the emotional level you would be on if you had what you want. In other words, you have identified your current dominant emotion versus the prevalent emotion you need to feel to get what you want. Having this awareness is a crucial step towards improving your circumstances.
Start shifting your attention
Let’s say you have identified that you have been feeling doubtful about getting what you really want. Whether you consciously acknowledge it or not, this feeling of doubt is triggered by what you think about – whether it’s a certain experience, memory, what others say to you or what you keep saying to yourself.
What do you usually think about or say to yourself when you are feeling the identified negative emotion? What are the thoughts that trigger your emotional response?
Fact is that our thoughts determine the way we feel. If we think unhappy thoughts we cannot feel but unhappy. However, if we focus our thoughts on what makes us truly happy, we experience a shift. As a result, we start acting in a different, more empowering way which has an impact on the results we get.
What you think & feel and what you get is always a match!
Focus is the key to true success
As human beings, we can focus our attention in any direction. Unfortunately, most of us have been practicing for years, if not decades, to focus on what’s not working out for us. We have been trained to give our attention to the things and situations we believe we need to fix and often try persistently so hard to change them. It appears logical to want to better things because we are facing reality after all! What we often don’t realise is that by giving attention to what we don’t want we are just reinforcing the thoughts which are keeping us stuck and making us feel bad.
However, if you shift your focus on what feels good to you and keep it up, if you make it your dominant intent to feel good and to look for things which make you feel that way, those things which are consuming you now in negative ways will gradually shift and naturally change for the better. Everything, including the action you take, will start falling into place in powerful yet effortless ways – almost as if by magic! The ultimate results will speak for themselves and often surpass your highest expectations.
Time to recalibrate your focus
If you feel that it’s time for a change and are ready to commit to a daily practice, The Book of Positive Aspects is the perfect tool that will help you to recalibrate your focus on what feels good to you. If you trust in the process and keep it up, you will experience a shift! The question is not ‘if’ but ‘when’ – and the answer is, as soon as you experience relief and allow yourself to feel consistently better. As a result, who you become and the actions you take will be aligned to what you want in a powerful way!
#1 Get a notebook that feels comfortable to you.
#2 Write on the cover/first page ‘My Book of Positive Aspects’.
#3 Make the commitment to spend at least 20 minutes each day on writing about a topic of your choice that makes you feel exclusively happy – this can be either an event, a person, a pet, a memory etc. – past, present or future.
#4 After you finish each day, decide on the topic you want to write about the following day. You may want to write about the same topic for several days in a row, that’s fine.
#5 Do this process for at least 30 consecutive days and pay attention to any subtle changes – in the way you feel and what’s happening around you!
