Negativity is Contagious

This is a widely accepted truth, something taught to you in early school and reiterated by that one hippie teacher you get every year as a teenager.

Now, I’ve often lamented about the fact that I hate teenagers, I also hated being one, so lets get that negativity out of the way now. There’s a certain point where hearing something too much makes it irrelevant and cursory. This is what happened with the negativity rule for me.

Truth is, I was a largely unhappy person for a long time, and I couldn’t figure out how there could be people that genuinely enjoy the mundane existence we all need to endure. I stopped trying, for a long time, until I got tired of that eventually, and went to therapy.

I sat down in therapy for my first session and he said ‘How are you?’

And I proceeded to cry for about twenty minutes.

The weird thing about being unhappy and living in Negativity Land is that you quickly get used to it. It becomes the ‘normal’ of your life, underpinning everything with just a twinge of bad that means you can’t fully enjoy anything. It becomes irrelevant and cursory. Pattern? Yes.

Once you make the tangible step to shedding your negative view of the world, lordy lord how it hits you. It’s a sudden realisation that life could possibly be more. It’s mourning years of your life that you’ve spent being miserable instead of living. It’s raw vulnerability. It’s scary. It’s exhilarating.

I truly am grateful that I took the step when I did. I mean, I’m still young, I still have an entire life ahead of me. Just imagine, what it would have been like, without deciding to actually be happy? That being said, it’s never too late, go look up people who have found success and happiness late in life, its a big motivator for the ‘mourning’ part of you.

Honestly, if there’s anything I learned from my short stint in therapy, it is that you really do choose the way you feel. Now, I know its not as simple as ‘choose not to be anxious’ but this is where the negativity is contagious thing comes in.

You can choose to cut out negativity in your life. Cut off people that make you feel bad. Recognise a negative thought that comes into your head, thank it for its hard work and kindly tell it to shove itself. Tell people that you care about if their Negative Nancy attitude is affecting you. Choose to do things that make you happy. Choose to look on the brighter side.

Choose.

It was a power given to me through therapy that I have been afraid of for a long time. But damn does it work.

Until next time x