Positive thoughts and the fine art of relaxation
Positive thinking is huge. But it’s so much more than a trend. The latest insight into the power of the human mind is astonishing. As it turns out, positive thinking works in mysterious ways to give us positive experiences. And that means you’re in more control than you imagined.
Listening to happy background music will boost your creativity. Feeling you’re healthy actually makes you physically healthier. Believing good things are going to happen changes your life experience. Believing a medicine will cure you improves your health.
It’s clear positive thinking is worth getting to grips with, as is the art of relaxation. They go together like strawberries and cream, and they both come with great wellbeing benefits.
The power of thinking realistically as well as positively
Science has taken a good look at positive thinking. It turns out positive thoughts and mental images about a lovely future make us feel better at the time, but long-term, positive thinking can de-motivate us. The trick is to combine positive thoughts with realism, visualising the obstacles along the way as well as imagining you’ve achieved your goal. Isn’t that useful to know?
Imagining the future is a neat trick, too. It connects you to your future self and changes how close the future feels. Maybe you can imagine yourself months or years from now, enjoying a future where everything has gone according to plan. Then write down what it looks like and refer back to it, refreshing the positive images you’ve created.
How journaling helps you relax
Journaling lets you clarify your thoughts and feelings to find self-knowledge. It’s great for resolving problems as well. When you write down traumatic events, you process them. You release the emotions and integrate the experience in your mind. The same goes when your journaling focuses on gratitude. Feeling grateful for the good things in life gives you such a boost. No wonder the scientific benefits of journaling include better physical health, cognitive function, immune system responses, and less stress.
Lovely mindfulness and meditation
Mindfulness means paying attention to the present moment, to your own thoughts and feelings, and to the wider world, and it can improve your mental wellbeing. Meditation is another consciousness-raising method with lots of benefits for psychological well-being, designed to put you into a heightened state of awareness and focused attention. They’re both really helpful for deep relaxation.
Imagine you’re worried sick about tomorrow and it’s making you feel terrible. But hold on... right now, in the present, you’re fine. Spending as much time as you can in the moment, in the now, in the present, makes you feel so much more relaxed and happy. It makes more sense than fretting over a future that hasn’t happened yet - and might not turn out the way you imagined anyway.
Meditation has much the same effect as mindfulness. It trains you to be more aware and gives you a healthy sense of perspective. You're not trying to turn your negative feelings and thoughts off, simply observing them without judgment, and it feels gorgeous.
The amazing effect of nature
Being out in the garden, a park or the countryside will help bring you back to earth, soothing your worries and calming down an over-active, anxious mind so you can relax. We’re seeing lots of new research finding strong links between exposure to nature and improved physical and mental health.
Studies around psychological conditions including depression, anxiety, mood disorders, sleep problems and stress, have found being out in nature helps to ease all of them. The same goes for negative emotions. Nature even helps us with our social interactions and gives people a sense of the meaning of life. And it boosts our attention, memory and creativity, whether we’re stressed or not.
Here’s some proper magic for you. In 2021 a team in Switzerland found that simply having a view of nature from your home can cut your perception of noise. The closer the green space is, the bigger the effect.
Better still, people with a view of nature from their hospital bed get better faster. There’s even an effect when there isn’t a real view, just a picture of nature on the wall. Opening the window to let fresh air in strengthens the effect. We’re obviously designed to be in amongst the green stuff.
More wonderful ways to chill...
Yoga is known to chill the body and spirit. Exercise in general makes us feel great. Simply paying attention to your breathing reels you in from the stresses and strains of everyday life, calming you and making positive thinking easier to achieve.
You could spend a few minutes visualising your favourite place, maybe a perfect sandy beach or cool forest. Find a hobby you’re fascinated by. Get creative.
Take a nice nap – 15 minutes is enough to change the way you feel about today.
Read a great book. When you lose yourself in a great story, you’re inside the story, in the moment, and your stresses tend to melt away. If it’s a story about other people’s problems it can bring you out of yourself, making you feel that you’re not alone.
Dance like there’s nobody watching. We’ve known since the 1980s that dancing regularly cuts down anxiety and depression. It’s a reliable mood-booster that helps you grow in confidence and enhance your overall wellbeing. It’s also good for you physically.
Snuggle with your pet or favourite human. Hugging or being hugged releases the ‘cuddle hormone’ oxytocin, which helps you handle stress and improves your overall wellbeing. It also slows your heartbeat. Frequent hugs can even lower your blood pressure, whether you’re hugging your pet or a fellow human.
Smile big and wide however you’re feeling, and you’ll notice yourself relax. The same goes for laughing. Both release natural painkillers called endorphins, along with the feel-good chemical serotonin. Together they make you feel great, boosting your mood, reducing pain, and helping you relax. Smiling makes you appear more attractive too, which also makes you feel better.
There are so many tips, and at least one of them is going to work beautifully for you. So get your positive thinking hat on, pick a few of the above to try, and watch yourself as you chill out. Doesn’t that feel good?
Relax with pure silk
One more tip. Treat yourself to the ultimate in chilled living with our elegant collection of wellness products for sleep and relaxation, and make it a routine. Develop a positive expectation of a heavenly sleep or an hour or so of pure relaxation, and that’s exactly what you’ll experience. Just like magic.
