As an entrepreneur, dealing with negative thoughts and toxic people is a common occurrence. Keeping a positive mindset can be a challenge.
How do you handle these situations when they arise? How does one maintain a positive mindset when dealing with negative people?
I want you to think of your mind as a garden.
You need to understand that the natural state of a garden is weeds.
Unless you are tending to your garden every single week, the weeds will take root, grow, and overtake everything that is in the garden.
Tending a garden can be boring. It can be monotonous and tedious. But it is necessary if you want a great looking and productive garden.
Your mind is a garden, and negative thoughts are the weeds.
If you do not get rid of the negative thoughts that are entering your mind, they will take over your mind.
You need to tend the negative thought before it takes root.
Once it takes root, it leads to self-doubt, lack of motivation, and a lack of belief in yourself and what you are doing.
I can almost guarantee you that if you’re in a place in your business or in your life where you’re feeling stuck and lacking in belief, this is because you allowed the negative thoughts to take root and overtake you mind!
“Your environment will be the number one determinant for success or failure in your life. The things or people you surround yourself with will determine where you end up in life.”
How Do You Prevent Negative Thoughts From Taking Over?
You have to learn to stand guard at the door of your mind.
You have to take responsibility for each and every thought that you entertain in your mind.
You cannot allow negative thinking to take root.
If this happens, don’t beat yourself up — the natural state of the mind is negative thoughts.
Almost ALL of us are conditioned to think negatively. As children, we hear the word NO more than we hear the word YES.
As adults, we have to learn to take responsibility and start focusing on the positive.
To tend to negative thoughts, there are two main areas you need to focus on.
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Pay Close Attention to Your Environment
Your environment will be the number one determinant for success or failure in your life.
The things or people you surround yourself with will determine where you end up in life.
One of the easiest ways for you to start being more positive is to surround yourself with positive, uplifting people.
I want you to analyze who the five people are that you spend the most time with. Where are they in life? Are any of those five negative and toxic? If so, you must spend less time with them.
Sometimes, in order for us to go to the next level in life, we have to limit our associations with some people.
Now, I know that it is hard if that person is your spouse.
Sometimes, there are people we cannot cut out of our life. We can, however, do everything in our power to make sure that those five people we spend the most time with are going to lift us up and not pull us down.
Understand that you will become the average of the five people you spend the most time with. If you’re at the top of your five, that’s not a good thing. If you have the best attitude and make the most money, as you start to spend more time with those people you will pick up their bad habits.
You want to be the worst of your five.
When you start surrounding yourself with people that are bulletproof in their belief and confidence, their behavior will start to rub off on you.
I can remember some of my early mentors as an entrepreneur. I remember looking at them in disbelief that a human being can have that much confidence. How could they have a level of unshakeable belief where no matter what happens, it doesn’t phase them?
Then, as I started spending more time with them, I started to adopt their way of thinking and existing. It changed my thought process and my way of life.
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Feed Your Mind Every Single Day
You must water your mind with positive, uplifting material.
One of the biggest things I did in my early days was to stop listening to the radio on my commute to work. I started listening to motivational material instead.
In the span of just a couple of weeks, I could not believe how much my entire mindset began to shift!
We have so many resources available to us today. We have podcasts, books, and seminars. You need to constantly be force-feeding your mind with positive, uplifting thoughts!
You need to train yourself to be able to think the way that you want to think.
If you stop watering and feeding your mind, your thoughts will begin reverting back to your old thoughts of self-doubt and negative talk.
Personal development is a never-ending process. To this day, I still fall victim to negative self-talk and doubt whenever I stop personal development for any period of time.
When this happens, I start taking action and watering the garden again. In a matter of 2-3 days, everything is turned back around.
It’s human nature to slip. Do not think you are immune to the negative effects of spending time with toxic people or not surrounding yourself with positive material.
If you allow them to, the weeds will start to grow. And those weeds will strangle your dreams and kill your motivation.
It’s a constant battle, but the reward is well worth the effort.
Can you think of people you know that you want to make a part of your five?
If you need more positive people in your life, join our waiting list for the Legacy Leadership Academy and engage with our membership of Legacy Leaders. This tribe of network marketers are the most positive, uplifting leaders that I know!
