Sustaining a healthy, happy lifestyle can seem like a juggling act at times. Maintaining the work-life balance is an art in and of itself. With the power of hope, optimism, and positive thinking, you can keep your balance and do so with ease. Hope, optimism, and positive thinking all sound the same, but there are some differences; however, each of these mindset characteristics has its own built-in benefits. Let’s look at the differences and the wonderful benefits of each.
The Power of Hope & Why it Matters
Let’s look at the meaning of hope. For some, it’s simply “wishful thinking.” For others, there is more power behind being hopeful. We may go through life with an expectation of how it “should” look, yet life delivers us something different.
We make plans and then something gets in the way of those plans: the actions of others, circumstances beyond our control like a job loss or divorce. One of the hardest things to accept is that we are not always in control. However, the beauty of hope lies within what we can control – our reaction.
When we take on being hopeful, we take back our power. The art of being hopeful allows us to understand that, while we cannot control the circumstance at this moment, we can take on a hopeful attitude for something better in the future. When we are hopeful, our actions emanate from that positive belief. Being hopeful puts us in the driver’s seat and we can head in a different direction.
The Power of Optimism & Why It Matters
While being hopeful is essential in maintaining our equilibrium when life throws us a curve, being optimistic is different. The power of optimism is key to sustaining a healthy balance in all areas of life such as relationships, careers, and health. What is optimism? The best way to describe optimism is having a positive expectation, a certainty, that all things will work out in your life with the most optimal result.
The more optimistic you are, the more you expect to get positive results. When you maintain an optimistic outlook, your brain attempts to produce results that are in alignment with your mindset. Your actions stem from your beliefs; if you believe things will work out for the best, your thoughts, feelings, and, actions reflect that belief.
The Power of Positive Thinking & Why it Matters
While hopefulness is an intentional mindset for future goals, wishes, and desires and optimism is a way of living life from a habit of being certain of positive outcomes, positive thinking is more of a conscious lifestyle. Some would say positive thinking is a pre-cursor to living with an automatic way of being optimistic in life.
Positive thinking is a way of looking at a situation and finding the silver lining. For example, if someone loses their job, they can view it as an ending of something or a beginning of something. The possibility exists of finding an even better job or starting their own company. Reframing something negative with the power of positive thinking and seeing the potential gives you the power to see the possibilities inside of that experience.
While we may not always control our circumstances, we can control our mindset with the possibilities inside of the power of hope, optimism, and positive thinking. That is one choice which is always ours.
