“Taking In The Good”
In Hardwiring Happiness, Dr. Hanson offers a three-step approach to balancing out the negativity bias with everyday activities. Here are his instructions:
- Seek out positive experiences. From a good cup of coffee or the feeling you get when you listen to music you love, there are many opportunities to pay attention to the little positives. Big ones work too! Try to find about six of these each day to use as your “feel good” practice.
- Turn up the volume. Really enjoy the experience and try to stay with the feeling for 20 to 30 seconds. Let this be an embodied experience, imagining that positivity fills up every cell of your being.
- Soak it in and intend for it to work. Hold this positive sensation in your awareness, knowing that it is helping your brain rewire itself for resilience and peace.
There are many things that cause suffering in life. The death of your loved one, naturally. That alone has financial, social, and spiritual consequences that add onto the loss itself.
Pandemic precautions and restrictions impact your grief as well. Even as many regions begin to reopen, the stress and anxiety of COVID-19 still linger.
So it is totally understandable if you feel like you are stuck in a cycle of negativity. If you are ready to get unstuck, keep reading.
Is Your Brain Working Against You?
Sort of, but not exactly. Let me explain. One of the reasons you feel stuck in a negative mindset is the simple and indisputable fact that you have a human brain.
Your brain is remarkable. It does things to keep you alive that you are not even aware of. It remembers names, lets you ride a bicycle without thinking, and not only alerts you when trouble is near, but activates the rest of your body to respond before you even know it.
This is your autonomic nervous system in action – more commonly called the stress response system. You learned how to turn down its volume during the Conscious Relaxation Master Class and with the meditations in Module 1: Conscious Relaxation.
But what you may not know is that your brain is wired to detect negative information faster than positive information. It is also wired to hold onto negative information tighter than experiences that bring us joy.
This is not a design flaw – this negativity bias helps keep you alive! After all, it is better to think you see a snake and jump than to mistake our fanged friend for a pretty walking stick.
While this does help us navigate danger, it also means that each time we encounter something negative, we become more negative. In the words of Rick Hanson, author of Buddha’s Brain, "The mind is like Velcro for negative experiences and Teflon for positive ones." This is why:
It takes five good interactions to make up for one bad interaction in relationships.
We work harder not to lose $100 than we would to gain $100.
We feel like we can’t shake even small slights easily.
Fortunately Dr. Hanson has this "taking in the good" remedy. I hope you find it helpful!