This week’s focus:
Choice…potentially our most powerful muscle!
Around this time three years ago, I had the privilege of attending a conference addressed by world-renowned cognitive neuroscientist, Dr Caroline Leaf. One of her staggering statistics is this one: “Research shows that 75 to 98 percent of mental, physical, and behavioural illness comes from one’s thought life.” So, as she points out, we can only blame the environment and genes for 2 to 25 percent of our mental and physical illnesses.
What this means to me, however, is that we need to take more responsibility for all our thoughts. More specifically, we need to take responsibility for the way we react to things because each time we do react, in Caroline’s words, “our brains become shaped by the process in either a positive, good-quality-of-life direction or a negative, toxic, poor-quality-of-life direction.” In this process, our brain actually changes its shape, whichever direction we have taken. Accordingly, our thought life becomes physically wired in the direction we generally take. Even our DNA actually changes according to our thoughts.
The power of positive thinking, then, is not only real, but it is literally more powerful than we think. This power comes from our ability to choose which way we wish to think and respond.
It makes sense to choose powerfully! And positively!
Monday Morning Perspective: “With everything that has happened to you, you can either feel sorry for yourself or treat what has happened as a gift. Everything is either an opportunity to grow or an obstacle to keep you from growing. You get to choose.” – Dr. Wayne W Dyer
