The greatest discovery of my generation is that a human being can alter his life by altering his attitude of mind. - William James (1842-1910)

My favourite understanding of the word attitude is a mental filter through which we process our thoughts and view the world. People who filter their thoughts through a negative screen will view the world as a dark, hostile place filled with doom and gloom. Filter those exact same thoughts through a positive screen and all of a sudden the world becomes a bright happy place filled adventure and opportunity.

Our attitudes towards things

Are likely to be more important

Than the things themselves.

All attitudes to all things are either positive or negative and are contagious Is your attitude to life worth catching? Would the world be a better place if every person acquired a dose of your attitude?

Do you encourage your friends and support their ideas or do you put them down and find the reasons why something won’t work?

Everybody lights up a room - some when they enter and some when they leave..

Things happen to us all at different times of our lives and sometimes we have no control over them. What we do control though is our attitude to that event and how we deal with it. I was recently inspired when I heard the remarkable story of a South African woman who was abducted, raped, stabbed multiple times and left for dead in the bush. She miraculously survived and now chooses to travel the world speaking to people about it . She said that for a brief time of her life those two animals controlled my body but I never allowed them to control my mind. Her attitude helped her think not as a victim and a wonderful new life direction has opened up for her.

I have come to realise that attitudes are mirrors of the mind. They reflect our thinking and we are all a product of our own thoughts. When our thinking is right our attitude to a situation is right, our abilities reach a maximum of effectiveness and best case scenarios will eventuate.

How many people do you know (and hopefully you are not one of them) who you do not ask how are you today? You know they will tell you and it is not good listening. It’s a miracle they are still alive and they seem to take enormous delight in regaling us with stories of their pain and suffering. Their kidney stone was the biggest the doctors had ever seen, their wife had just left them for another man, their migraines were probably caused by an enormous brain tumour and on and on it goes. When you finally break free from these people they feel better but how do you feel?

Long ago I discovered something fascinating. Whenever I used a word to describe how I was, that state of being seemed to eventuate. When asked the question how are you today? I would answer (and still do) fantastic or amazing or phenomenal or incredible regardless of whether or not that was a true refection of how my body was feeling. What I discovered was that I began to feel fantastic and generally have a fantastic day. In other words if we choose to think a certain way we will move toward an inevitable result. If you think you can there is a good chance you can but if you think you can’t you will find a way to absolutely prove you can’t.

Remember the movie Apollo 13 which was the re-creation of a 1970 moon mission in which the astronauts in a crippled spacecraft were brought safely back to Earth. As more and more systems on the spacecraft began to fail there was panic in mission control in Houston. Flight Director, Gene Krantz asked the question. What have we got on the spacecraft that’s good? This one statement changed the focus of the group under his control from what was broken to what was working and against the odds the astronauts were safely returned to earth.

Things turn out the best

For the people

Who make the best

Of how things turn out

Make your attitudes your allies - not your enemies.