How to Take Charge of Your Thoughts to Get the Results You Want

Do you want to get better at something?

Do you want to act differently toward someone?

Do you want to stop undermining your plan?

If the answers to those questions are yes, there is good news for you.

It all starts with your thoughts. What do we hear all the time? “Think positively!” “Don’t think that way!” “You’ll never get anywhere with those negative thoughts! We hear it over and over again: Change your thoughts. But do you realize the true impact that changing your thoughts will actually have on your life? There’s a reason people say those words all the time. It’s because we behave, move, and act according to what we think.

So, if we think something is going to be hard today—“I still have five more hours at work.” “Why did I eat all that dessert last night?” “I am too tired to exercise.”—Guess what? We will believe that.

We will think that today is going to be hard. We will look at the five hours ahead of us and they will feel impossible. We will skip the gym. Basically, we will act on what we have thought. If we think thoughts or even say them aloud—I’ve never been able to lose weight. What makes me think I will now?” We will act on that. We will sabotage our efforts because we have already told ourselves that we can’t do it. In many ways, thoughts are a little magic because we have a tendency to do whatever we think or say. But unlike magic, or even miracles, these outcomes are easier to change.

Do you want today to be easier? Then think this day will be great: “It is ONLY five more hours.” “I have the energy to exercise and feel great!” Consequently, our behaviors, actions, and results will start to change with those thoughts. We must gain control of our thoughts. We must regulate the words that come out of our mouths and the thoughts that come into our brains.

We do this by stopping as soon as we have a thought that is going to lead to a bad behavior. We change the thought immediately from that negative, defeating thought to a thought that will give us the result that we want. Because the positive thought will lead to the behaviors that lead to that result we want.

So for today, the challenge to you is to become aware of the negative thoughts and change them to better thoughts that will get the desired results.