Posts Tagged positive communications

Choose Positive Words

On May 16, 2017 / Blog, Stress Management

Positive words have a positive effect on your life. The fact is that the words you choose can help you win or lose. They can put you in a positive mood, or they can enable you to free fall into a downward spiral. Your words can make you feel empowered, or they can burden you with stress. In any case, you get to choose the words you think and say. That means you have total control over your outlook and stress load.

Here’s a simple example of how your words—even a single word—can promote a positive mindset and why positive words are always the best choice. Consider the following example that a 14-year-old student sent me:

“When I think of … >>>

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Say “No” Positively

On February 26, 2015 / Relationships

In my books, speeches, and professional work, I always stress the importance of positivity. But sometimes you simply have to tell people “No,” even though it’s not a positive word. So how can you say “No” without actually saying “No”? Here’s a simple four-step process:

1. Acknowledge the importance of the request.
“I understand why that’s important to you.”

2. Inform the person that you have a problem with it.
“But I have a problem with it.”

3. Describe the problem as you see it.
“Your doing that would mean it would put a burden on everyone else.”

4. Elicit from the person something else.
“Let’s think of something that would be fair to everyone.”

By doing this, you’re saying … >>>

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Keep Discipline Positive

On June 11, 2013 / Parenting, Responsibility

As I like to remind parents, there isn’t any empowerment more effective than self-empowerment. Because being positive is so enabling, it is best to displace thoughts, communications, and discipline practices that are destructive. Continually ask yourself how what you want to communicate or the lesson you want to instill can be put in a positive way.

For example, saying, “You are bad tempered,” has the same meaning as, “You need to work on controlling your temper.” However, the first labels the person, whereas the second enables the person. People change more by building on their strengths and aptitudes than by working on their weaknesses. This does not mean that an area of weakness should not be worked on, but … >>>

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Paint Positive Pictures

On October 10, 2012 / Effectiveness, Parenting

Practicing positivity requires painting positive mental pictures. Let’s see how this works. Imagine you have just arrived at a restaurant that does not take reservations. The lobby is full of people waiting to be seated. The host says to you, “I don’t have any tables right now. You’ll have to wait 30 minutes.” Now picture the same situation again, except this time the host says to you, “I’ll have a wonderful table for you in half an hour.” Notice the difference in how you received the information. The chances that you’ll actually wait to eat at the restaurant are greater in hearing the second message.

Why? Because the brain thinks in pictures, rather than in words, so the words you … >>>

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Positivity Is Constructive

On August 27, 2012 / Parenting

What we think and say becomes our habit. When our self-talk is negative, we have a tendency to communicate with others in a negative way. This is particularly true with our children. So often when we want our children to change, we attempt to influence them by using negative communications rather than positive ones that would actually prompt them to want to do what we would like. Even the worst salesperson knows enough not to make the customer angry. Yet, because we allow our emotions to direct us, we often ignore this commonsense approach and send negative messages. You can easily tell if your communications are sending negative messages if what you say blames, complains, criticizes, nags, punishes, or threatens.… >>>

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