A question for people who are always positive and content and upbeat. How do you do it?

[ConsumerCockup]

Like, how?

@calamityjam

I am one of those people 90% of the time. My husband committed suicide age 29, 14 years ago. I was left with 3 small children. I made myself a promise to keep myself happy in order for my children to learn positivity and have a happy life. If I find myself in a situation where I am unhappy, I leave and move on. I make changes to my life to stay happy. I believe that we attract what we are. If you are happy with your life, you attract like minded people. If you see negativity everywhere and feel negative you will continue to be surrounded by negativity. Basically if it makes you feel miserable get rid.......whatever that may be

A lot of people feel like it is their own thoughts that make them miserable. How do you get rid of your own thoughts.

I do believe that we attract more of what we are but we can't just emanate contentment if we have unresolved shame, unresolved low self-worth, a poor sense of who we are.

I definitely believe in taking control of my future but so many people who try to practice gratitude and be positive, they need to under pin the scaffolding first.

I love Gabrielle Bernstein NOW but I wouldn't have been able for her 6 years ago. Because I was still ashamed deep down. Now that I am genuinely content, I can emanate contentment and attract more back but this wouldn't have been a good move for me six years ago. I just would have felt shit that I couldn't emanate wisdom, empathy, contentment and gratitude because of all the shame and resentment I felt.

My dh & I are like this as is my dad. I have the attitude that there is always someone worse off and that negativity breeds negativity. My dh and my dad are both extremely laid back and just don't worry about things.

I am content & self reliant.
I have been lucky in life, never been really poor, always had a secure home, working in a career I feel passionate about and I think is worthwhile.
I am happy with myself - who I am & I am very happy in my own company, but I'm lucky enough to have a DH & DC who I love dearly.
I'm really at peace outside - swimming, dog walking, rowing. If anything I'm a rather dull person, introverted slightly perhaps, but content & relaxed.
The main clouds on my horizon and tbf they're a fucking big ones are the climate & biodiversity crisis & women's rights. But I don't let myself look at them for too long, and just know I'm doing the best I can to make a difference.

@lazylinguist this is true. Probably has a lot to do with resilience too. I have basically none and am projecting.

I'm not sure I have much resilience tbh. I've just been very lucky. Yes I'm pretty positive and contented by nature, but when I read about some of the things other MNers have had to deal with in their lives, I don't think I would be at all resilient in their shoes. It's easy to be resilient when your resilience hasn't been tested that much. My contented attitude is down to luck- in my upbringing, maybe my genes and certainly my life circumstances. It's not something I've deliberately tried to embody. That's why I think that telling people their lives would be fine if they were more positive is a shitty thing to do.

I am genuinely in awe of the people on this thread who have suffered immense trauma and heartbreak and yet still try to see the good in life and in other people. You are all truly inspirational.

I nearly died in 2011, so generally I am just happy to be alive 🙈 and I do think of myself as lucky, even when bad things happen to me, I assume it's for a greater purpose and will do me good in the long run.

I've been asked a variation of this question about myself. Shortly after trying to end my life (they didn't know that).

In my view it comes down to luck and fakery.

It's easy to be resilient when your resilience hasn't been tested that much.

This captures most of what I hear and read of people commending themselves on their own resilience.

Don't sweat the small stuff
Count your blessings and appreciate the little things
Keeping things in perspective
Knowing crappy times will pass
Knowing when to come away from social media

All of these don't always work and sometimes I can be a moan. Usually I'm upbeat though... But I've had to work at it

If there’s nothing I can do about something I just forget about it 🤷🏻‍♀️ I’m always looking for the positives, give random people compliments, making other people happy makes me happy.

Basically I choose to ignore the shit stuff and focus on the good stuff.

Oh and what @Ihaventgottimeforthis said, I’m pretty introverted, I like my own company and that of my family and a few friends but I’m quite happy being by myself. Preferably with my dogs too mind you!

I am a very optimistic and content person and it's genuinely not a front. I've always been like this - I always look for the positive in a situation. Unlike some of the others on this thread, I had a happy childhood and haven't experienced major trauma as an adult. When things do go wrong, I'm good at facing it, living with it and then mentally moving on.

People think I’m a happy upbeat person but the reality is they don’t know that I’m on antidepressants and I’m actually very low a lot of the time. I just don’t talk about it. The happy easy going thing is a kind of barrier so I don’t have to talk about feelings. Being brought up to think crying is a weakness and you have to be strong was part of it too.

Place marking as I was thinking of starting the exact same thread. Thanks OP

the people I know well who are outwardly always smiling, laughing, easy to talk to etc. have depression.
the friendliness is their outward masks, they are deeply miserable inside.
depression is sometimes also known as 'smiling disease'

One of my sisters is a very positive ‘sunny’ character. Love it about her. But I think it is partly a quite fragile/brittle thing. Partly genuine.
Sometimes it’s clear that it is a way of coping with difficulties - kind of making light of things when sometimes they need to be faced and acknowledged to be dealt with. It sometimes means she doesn’t look after herself as much as she should/could. Making light of the big stuff isn’t always helpful.
So I’ve experienced this, in her, to be a very mixed attribute.

I think mental flexibility is important. I'm generally happy but I'm very adaptable and flexible.

My DD is like this. She is only 9 but she is the most cheerful, sunshiney soul you could wish to meet. She of course has her moments of sadness when things don't go well, but she bounces back with amazing resilience. DS (11) is the polar opposite and always has been. I envy DD and at the same point in time just love living with her. I feel for DS and wish for him (and us sometimes) that he could have some of the positivity that DD seems to have been born with. I'm just praying DD doesn't change too much when she goes through puberty!

I tend to be somewhere in the middle. I have tried to stop living in the past or the future and just concentrating on the present.

Oh, and I also recommend getting a retired greyhound - they are the perfect antidote to modern-day living and a study in zen-like calm and restfulness (aka lazy).

I wouldn't say I am upbeat 100% of the time, I'm human and do have off days. But I am content 100% of the time. I have had a lot of very trying times- death of parent, dc with SN, horrendous divorce, house sale and back to renting as a middle aged woman ... but lots of these things happen to other people too and there is no point in letting these things define my life. Other things I am pragmatic about and can move past because I don't dwell on them - this doesn't mean they were not importantor an issue, but they don'tneed headspace if they are over. My life is lovely and I am grateful for what I have. That doesn't make me depressed or untrustworthy, it means I process things and move on. Oh and I never compare either. Myself, my life, my job - I'm doing ok and I don't need to try to find reasons not to be.

Every day, and sometimes multiple times a day, I stop and reflect on the small blessings in life.
I turn off negative media.

It's a choice for me. I'm not relentlessly upbeat but I do have an ethos of 'cup half full' and a genuine belief that most people are actually OK. I genuinely believe that you take your attitude with you into a situation and that positivity can be infectious to others. That said it shouldn't be relentless and in appropriate. There is a time to be down and sad, it's just not all the time

Horrible things have happened in my life and work life and at those times I'm down and show emotion and cry etc but even in dark times, like when my dad died slowly of dementia, we found humour in the mad things he did and smiled at the memories of him after he had died. I cried and wailed as well.

There's a brilliant book called 'Humankind ' that discussed how humans are generally good and helpful and kind. I can really recommend that to,anyone who's -quite understandably at the moment- struggling with the mountains of Crap we are all in.

I am mostly upbeat and happy but it is because I live in this type of environment. My partner is the most positive person I have ever known. If your leg falls off he would comment you would save money in shoes.

He can see the positive side in anything and I am grateful for it as he faces adversity proactively and we deal with it.

The thing that makes me relatively upbeat is having enough sleep. Investing in a good mattress and no late nights has worked wonders.

Healthy boundaries in all aspects of life, be comfortable saying no.

Recognise that other people have stuff in their lives that makes them say/do things, don't take it personally.

Look for the positives, appreciate the moment, embrace contentment.

Let go of things you can't control, walk away from negative people.

I am genuinely in awe of the people on this thread who have suffered immense trauma and heartbreak and yet still try to see the good in life and in other people. You are all truly inspirational

The alternative is to sit and wail about life’s misfortunes and I would rather try and either fix or move on from what is done

I have met people who blame everything on their shitty childhood or cry and beat themselves up over mistakes for months or years. Or wallow in self pity over what they have allowed people to do which has affected them. The results are boring people who can’t or won’t move on and it wrecks their lives.

I'm like this. It isn't something I do consciously, but I always think of the positives, which pushes negative thoughts back; I believe most people are mostly good and when someone isn't I automatically internally empathise why (bad day, fear, their own past experience); I don't really expect that much from other people and notice with gratitude when they do something kind, which happens often (eg stopping to let us cross the road etc); I mostly feel sufficient as a person, and I actively choose to feel happy at other people's strengths and successes and not compare them to my own (this is probably the only one I started consciously, but is now almost as automatic as the others)

I find it interesting that some pp attribute having these attitudes to a privileged life, and others attribute it to having experienced hardship. I think @Rystall has it right that we make a choice.