Are You Only Noticing What You Look for and Missing the Good Stuff?
We watch the news and hear about all the problems and dangers in our world. We talk to friends and discuss our personal troubles and lament the world problems we hear about. We notice all the things that are wrong at work, in our community, in our families, and in our lives. There are so many things that just aren’t fair!
Does this sound at least a little familiar? No wonder it can seem like there’s so many problems, so much bad happening all around us with very little good.
Before you read any further, click on the link below and watch this short video (< 2 minutes).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJG698U2Mvo
Did you watch the video? Don’t read any further until you do 🙂
Maybe you’ve seen this fascinating video before, but the concept that it drives home – selective attention – really opened my eyes, literally!
We notice what we look for and miss the rest.
What are we wired to look for? Our survival instinct has us finely tuned into anything that could be bad, dangerous, or a threat. It’s important we notice and remember these things so we can take action to protect ourselves. What don’t we notice? Our instinct is to ignore anything good. After all, if things are good, we don’t need to take any action to keep ourselves safe.
The video is such a good reminder that just because we don’t “see” something, doesn’t mean it isn’t there. Just because we naturally don’t notice the positive things, doesn’t mean they aren’t there. We just need to retrain ourselves to override our instincts and also see the good stuff.
Take a minute right now. What are some positive things, people, situations, opportunities in your life? Don’t let your survival instincts control your reality.
To get more Positivity Tips like this delivered to your inbox, sign up here.
Tina Hallis, Ph.D. is Chief Positivity Officer of The Positive Edge, a company dedicated to helping people and organizations increase their positivity to improve the quality of people’s work lives and the quality of company cultures. She is certified in Positive Psychology, an authorized partner for Everything DiSC®, and a Professional Member of the National Speaker’s Association.
