Positivity

If I look back on the past year then I think of many things that did not happen or in any case happened differently than was planned. It was an on and off situation of many things that suddenly could take place and then suddenly could not. This all placed high demands on everyone's adaptability and therefore also on mine.

The fact that everybody was hindered by these restrictions has helped me to remain positive. After all, it is something that we can't do anything about and that we still have to relate to.
I can well imagine that some people might get a little irritated when they hear the word positivity. Even so, I still want to talk about it in this blog. Many people associate positivity with the objective of putting a positive slant on all the unfortunate things that occur to you during your life. Personally, I don't think that it works like that. In my opinion, positivity is about taking responsibility for the manner in which you deal with the things that happen to you. For example, I trained very intensively during the past year for a full triathlon that was planed for June. In May I heard that the race was postponed until September. That required changes to my training schedule and all kinds of other things (hotel reservations etc.). Then in August, I heard that the race was again postponed, now until 2021.

This was incredibly frustrating and people asked me whether I had the feeling that I had trained for nothing. I could whole-heartedly say that this was not the case. A race for me is nothing more than the icing on the cake because I mainly train for my pleasure.

For me, positivity means reflecting on the moment. This can be stress, joy, sorrow, confusion or something else. The trick is to be aware of this and to use this to move forward
I recently read “The Gift” by Edith Eger. In short, it concerns:

“That which happens to us is ultimately not important. It's about what we do with it. We are all faced with suffering during our lives. We all recognize sadness, loss, despair, fear and failure. But we also all have a choice whenever we have to deal with trauma or difficulties. We can give up, or choose to experience every moment as a gift."

Dr. Edith Eger, celebrated therapist and Holocaust survivor, has written this practical guide to encourage us to change the thoughts that keep us prisoner and the destructive behaviour that impedes us. Her powerful lessons together with the stories from Eger’s own life and those of her clients are the basis for “The Gift”. In this book you learn to recognize your worst moments as your best teacher, and you find freedom through the strength that this brings.

I can recommend this book to everyone. Please contact me if you have other book tips or questions about this blog.

Jörg Sauer