I was recently asked to deliver a talk entitled “Staying Positive In Difficult Times”. I accepted the invitation, but I changed the title.
The words we use are important. They reflect our thinking just as much as our thinking reflects our words. If times were difficult I would not want to stay in them, positive or otherwise. Nor would I want to stay positive under them, about them or while they last, although I might choose to stay positive through them.
I am equally twitchy at airports and railway stations where I am invited get on the train, or on the plane. No thanks! I’d much rather get in than get on!
And why would I wish to stay positive only in difficult times? Wouldn’t staying positive serve me just as well, whatever way “so-called” times turn out? If your outlook truly serves you well, it should do so whatever the circumstances. And if times were difficult would I want to stay?
The fact is the phrase “staying positive in difficult times” is a complete oxymoron and that’s lesson one: watch your language and do away with labels.
For someone who is positive times are neither difficult nor easy; times are neither happy nor sad; times are neither good nor bad. Times just are; they have no innate character that is true for everybody, everywhere, every when.
Times are what you make of them. It is quite possible for times to be both good and bad at the same time. Don’t take my word for it. Dickens said it most famously in the very first sentence of A Tale of Two Cities:
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.”
Isn’t that just like now?
The words we use are important. They reflect our thinking just as much as our thinking reflects our words. If times were difficult I would not want to stay in them, positive or otherwise. Nor would I want to stay positive under them, about them or while they last, although I might choose to stay positive through them.
I am equally twitchy at airports and railway stations where I am invited get on the train, or on the plane. No thanks! I’d much rather get in than get on!
And why would I wish to stay positive only in difficult times? Wouldn’t staying positive serve me just as well, whatever way “so-called” times turn out? If your outlook truly serves you well, it should do so whatever the circumstances. And if times were difficult would I want to stay?
The fact is the phrase “staying positive in difficult times” is a complete oxymoron and that’s lesson one: watch your language and do away with labels.
For someone who is positive times are neither difficult nor easy; times are neither happy nor sad; times are neither good nor bad. Times just are; they have no innate character that is true for everybody, everywhere, every when.
Times are what you make of them. It is quite possible for times to be both good and bad at the same time. Don’t take my word for it. Dickens said it most famously in the very first sentence of A Tale of Two Cities:
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.”
Isn’t that just like now?
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