Positive Thinking

I have to admit that the positive thinking of the title is very much comparative! As people who know me will attest, the idea of me and positivity really doesn’t go together. I have generally got a negative view of human nature, a negative view of my own abilities and achievements and a negative view of the ebbs and flows of life. It comes from an upbringing where inside and outside the house negativity was the default setting. Over the last few years this had got worse and when I decided that I was going to finish full time work I realised that this had to change. I couldn’t go into a completely new stage of life expecting things to get worse. That would defeat the whole object of the early semi-retirement because I would have been subjecting myself to a narrowed approach to life which would have ended up making me miserable. So, I decided to look for new things to do, new approaches to take and new skills to develop. Am I finding each day a new and wonderful experience? No, I am not 😂😂! Am I looking forward to the future with more optimism? Generally yes. I have given regular updates on life after full time work on this blog and the reflection on my month just gone has been very useful in pinpointing areas that are improving and those that still need to improve. I am a work in progress and I always will be, but I feel like that progress is better now than it has been for many years in terms of my attitude to life.

That was the long answer. The short answer is that the most positive change I ever made was to marry Janet 35 years ago. Everything good in my life has come from that decision and I will never stop being grateful even if I don’t always express it in my approach to life!