While Monsters Inc., a 2001 animation comedy by Walt Disney Pictures made millions at the box office and entertained audiences across the globe, monsters in real life are not somethings that are so sought after. Monsters by definition are large, ugly and frightening creatures however, our mind is capable of creating monsters of our own.

Negative thoughts are no less ugly, frightening, and daunting monsters that our mind creates.  Life is and always will be a mixed bag with good days and bad days, with successes and failures, with hard work and enjoyment all going hand in hand. Life is not easy because life was never meant to be easy. While this is a fact, another fact remains that our attitude, our happiness, and the choices we make each day are fully in our control. The monsters of negative thoughts have an inherent capability of growing and multiplying beyond our strength if we give them the power to do so. Such thoughts can become unconquerable monsters if we don’t arrest them and catch them while they are still little.

One may argue that it is very easy to preach about positive thinking. Until you experience what a person is going through, it is impossible to appreciate the gravity of someone’s situation. There is no denying the fact that you, in fact not only you but all of us face situations in life where we feel that this is something we have never encountered before and is definitely going to break us. The situation, whatever it is, the choice at that point is in our hands. While we may choose to indulge in negativity and do nothing about handling the situation which would actually make the ‘monster’ even grave and manageable. The other choice is to calm your mind, look for the learnings in the situation, analyzing the problem to assess what can be done to remedy the situation, look for small micro-steps that can be taken to improve your circumstances.

If I may request you to think about a previous grave situation that you were stuck in and you had thought that there is no way out and the situation is going to break you. Today, in hindsight, what do you think about that problem. It hasn’t broken you, you had successfully handled it, it has given you life learnings to handle your future problems and life situations, and actually doesn’t look challenging to you at all.

I would actually encourage you all to arrest the monsters of negative thinking and focus on thinking right since right thinking may or may not sound positive at that moment in time but will surely turn out to be positive for you in the future.

In fact, negativity is always bad, whether of thoughts, situations, or people.

“Stay away from the negativity of all kinds, it will always have a problem for every solution.”

– Nalin Chandna