Stick With Me Here
Stick with me here, for a second.
Sometimes it’s a bit funny how the world works, seems a bit funny anyway, until we take a look under the hood, so to speak and view the majesty of the entire Universe in all its simple magnificence.
So I’ve got a Facebook page for A Life Of Light, and I’ve also got one for myself. I don’t have a huge number of friends, but a fair number of folks I get a chance to read what they write about in my news feed.
Yesterday I realized that so many of the things that people are writing about – the things that show up in my news feed anyway, are angry, or mean-spirited or just kind of snotty, so I decided that I did not need more of that in my life, for any reason whatsoever, so I started blocking and deleting and hiding and in general getting rid of stuff that was just plain ugly.
Frankly, I am all for people expressing their opinions about things, but that is their opinion; I realized that I don’t need to be reading about it.
And I felt a lot better and a lot cleaner inside. 2 thumbs up.
And then, interestingly enough, there was some attention giving space in my day. Space that could be filled up with something more positive and today – Shazzam – a new person with great ideas showed up to fill in that attention space with lots of positive things to say.
Her name is Caren Baginski and she wrote a great article about letting go of things that are not serving you, specifically she talks about letting go of some words. Here is a link to her post so you can read about it too when you click this link —>> Unlearning 2000 Words
She has really good ideas, and even better, she illustrates a way to help people let go of things that are not serving them. Very powerful stuff.
I don’t know Caren personally, she is a member of a program I belong to called Trailblazer. But the fact is, that when I let go of stuff that made me feel bad inside – the junk on Facebook – some new space opened up and a great new positive person with great positive ideas showed up to fill that space.
I so appreciate the way the Universe works, and I am so grateful for that realization.
Filed under: Friends of ALOL • Law of Attraction
Great post Michael
I am undertaking a spot of therapy at the moment and am learning to let things go. I am surprised at how much we cling on to!
Sarah Arrow recently posted..Does my business blog need an email list?
It is funny how many things we cling to hoping they will turn around. When I listen with my “heart of knowing”, it amazing how the truth just shows up in a way that is easy to hear and understand.
Michael, Wow – I’m flattered and honored that you blogged my post. I love the Universe. I’m so glad I could be a positive “light in your life” – see what I just did there? To Trailblazing, letting go, filling up and happiness!
Caren, I really liked your article and I really liked that you gave a suggestion to do a yoga pose to help let go of those negative words. It is fabulous to find new friends online who share similar views. Rock on.
Excellent point Michael and I’ll be sure to click on over and check out the article. As far as the anger you referenced, sadly there is a whole lot of that around these days and you can read it in comments on a variety of sites like CNN, AOL and MSN … some of the comments on CNN – even under positive stories about people doing good in the world – are often so mean spirited it’s really disturbing. Even comments for the feel good ‘TED Talk’ videos often focus on picking apart the presenter’s message. It’s not that I want to live with my head in the sand, but I (also) choose not to let that negativity into my life.
marquita herald recently posted..How to Stop Feelings of Unworthiness from Sabotaging Your Dreams
So true, Marty, there seem to be so many people who are angry. i don’t know if it has always been this way, but when I started seeing it, I was quite astounded. I think that what we pay attention to grows in our awareness, so I decided to pay less attention to stuff that was uncool. Works great too.
Michael, you made a great find in letting go of all the negative words and feelings. You are what you give out. Your thoughts and actions are a reflection of words. Words are thoughts first so choosing to use positive supportive words in one’s life will show in a supportive way from others.
Your are inspiring lots of people with being transparent here. That is something more of us need to do, let that baggage go. Hey, I rather feel good speak supportive and search for positive things in every situation. Speak and live well with harmony in my mind and actions.
Thank you Michael for sharing this usable information. I must say that you gain a new supporter today!
William Earl Amis Jr III recently posted..Can you hear you now?
Thank you for your kind words, William.
It is better to let go of things that don’t feel right. I guess maybe sometimes most people have issues they need to express. No worries there, for sure; but when that’s all there is and it is almost as if someone was looking for something bad to talk about, that’s the point where I decide “This is not for me”
With transparency, that counts a lot with me and is something I look for in others too. Thank you again for your kindness.
great post! thanks for sharing this one to us! keep it up!
Candice Michelle recently posted..mortgage
Thank you Candice, I will do my best.
Loved it Michael! I agree about the negativity. I loved Caren’s post. I commented over there that Can’t was a dirty word when I was raising my kids. Words have everything to do with what we attract, how we feel, and what we project.
Laura Morris recently posted..6 Ways to Go from Mediocrity to Magic
Thank you Laura.
I say sometimes that “You are what you eat”, not so much from the organic food viewpoint but more like everything that we take into ourselves becomes part of what we put out into the world. And what we put out into the world comes back to us; sometimes even bigger and better.
Way easier to send out love and peace and happiness and then expect those things to show up in our lives.
Michael,
I have had a wonderful experience on Facebook. My friends who share often only put really positive and uplifting images and words. Sometimes they talk a bit too much about their families and their current activities, but it is all positive. If you have online friends that are negative, it is really simple to just delete, unfriend, and let them go.
Select your friends carefully – online and in your day to day life. Words and attitudes have power and can be contagious.
Warmly,
Dr. Erica
Dr. Erica Goodstone recently posted..Love is a Decision and a Choice
You are absolutely right, Dr. Erica. There are plenty of great people on Facebook who write wonderfully and positively. Those posts I love to see showing up in my news feed. And it is so much easier to see them now with less competition from the more negative ones. A very cool thing.
Hi Michael, that was great you were able to create space for more people you wanted to hear from! I used to get annoyed about all the games on Facebook, and they’re all gone from my news feed – I gradually hid them all. That’s what I love about facebook, we get to choose. Don’t you love the way people post all those images now, with the quotes written on them, brightens up the page so much!
bye for now, Julieanne
Julieanne van Zyl recently posted..What Inspires You to Teach?
Hi Julieanne, I do like the way we can choose what to keep and what to pay attention to in our FB newsfeeds. Clutter bothers me quite a bit and I do my best to get rid of it, and the negative stuff I did not enjoy at all. It was kind of odd too, how the extreme and relatively constant negativity crossed age lines and gender lines. ANd interestingly enough, I don’t miss it one bit.
Isn’t it amazing how moving the negative clutter out makes room to let the positive valuable things in? Much of the negative is so ingrained in me that I’m finding the only way to move it out is to REPLACE it with my positive self talk. Something like the only way not to think of a pink elephant is to purposely think of something else.
Willena Flewelling
Willena Flewelling recently posted..June 5 – A Day of Faith and New Beginnings
I absolutely agree, Willena, how hard is it to NOT think of fried onions when someone says, DON’T think of fried onions.
How much better to fill our lives with beauty and grace, than with meanness and snarkiness. double 
Hey Michael,
I went over and checked the other post and commented on her’s too! I like what you did on Facebook. Great idea. It is like not watching the news.
Because my Facebook friends are sometimes clients that I’m working with, they may express negativity. But when I get on Facebook I eyeball the left side to my groups that I work with and take it from there.
I hardly look at my news feed. It is something I chose to do not to waste time. I have blocked and hidden many from my feed, but did not make a project of it. I think I am going to take it one step at a time.
When something really negative comes in, I’ll pay more attention and block it. Especially political stuff. Everyone is entitled to their views and expressing them. Even a rant at times, but some focus solely on that topic. I don’t want to know!
Thanks for this post and inspiring me to pay more attention to the blocking of negativity and also for the great link.
Donna
Donna Merrill recently posted..The 80/20 Rule
I saw Caren’s blog in another group I’m in and I was pretty impressed by what she was writing. And then it just got me to thinking about what I see in FB feed. I do read that more than I post in my own and there was just a ton of rally negative stuff there. At first I thought, it might just have been the day, but then i went back through some of the other days and I saw there seemed to be a lot of really angry people writing there.
I am the last person on earth to tell people what they should and should not write about, I surely don’t want anyone to tell me, but I just didn’t enjoy reading so much down going stuff. Time to look for some folks who are in love with their lives and get them to be my FBF’s.
Hi Michael. This post made me feel better. I unfriended someone recently who had posted a poster about the Tea Party, depicting them as racist, bigoted, and stupid and Republicans as the moneybags that like to keep them that way. When I complained about the poster, she started YELLING AT ME in CAPITAL LETTERS and couldn’t understand that I was unhappy because it painted Tea Party-ers with a broad brush. She felt that I was very small minded to unfriend her, but you know, I felt the same way. I want to keep my Facebook and Twitter pages full of light, a place where Christ could friend me.
Thanks for your post,
Leslie
Leslie Denning recently posted..How Do I Make Videos? Part 2
I am glad you feel better, Leslie. It was quite amazing how much better I felt when I edited my news feed. At first I had thought it was just me, being too sensitive about how negative other people were, but a number of people have told me that they have felt the same way, and have been editing their friends’ lists as well. No need for yelling at anyone for sure, especially ALL IN CAPS. Good for you that you let that go from your life.
Hi Michael,
we need to dare to take radical decision and cut out of our lives the negativity. Sometimes we continue to stay in situations we do not like out of habit.
I have not had bad experience on Facebook but someone I did not know asked crazy questions for more tan one week by mail.
I believe that Internet is giving us a ot of opportunities to meet nice people but it is up to us to protect our privacy and image.
I was very kind and just deleted the name of this person of my list.
We should have the courage to do the same in our lives too to leave space for good things to happen.
Thanks for sharing Michael, it’s good to know we are not alone in such incidents;)
Patricia Gozlan recently posted..Women’s Wisdom Revealed Secrets: From Self-Sabotage to Prosperity Consciousness
It is so true, Patricia, we do need to take that kind of radical action and let go of relationships that do not serve us. Sometimes, we try things out and they seem like a good idea at the time, and then we get some experience with them and find they don’t do anything good for us at all. Making that radical decision to let go of them helps us and helps the others too. Then everyone has more room in their lives of the people and relationships that work the best for them.
I am glad that doing this worked well for you.
Pretty insightful post, I found your site on Bing looking around for something completely unrelated and I really enjoyed your site. I will stop by again to read some more posts
Allen – Flash game developer recently posted..Get Awesome Custom Facebook App Development from Social Cubix
Well, that’s cool Allen. I really appreciate you coming by here to comment. Stop by any time.
Hi Michael,
This is a great article and I want to thank you upfront for sharing your new Facebook page, A Life of Light, and the post by Caren Baginski. Her post was another eye-opener!
As you discussed how your Facebook Page came about by getting rid of negativity on Facebook, I am in the process of leaving all negative people in my life. I read a blog this morning called, 9 Beliefs of Remarkably Successful People by Jeff Haden and I must share this excerpt from his post. “Some of your employees drive you nuts. Some of your customers are obnoxious. Some of your friends are selfish, all-about-me jerks.You chose them. If the people around you make you unhappy it’s not their fault. It’s your fault. They’re in your professional or personal life because you drew them to you–and you let them remain.”
I think this saying is very powerful and as I read it, became an instant wake up call for me. Soon after leaving that post, I popped in to your blog and you are discussing eliminating negativity….what’s up..eh???
So for me, it’s about becoming aware, then taking action to change, as you did with Facebook. It’s allowing new space to make room for something better.
As always, love your content!
Raena Lynn
PS Having positive people in my life, like you, helps me a lot…just wanted you to know:)
Raena Lynn recently posted..Tribe Networking Brings More Targeted, Peer-Referred Traffic
Thank you Raena, for your kind words and for posting here and on FB too. I suspect that things do come into our consciousness when we are ready to see them. They might be there all the time, but just not registering and then some one thing happens that might not be all that big a deal and Woof, Kerplow, it jumps right up and facepalms you on the forehead.
I would venture a guess that reshuffling the people who are in your life and crating the most influence on you is a pretty important thing in your life right now, that’s a lot of messages showing up in a short amount of time. that happens to me sometimes (OK, a lot of times) and the volume just keeps getting cranked up higher and higher until I pay attention.
And the cool part is, that the people you release are going to find someone else who is more like minded for them and their life is going to become more congruent just like yours. I really like your quote, I am a firm believer in personal responsibility, not blame, responsibility, because that gives me the opportunity to be in charge of my own life and that works really for me.
Thank you again, I like having positive people in my life and I am glad you are one of them.
i like the article so much
its my first visit but it wont be the last
HI Farouk,
Thank you for coming by to comment. Please come back soon.
Thanks for sharing Michael… I have so many unususl expariences that I coudl just say they are coincidence.. BUT in reality is what teh UNIVERSE had already planned for me… it is great to read post with like minded people… WE always learn more an dmore and at the same time contribute to others as well.. Hope we always open to acceot all what the Universe has in store for us… I found that it is always good.
Thanks again
Nick Catricala recently posted..Happy 4th of July… take Time off…
Thank you for your kind words, Nick. The Universe is full of wonderful surprises that sometimes seem like have been waiting there just for us. Nick I so appreciate that you are in this wonderful group of like-minded people. Thank you.
I agree, we should block all bad post,comments,and updates. If they are not uplifting get rid of it. The more we see it, the worse are off. If we put something more positive, it is better for our minds to progress. We have to spit the inner demons others, kind of funny.
Jacob recently posted..One MLM Secret That Will Make Or Break You In The Next 24 Hours
Absolutely better, Jacob, and interestingly I have started reading a number of posts where people are saying the same thing, that they are blocking the people who are always making negative posts on Facebook and some of them unsubscribing from email lists too. Being positive makes life so much easier.
Hi Michael, thank your for your insight.
On my end, I do not get much negativity online as I guess I veer clear of it, but offline on the news and such there is plenty of it. As of late I have been trying to avoid it as it gets old and makes life unnecessarily complicated.
Nathan Gurley recently posted..Free Antivirus and Cleaner Did the Trick!
Hi Nathan,
I guess I did it the other way around. I started by eliminating the negativity form my life offline. i don’t watch the news, I don’t trade gossip with the neighbors, I hardly watch TV at all, and changing those things allowed me to let a lot of negative stuff out of my life. And when I cleared out much of the negative stuff from my online activities as well, it has been a very peaceful and delightful experience. I wish you well in your quest to let that go too.
When I realized how much my emotions are affected by the negativity of others I started removing them from my life. This included family, friends, co-workers, etc. To the best of my ability I had to stop making excuses for the behaviors and words of others. So I did a Let Go Let God. It has worked. Online I have done the same I keep it moving and unfriend in a minute if someone is sharing negative hurtful content. I don’t listen to negative comments about others and stay focused on the solution. Thanks for this post.
Lydia Brown recently posted..Unemployed the “New Minority”~MLM Businesses Care!
So true, Lydia. It is quite amazing how we seem to get our lives filled up with all kinds of negativity. It takes some doing to be willing to let it go, but when we do, our lives are so open and wondrous again. It is almost as if we were reborn. I am glad you were able to do that so you could enjoy your life even more.
I can completely agree with your comments Michael. During the elections it seemed that there was even more negativity on Facebook. It actually helped me out a lot because I was able to clear out a bunch of people who I knew that I would never agree with. Some comments were borderline abusive and frankly it kept me off Facebook for a bit of time. Then I did like you did and unfriended those people. It was better to be associated with people who kept a positive light on life versus focusing on all the bad without actually coming up with solutions to the problems they were attempting to shed light on.
Clint Butler recently posted..Live The Dream 3 – Ray Higdon And His Shiny Suit
The idea of being positive is such an easy idea to live with, much easier than living with constant negativity. My Facebook feed is ever so much lighter now and I look forward to reading it everyday.
We’d love to hear from you in the comments: How do you cure one of the habits above? Are there other habits twenty-somethings need to dispense?
Agnes Avila recently posted..No last blog posts to return.
Agnes, the best way to make any kind of change, whether you are a 20-something or some other age is to decide that the way you are living right now is not tolerable anymore. Then decide how you want to change and make one small step toward that new idea.