If You Want To Attract Less Negativity, Make These 11 Choices

1. Choose to focus on the present moment.

Close-up of a person with long hair looking out a window with raindrops on it. They are touching their face with both hands, and their expression appears contemplative. The background is blurred. Their nails are painted red, with a decorative design on one nail.

Being present takes a Herculean act of will when it seems that all aspects of daily life are increasingly designed to confuse and distract as much as economically, politically, or spiritually possible.

Yet, in order to attract less negativity, you must be mindful.

The ability to appreciate what happens within a moment, then the next, and the one thereafter focuses our random desires and brain musings into a state of mindfulness that prevents the buildup of plaque-like falsehoods.

Staying grounded, centered, and aware is vital to a positive mindset.

2. Choose to seek beauty.

A bearded man with dark hair and a blue jacket is standing in a forest, smiling as he reaches up to touch a green leaf on a branch. The background is filled with blurred trees and foliage, creating a serene and natural setting.

The funk-soul band Earth, Wind & Fire had a talent for crafting lyrics that settled in the warmest part of the soul. “If there ain’t no beauty you got to make some beauty” from the song All About Love is one.

The world is an ugly place. It’s loud, it’s frightening, and very often deserving of tears.

But take a walk through any forest and you’ll see the world is an extremely beautiful place. A gentle place. And if you happen to cross paths with a stranger in those same woods, you might be fortunate to realize that person is beautiful and gentle too.

Beauty doesn’t block out the unpleasant, ugly aspects of life. That’s not its task. Beauty quietly, gently hopes to remind everyone that it exists alongside the lashing winds, brambles, and twisted barbs we tend to focus on as “real” life.

Deciding to see beauty places beauty right in front of us. And if by chance it’s still not found, we make it.

3. Choose to engage your creativity.

A smiling woman with blond hair stands in a lush, green forest. She is holding a camera, poised to take a photo. She is wearing a khaki jacket and appears to be enjoying the natural surroundings. Sunlight filters through the trees.

Ever notice that positive people tend to be creative?

The aunt who was quick with a laugh baked the best pies; the girlfriend from college who smiled with her entire being knitted scarves and gloves like they were going out of style.

Positive people make a choice to be creative at something. They’ll experiment with new foods in the kitchen, or perhaps mix beverage concoctions just to see if they’ll like the taste.

Often they’re readers, reading being the ultimate game of creative mental theatre.

The choice is made to find a creative refuge from the demands of home, work, family, even love. If, as a people, we can’t carve out a space to express “us,” we harden ourselves to joy and take a negative universe as a given.

4. Choose to face reality.

A man with short hair and a beard stands by a window with his hands pressed against the glass. He appears deep in thought or reflection, gazing downwards. The scene outside is blurred, focusing attention on his contemplative expression.

“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference.”

We know this quote as the Serenity Prayer, originally written in 1951 by theologian Reinhold Niebuhr.

It is relevant and important to attracting less negativity because it illustrates a key facet of positive living: facing the world creates a particular power that willfully retreating never can.

It’s hard to be truly positive unless you live an honest life. To be positive you need to make the conscious choice to face reality in order to remake the parts of it they can for the betterment of all, minus the angst and guilt of not being a part of the solution to everything.

5. Choose to look for “wins.”

A woman with blonde hair holds a white mug with both hands, eyes closed, and a content smile on her face. She is wearing a light-colored cardigan and sits in a cozy indoor setting with a window in the background allowing natural light to gently illuminate her face.

Getting through a big copying job without a single paper jam: win.

Catching all the green lights during a relatively deserted drive: win.

Successfully teaching your child the concepts behind magnetic attraction and repulsion: win.

If you want to attract less negativity you need to consciously seek moments during your day to count as wins, because as humans, we need those pops of light to let us know we’re doing something right.

Big wins are great, but it’s the smaller daily wins that sustain us.

6. Choose not to dwell on the past.

A man with short hair and glasses stands outdoors with eyes closed, wearing a white t-shirt. The background is filled with greenery from trees, creating a peaceful and serene atmosphere. Dappled sunlight filters through the leaves, casting shadows on him.

Being positive doesn’t mean not experiencing (or not ourselves being the cause of) negative situations.

What it does mean is choosing not to mire yourself in that past like doomed flies to emotional flypaper.

If you want to attract less negativity, choose to acknowledge the past and, if fortunate, learn from it, but draw the line at feeling constrained by it.

You can’t focus on the present or even your immediate future while simultaneously trying to live in the past.

7. Choose to be a beacon of light to others.

A diverse group of people sitting in a well-lit room with large windows. Two people, one older and one younger, are standing and smiling warmly while embracing each other. Other group members are seated and smiling, creating a positive, supportive atmosphere.

The weird thing about negativity is it causes people to be stingy at giving of themselves but greedy at making themselves miserable, leaving your entire life feeling slow and leaden.

Few things are more energizing, however, to a positive-minded person than seeing someone else shine, and if said positive person can shine their own light on someone else’s brilliance, they generally will.

8. Choose to listen more than you speak.

A man and woman are walking and having a conversation. The man, dressed in a light-colored shirt, dark pants, and a gray blazer, gestures with one hand while speaking. The woman, dressed in black, listens attentively. They are in an outdoor urban setting with stone walls.

It’s been said we learn more with our mouths closed than open.

Even online, our first reaction to seeing something we think others might find noteworthy is to “speak” on it. If we’re not commenting somehow or other, a feeling creeps in: we’re fading from existence!

Harlan Ellison wrote a short story in the late sixties entitled “I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream,” which presciently encapsulated the current tenor of 21^st century life.

If you want to attract less negativity and more positivity, know that you have both mouth and voice, but choose your words sparingly unless you’ve genuinely got something to add to the discussion that will enrich all involved beyond the simple dictates of the ego.

9. Choose not to jump on the bandwagon.

A woman with long hair tied back, wearing large round sunglasses and a light grey sleeveless top, is looking at her phone with an expression of shock or frustration. She is holding a turquoise phone in one hand and has her other hand raised in exasperation.

Along the lines of listening, positive people work to avoid most forms of bandwagon hopping, otherwise it’s far too easy to be swept along by the tidal wave of issues and outrages plaguing the world today, and regaining safe ground becomes a constant drain.

This is not to say you shouldn’t make your voice heard or strive for change.

On the contrary, you can have a potent voice precisely because you aren’t constantly in someone’s ear, commenting on every post, or echoing the concerns of every hotbed issue.

People who attract less negativity look for solutions, find those solutions, and share those solutions as necessary.

10. Choose to enjoy the physical life as much as the spiritual.

A bearded man in a plaid shirt spreads butter on a slice of toast at a sunlit breakfast table. The table also has stacked toast, a soft-boiled egg, a butter dish, a cup of coffee, and a glass of orange juice. The room is bright with sunlight coming through a window.

If you want to attract more positivity, make a regular effort to get your body to do more than just move them from room to room.

You may be surprised to hear that positive people also make an effort to enjoy culinary delights. And physical intimacy. And taking long baths. And very likely the unending joy of an itch scratched well and good.

Meditation and emotional engagement are lovely, but, rather than push against the pleasures of the flesh, there’s more positivity in appreciating the wonders that the billions of nerve endings and receptors we house have to offer.

11. Choose to bring in the reinforcements when negativity rears its ugly head.

A person wearing a sunhat and casual clothes lounges in a green, striped hammock tied to a tree in a lush garden. They are positioned with their feet up and hands behind their head, creating a relaxed and tranquil atmosphere. Leaves are in focus in the foreground.

Positivity can wane.

To remain on the plus side, you’ll need to repeat these choices the next day, and the next, and so on, because staying positive amid combative, divisive voices is not easy.

You’ll also have to endure dismissive voices, because “positivity” still carries the unfortunate connotations of being one part escapism, one part naivety, and one part deluded optimism.

But to be truly positive, you must not only acknowledge your omnipresent darkness but see it, then decide to push against it.

If you want less negativity, choose to reach out to other sources of light when in need of recharging: friends, lovers, teachers, all those seen as shining positive lights in their own unique ways.

Being positive is an act of valor, strength, and service to others. It’s what keeps the world from being nothing but thorns when we stop to smell the roses. If only all bouquets we approach could be that sweet.