211 – The End Of Drama And Negativity

Being A Better Man

The End Of Drama And Negativity…

Hey every body! It’s Friday once again. Thanks for tuning into Being A Better Man, where we talk about the issues of manhood itself. Being a man isn’t just a matter of age. Nor is it simply a matter of gender. Being a man is a matter of character, it is a state of mind, a responsibility and a duty. I am your host, my name is Alf Herigstad

Today I’m going to talk about something that does not get talked about enough. Before I get into that though, I am going to talk about the esteemed sponsor of our Friday episodes; Stumptown Kilts.

It’s June. Summer is coming and in some places, it’s already here. You may have already had a day where you got uncomfortable, your legs got all hot and sweaty, things started sticking and chafing where you didn’t want them to, right?

Now imagine what that same day would have been like with the coolness of the breeze wafting up and getting rid of all that sweat and discomfort before it even happened. That’s just one of the advantages of going out into the day wearing a supremely crafted StumpTown Kilt.

Guess what? Fathers day is coming up on June 18th. I personally can’t think of a better Father’s day gift, than a beautiful Stumptown Kilt. If you are a father, or if you think you might ever be a father, if you have a father or even if you know someone that is a father this would be the perfect gift. There isn’t anything wrong with giving yourself a gift either. To make it even better, right now listeners of this program can get 10% off their online purchase by going to stumptownkilts.com and entering the code: betterman, at checkout. That’s all you have to do. So make some father’s day this year, even if it’s yourself, by going to stumptownkilts.com and entering the code: betterman. All one word and all lower case.

There is a lot of really crappy news in the world today. It seems like everyone just wants to talk about the bad stuff all the time. Whenever you watch the news or even in social media threads there is a ton of negativity being pumped into the universe.

I get it, it’s kind of a natural thing. People are activated by bad news. People listen intently if you are talking about something negative. I think we are hard wired this way, we are drawn to bad news because our ancient ancestors had to address the threats in life first, in order to survive.

The problem is, we don’t live in those times any more and much of the negativity we are exposed to isn’t a threat at all…it’s really just gossip. The downside of all this negativity in my opinion, is that we become infected by it. If we aren’t careful we get sucked into the drama and before you know it, we are contributors. It is a self perpetuating condition. Negativity breeds more negativity.

So today I want to talk about the virtues of positivity. Many years ago I decided that I was going to start living a drama free life. I was going to avoid all things that were negative and focus only on positive things. It went really well for about ten years. Things were great, life was happy and peaceful and I was quite content. During that time if someone showed up in my life who was negative, I would simply not let them in. In fact, I called my house “The Fortress Of Solitude”, named after Super Man’s lair of course—but I would not allow any negative energy to come into my life.

Then eventually, I got so cozy in my drama free life that I lost sight of my goal. I allowed one little drip of negativity in, that created more negativity, and in no time it all came crashing down. My drama free life was over just like that, but it took me some time to identify it.

That lasted about four years. It took me that long to realize what had happened, to understand what I had done. Once I was able to identify the problem then I could fix it, and I did. I’m happy to say that I am once again living drama free, and I intend to stay that way.

The secret to staying that way I have learned, is to think about it all the time. In this world we live in especially it takes a tremendous amount of effort to not be affected by all of the negative energy that’s out there. You cannot get cozy like I did. Like everything else though, it starts with a decision.

You have to decide what you are not willing to tolerate in your life, and then take action on that decision. It can be really tough though. I have known people who were so steeped in negativity and drama that they didn’t even realize it. It had become ‘normal’ to them, to the point they had lost all sight of another way.

It can also be tough because if you make a decision like this, it means there are people you may have to eliminate from your life. People you call friends, or even family. These are people who contribute nothing of value to your life or theirs. They are like human vacuums that go around sucking up all the joy from everything. Do you know anyone like that? Eliminating the influence these people have is probably the hardest thing to do, but it’s only hard up to the point that you do it…then, it is a huge relief.

I’ll give you one little tip to think about. Practice it for a couple days and see if it makes a difference. My tip is that there are two sides to every coin. In every single situation you encounter during life there are two ways to look at it. You can look at the worst side, the negative side. Or, you can choose to find the positive side and make that your perspective. For example, if you get in a car wreck you can focus on the damage to your car or your body, you can focus on the financial burden it might cause. Or, you can focus on the fact that you are still alive, that your wounds will heal, and that you have the rest of your life and you will have many cars before it’s over. See the difference?

I think this is important if you are being a better man. It’s important because it causes you to focus on the positive, and as you know…the things we focus on expand.

If you are expanding the negative by focusing on that it will be very difficult to improve as a man. You will be mired down in the drama and drudgery of life. On the other side of the coin though, if you are expanding the positive by focusing on the positive aspects of life and avoiding negativity, improvement becomes natural. As everything in life becomes more positive you will be much more able to be a better man today than you were yesterday.

Think this over as you head out into the world. How negative are you? Think about what steps you can take today to relieve yourself of some negativity. Visualize yourself living a drama free, happy, positive life. Then take the actions necessary to make it happen.

If you have any questions about this, or you would like more specific details about what I’m talking about or how to apply it, just write me an email at: [email protected] and tell me whats going on.

Hey I also know that there are those of you still out there who have not gotten my book forging a man. It’s on Amazon in print and eBook form so there really isn’t an excuse, go get it today.

Hey remember to to check out my new book, Forging A Man, available right now on Amazon.

(GET THE BOOK HERE)

Also, please take time to check out the MANLY RESOURCE CENTER, in the menu tab at the top of the page. Or, click on these links.

PATREON

STUMPTOWN KILTS

AUDIBLE

FACEBOOK

(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//forms.aweber.com/form/27/1175410227.js"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, "script", "aweber-wjs-t8d8jxubo"));