On the weekends I look forward to taking long walks to explore new parts of our neighborhood. This morning I had planned an ambitious route with almost 45 minutes up hill leading to an impressive view of the San Francisco Bay. Before I headed out I downloaded some new music onto my iPod. It’s been a long time since the lyrics of a pop song moved me to tears…tears of hope. I listened to this new song over a dozen times on the incline. Close to the summit I had memorized the lyrics and sang them all the way home. I thank India Arie for sharing her positive and uplifting message. I didn’t even notice the hills!

There’s Hope by India Arie

Back when I had a little,
I thought that I needed a lot.
A little was overrated but a lot was a little too complicated.
See, zero didn’t satisfy me.
A million didn’t make me happy.
That’s when I learned the lesson,
That’s it all about your perceptions.
Hey, are you a pauper or a superstar?
So you act, so you feel, so you are.
It ain’t about the size of your car,
It’s about the size of the faith in your heart.

There’s Hope.
It doesn’t cost a thing to smile
You don’t have to pay laugh
You better thank God for that.
(more…)

My walking buddy, Juliet, is one of the most generous, kind, and loving women in my life. Over the last few months we’ve enjoyed many a “walk-n-talk” and I have come to cherish our time together. She calls me “big sis” and it warms my heart.

This weekend after walking up a VERY steep hill (good for us!) we were brainstorming ways to stop negative and pessimistic thoughts. We all battle the voice of our inner critic and listen to countless loop tapes that do more harm than good. (I don’t know about you but I’m eager to get rid of those tapes and I don’t want to upgrade to CDs.)

Aside from yelling ‘Stop!’ out loud, what other techniques can we use to recognize thoughts that are not healthy? How can we practice being more loving and optimistic?

In Martin Seligman’s book, “Authentic Happiness” he dedicates Chapter Six to “Increasing Optimism and Hope” and offers a method for building optimism that consists of recognizing and then disputing pessimistic thoughts. He writes, “The key to disputing your own pessimistic thoughts is to first recognize them and then to treat them as if they were uttered by an external person, a rival whose mission in life was to make you miserable.”

Juliet knew a variation of his method and I’ve been practicing it with positive results.

Once you recognize a pessimistic thought that seems unwarranted start a conversation with yourself moving through Steps A to E:

1. A = Activating event — Ask yourself: What set you off, why are you being pessimistic?
2. B = Beliefs — Ask: What does the situation or event lead you to believe? These are the beliefs you automatically have when pessimistic thoughts occur.
3. C = Consequence — What are the usual consequences of the belief. What do you do in response?
4. D = Dispute — Action: talk back to the routine belief.
5. E = Evidence — is there any evidence that your beliefs are actually true?