The other day I was wandering the web looking for information on positive and negative thinking.

I found many articles that had great little snippets of advice on how to eliminate negative thoughts.

Below is a summary of some of the advice I found on how to deal with negative thoughts.

1. One of the things I found that surprised me was that there seem to be studies that imply that negative thoughts have a greater impact on our lives than positive ones. I suspect that the reason for this would be the emotions associated with these thoughts. I would think that negative thoughts are super emotionally charged while positive thoughts lack strong feelings. This would mean that you need to have a lot more positive thoughts to counteract the negative ones. It would also mean that you need to have a lot more emotions associated with your positive thoughts.

2. Since we know that we are prone to negative thoughts, we always have some positive thoughts to counteract.

3. Be aware that negative thoughts are tenacious. They don’t want to give up their control over your life. When you realize that you are in a negative spiral, just stop and smile to yourself. Be aware of what is happening and just put those negative thoughts out of your mind.

4. Do things that make you happy. Do not give place in your mind to the negative.

5. When you find yourself angry with someone immediately change your point of view to the positive.

6. If you’ve heard the expression “You are what you eat.” Well, you’re also like the people you date. If you hang out with negative people, you will simply absorb their negative energy, so remove the negative energy from these people. Work very hard to be with positive people and you will see that you become more positive.

7. Eliminate all negative words from your vocabulary.

8. You will find that helping others is a great way to help yourself. Helping those less fortunate will make it harder to keep negative thoughts in your mind.

9. When you’re stressed, you’re more likely to have negative thoughts. Be aware of this and immediately change any negative words.

10. Pay attention to the good things in your life. Focus on gratitude.

11. Seek advice outside of yourself. When you’re being attacked with negative thoughts, ask your friends and family for some perspective.

12. Use negative thinking as a way to be aware of what is going on in your life. If you start having negative thoughts, look at what situations you were in that might have triggered them. If you can identify specific situations, you can avoid them or be prepared to defend yourself against negativity.

13. Reframe the thoughts you have. Instead of thinking that “this situation is impossible,” work on changing your thoughts to “this situation presents me with many challenges to grow.”

14. Realize that you are not perfect and that no one else is.

15. Know that you say things to yourself that you would never say to anyone else. Treat yourself with at least the same respect and you’d be an outsider.