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We are wired to think negatively

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One thing to keep in mind is that our brains are not wired to think optimistically. Instead, they’re wired with a negativity bias. Anything that’s bad is going to be stronger and more attention-getting than something good.

We’ve likely all had the experience of getting feedback that was maybe 95 percent positive, but we end up focusing on that 5 percent that’s negative. We’re more likely to stay up at night worrying, rather than finding ourselves unable to sleep because of all the things we’re grateful for. For this reason, we have to actively put the positive into our lives, actively leveraging that 40 percent through happiness-building activities like fostering positive interactions with people and focusing on what’s right with us instead of what’s wrong, because our brains are not naturally going to do this.

Luckily, there are many, many ways we can increase our life satisfaction! This is where the pathways of the PERMA-V model come in:
• Positivity: Building our experience of positive emotions through pleasure, gratitude, curiosity, and the right mindset.
• Engagement: Being present and fully experiencing our lives through mindfulness and flow experiences.
• Relationships: If any of these pathways is more important than the others, it’s this one. In study after study, research shows that what the happiest people have in common is that they have strong, authentic, high-quality relationships. Positive psychology can be summed up in three words: Other people matter! We’re wired for connection; we need people that we care about and that care about us. We need community.
Here are some practical next steps you can do to work toward continued happiness. You can:
• Keep a gratitude journal.
• Perform random acts of kindness.
• Increase flow experiences.
• Set a goal and work toward achieving it.
• Meditate.
• Engage in physical activities.
• Shorten your commute.
• Spend more time in nature.
• Deepen your relationships.
• Get involved with a cause you care about.
Variety is key!

In effect, our brains are like Velcro for bad experiences but Teflon for good ones. For example, if ten things happen to you during a day at work or in a relationship, and nine of them are positive while one is negative, what do you tend to think about most? Probably the negative one. Pleasant, useful, beneficial experiences happen many times a day—enjoying a cup of coffee, getting something done at home or work, snuggling into bed with a good book at night—but they ordinarily pass through the brain like water through a sieve, while each stressful or harmful experience gets stuck to it. We’re designed to over-learn from bad experiences while under-learning from good ones. The negativity bias made sense for survival over millions of years of evolution, but today it’s a kind of universal learning disability in a brain designed for peak performance under Stone Age conditions.

Ask yourself what stands out in a typical day. The car that cut you off, the dish that broke, and the frustrating project at work? Or the pleasure of eating breakfast, the sense of determination as you push through a difficult task, and the beauty of a sunset? Think about your relationships. What draws your attention when you’re interacting with others: the many things going well, or the one word that stings?
If you’re like most people, it’s the negative that stands out. Because of the brain’s negativity bias, painful and harmful experiences move to the front of awareness, while enjoyable and useful ones fade into the background. This may have short-term benefits in harsh conditions, but over time it causes much wear and tear on your body and mind.