MIDDLE GRADE READING: Bad Habit Thinking

Bad habit thinking can become a bad habit that follows us into our adult lives. If allowed, a single middle grade thought can trip…you…out. During the formidable years of middle school, life is stuck on hyper-speed and everything seems to be a matter of life or death. IT…IS…NOT. Middle grade years have the ability of becoming some of the best years of our lives if we keep the mental playground free of limiting thought patterns, otherwise known as

bad habit thinking. Some examples of bad habit thinking can be:

‘I hate my life.’

‘Nobody likes me.’

‘I’m stupid.’

Runaway thoughts like these are nothing more than a traffic jam of thoughts and come from a place of insecurity and doubt. The reason we think runaway thoughts (otherwise known as lies) are true is because of our bad habit of ‘limited thinking’ is stronger than our practice of ‘affirmative thinking.’

Limited, bad habit thinking kills our ability to trust because fear leads to more fear. On the other side of the coin, happiness has the ability to leads us to more happiness. We are but magnets for the thoughts we carry in life. If we repeat a lie long enough, sooner or later we trick our minds into thinking that lie is the truth. Why not replace bad habit thinking with the amazing power of affirmative thinking?

Some say affirmative thinking is merely positive thinking. It goes way beyond positive thinking because you can be positive you are unhappy. Affirmative thinking is a declaration of gratitude. When you are grateful for your life, life gives you more things to be grateful for.

“Our thoughts become our words as they become our beliefs; our beliefs become our actions as they become our habits. Our habits become our values as our values become our destiny.” – Gandhi

In essence, we can either have grand thoughts about ourselves, or we can entertain some perpetuated lie based on bad habit thinking. We never arrive in life because life is a journey, not some exotic destination filled with chocolate chip cookie dinners. I can eat about a million chocolate chip cookies as long as the milk is cold enough, but if that’s all I ever ate, I would get sick to my stomach. The same goes for bad habit thinking, which can actually make you sick to your stomach and keep your from your true potential.

The next time you have a self-defeating, motivation-crippling thought, all you have to do is look in the opposite direction of that thought. We look there because nothing can exist without a polar opposite. Hot cold. Ying Yang. There is always another side to the story. The same can be said for the story of our lives. If life is tripping you out because of bad habit thinking, simply turn around and begin again. You deserve greatness TODAY.

MIDDLE GRADE READING: Bad Habit Thinking