Photo Props

What if tomorrow morning you woke up only to realize someone had withdrew half the money in your bank account?

Negativity is trying to do that to our creative account every single day.

There’s a big difference between critical thinking and negativity. Critical thinking is done to help produce a better result. Negativity is used like a cold, wet blanket to stifle and cover our creative energy.

Negativity never walks through the door announcing its arrival, it sneaks in via a trojan horse.

Here are just a few places where you can find negativity hiding out:

• In our calendar and pace of life.
• In being critiqued or challenged to be better.
• In our boredom with the status quo.
• In excessive meetings.
• In our inability to do enough of what fills us up.
• In stress.
• In conflict between co-workers.
• In excessive problems.

But you don’t have to fall victim to the traps of negativity. We have a responsibility to fight negativity by fostering creativity. When you feel yourself leaning to the negative, it’s time to act. In these moments, you must realize you’ve stopped looking at the opportunities in your environments that are begging for your ingenuity and ideas. These ideas will help create new solutions only YOU can provide. God has gifted you with the ability to be creative. You not only can see problems and solutions differently, you thrive on these opportunities. So, it’s time that you start to:

• Schedule time to be creative.
• Look for the opportunity in meetings to impact decisions and direction.
• Bring a different solution or angle to the conversation.
• Refuse the status quo and delegate tasks that become boring…or change them so they can provide energy.
• Embrace other opinions and the opportunity to get better every single day. There is nothing like the fuel of a hater.
• Look at meetings different. View them as a chance to share ideas, help others’ ideas, or move the needle in the organization.
• Schedule meetings with creativity. Times to read, write, dream, or whatever it is that fills the tank.
• Pray.
• Extend grace in relationships the way you would like grace extended to you.
• Problems are opportunities waiting to be uncovered.

No one expects “SUNSHINE” all the time. But when negativity starts to stifle creativity, it robs you of your ability to be all God has created you to be – and that’s what we need you to be so we can be our best.

What are some of your methods for fighting negativity?