A Positive Attitude Creates a Positive Attitude
Just as energy creates more energy, a positive attitude creates a positive attitude. So in effect, no matter how bad a situation may seem, you can make it better simply by pretending to have a positive attitude - even if you don’t feel positive.
A positive attitude affects your own mindset, as well as the mindsets of the people around you. Therefore, even if you are just pretending to have a positive attitude, the people around you will be affected to the point where they develop a positive attitude in relation to the situation. This positive attitude will clear their thinking, and help them make better decisions in relation to the problem at hand - which helps you out as well, and helps your false positive attitude to become real as well.
That pretend positive attitude will also have a great deal of positive affect on anyone that you need to deal with that could be a solution to your problem as well - even if they are not directly involved in solving the problem. For instance, if your business is on the verge of collapse, and you needed to visit your banker to get a loan to carry the business through the financial crisis, you wouldn’t want to walk into his office crying and complaining about how bad business is. Instead, you would want to walk in with a smile on your face, and tell him positive things about the business and the plans for the future, so he can see that you haven’t given up, and he can see that there is a viable plan.
Pretending to have a positive attitude is not permission to tell untruths, however. The people that are involved in helping to resolve a problem must be told the truth of the circumstances. The point is to try to portray a positive attitude that a solution will be found, and to let your team know that you are not giving up, that you don’t believe the situation is hopeless, and the situation will be resolved somehow - even if you don’t really believe any of that yourself.
Furthermore, you can fool yourself into having a positive attitude as well. By pretending to have a positive attitude, you portray it for so long that it becomes a habit - a learned response. Without even realizing it, the positive attitude that you portray each day becomes real. When this happens, most people don’t even remember that they were pretending in the first place!
