One of the things I loved about the law of attraction when I first really started understanding it was its focus on how you’re feeling, rather than on positive thinking.

Positive thinking is often very helpful, but when you’re up against something that feels more like a crisis, or something that makes you feel really awful, it’s very difficult to use positive thinking to make yourself feel better.

With the law of attraction, though, the emphasis is always on your feelings. It’s not, “am I thinking positively?”, but rather, “how am I feeling right now?”

Which means that when you’re faced with a situation that only makes you feel worse the more you try to put a positive spin on it, the solution is actually easy. Well, easier than trying to positively think your way out of it, anyway!

So what should you do?

Try this: drop the subject you’re thinking about and reach for something totally unrelated that makes you feel better. It’s the “totally unrelated” aspect of it that gives this the juice.

Why something unrelated?

Because anything that’s related to your problem can be too tempting for your mind, and chances are, you’ll find yourself wandering back down the path to your problem. And also, in dire situations, it’s harder to find a related thought that you actually feel good about.

(But if you can find such a related thought, go for it - go for it, because it will be more effective in making you feel better about the situation at hand than an unrelated thought.)

You may find yourself resistant to the idea of thinking about something totally different. After all, if you’re facing a huge looming disaster, shouldn’t you put all your energy into thinking positively about it? Well, yes, if your positive thinking will make you feel better and help you find a solution.

But if it’s a situation where no amount of positive thinking is going to work, how does it benefit you? You’re not going to solve the situation with your positive thinking, and your focus remains on the situation, on your here and now - when what you want most is to attract something other than your here and now.

It is actually easier, and far more beneficial from an LOA perspective, to just stop thinking about the situation and go for a thought that will give you a good feeling.

Granted, you probably won’t end up feeling elated. But the goal here is to feel better than you were feeling. That’s all. Just better. Because from that better feeling place, you’ll be able to reach for an even better feeling place, and so on and so on, and guess what?

Your focus is no longer on your dire circumstances but rather on something that actually makes you feel better.

You’re giving law of attraction something good to work with.

And if you can’t come up with anything that will make you feel better, then try to get calm, and quiet your mind. If you can, meditate. If you’re just too frazzled, then calm your mind as best as you can. The key is to take your focus away from what’s upsetting you. Not thinking about anything is better than thinking about something that makes you feel bad.

Once your mind is calmer, try again to think about something totally unrelated to your situation that will make you feel better.

One last thing. It doesn’t need to be anything major. A memory of something that always makes you smile is all you might need to feel just that little bit better.

It’s a stepping stone up.