Beings, Places, Objects, Activities

Intention:

The beings, places, objects, and activities that we interact with have the potential to impact our thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. Those perceived as favorable influences can contribute to our good mood, and vice versa. In fact, to improve our mood it is recommended that we deliberately increase our contact with strengthening (‘positive’) external influences, and reduce our exposure to debilitating (‘negative’) ones.

The following is a simple format to identify the beings, places, objects, and activities that stand out as ‘positive’ and ‘negative’ in our lives. We can explore the origins of these associations, memorize them, carry the lists with us as a reminder, or simply refer to them periodically and update them as we garner new experiences.

Instruction:

List under the headings of beings, places, objects, and activities those that evoke ‘negative’ associations for you. On a separate page, list under the headings of beings, places, objects, and activities those that evoke ‘positive’ associations for you. Under beings you can include human and other beings, living or not.

You can repeat the exercise listing beings, places, objects and activities for your family or group.

On both the ‘negative’ and ‘positive’ lists, you can include beings, places, objects, and activities with which you do not relate directly (e.g., deceased persons, lost objects) or regularly (e.g., distant places, seasonal activities).

Reflect on the exercise process and on your responses as you answer the following questions.

Inspection:

·       What did you discover or learn when creating these lists?

·       Did you have difficulty creating any of the lists?

·       Did the exercise encourage you to have more contact with what is on the ‘positive’ lists, or to address in some way what is on the ‘negative’ lists?

·       What pleasant and unpleasant emotional reactions did this exercise elicit?

“NEGATIVE”

BEINGS, PLACES, OBJECTS, ACTIVITIES

BEINGS

PLACES

OBJECTS

ACTIVITIES

“POSITIVE”

BEINGS, PLACES, OBJECTS, ACTIVITIES

BEINGS

PLACES

OBJECTS

ACTIVITIES