The Power of Positive Thinking

By James Donahue

The late Dr. Norman Vincent Peale, a popular protestant minister and author was well known for his philosophy of positive thinking and how it can change lives. His best known book was titled “The Power of Positive Thinking.”

Dr. Peale and His Holiness the Dalai Lama would have found much to agree with on this. The Dalai Lama is currently on a tour of the United States in which he is promoting the very same kind of mental attitude. He says it is the key to finding peace and happiness in a world that appears to have gone stark raving mad.

My wife, Doris, recently spotted one of the Dalai Lama’s unexpected appearances in a live daytime television show and was deeply moved by his brief message to the millions of Americans watching at that moment.

She said he told Americans not to be excited or alarmed about all of the disasters, extreme weather and natural occurrences and the political turmoil sweeping the nations. He said the key to making things improve is to seek quietness and to think happy thoughts, even about our enemies.

Indeed Buddhism teaches that there is such a thing as karma, or a kind of energy that each of us emit with our every thought throughout every day. If we think bad thoughts, fearful thoughts, hateful thoughts, we are constantly sending bad karma off into the world around us. If hundreds of millions of people are all doing the same thing at the same time, the effect can be catastrophic.

The worse things become in the world, the more bad karma the people create. This intensifies the problem rather than fixes anything.

The world appears to be sliding so rapidly into a total chaotic state that I suspect the Dalai Lama may be making what he perceives as a last-ditch effort to use his influence to teach us how to put on the brakes and possibly bring some sunshine and happiness back into our existence before we plunge off the cliff.

This is not a pipe dream. Our daughter Susan, who has been trained in Theta Healing, says one of the biggest causes of personal problems people are having is the attachments by what she calls “fallens,” "waywards" and other entities that appear to be living creatures created by all of the negative thoughts and actions performed by humanity since the beginning of our existence on this planet.

As you might imagine, these things swarm around us all, and when the opportunity is there, they attach themselves to us. Attached entities drain our energy, make our bodies hurt, cause personal aggravation, and have an effect on each day of our lives.

In an interview by Swati Chopra the Dalai Lama spoke of using something he called shunyata to purify the mind and know “the nature of reality. Negative emotions arise from a misconception of reality. In order to remove suffering, you have to meditate on shunyata.”

A technical description of shunyata is “nothingness.” I once heard someone call this a mental state of “no-thought.” The way to reach this state of peace and contentment is to meditate until we erase all thought from our mind. That is very difficult to accomplish. Perhaps only the most advanced Buddhist monks can truly achieve this state of consciousness.

The Dalai Lama also calls on Americans to be more compassionate. He said “compassion, or karuna, stems from wisdom. I believe that whether a person follows any religion or not is unimportant, he must have a good heart, a warm heart. This is essential for a happy life, which is much more important than Buddhahood. This is part of what I call ‘secular ethics.’”

The Dalhi Lama said “compassion automatically brings happiness and calmness. Then, even if you receive disturbing news, it will be easier to take, as your mind is still. But if you are agitated, even a minor happening will upset you greatly.”

We are lucky to have such wisdom in our midst during these troublesome times.