Story of a paper box: Stop worrying and start living

“The two looks out the window
“One saw the mud, the other saw stars.” 

1. From the most wonderful joke 

Author Paul Hellman tells about the most interesting joke of the 40th president of the United States.
 
It was not about the story itself, but when Reagan told it. President Reagan was shot on his 69th day as President, the bullet missed his heart a bit, and he was telling his wife about that assassination attempt.
 
"Darling, I forgot to avoid it” - Mimicking the first sentence that boxer Jack Dempsey uttered after losing a battle.
 
Reagan refused to get panicked - his sense of humor told it all.

"I hope everyone is Republican," he joked to the surgeons. I acknowledge, he is not excellently humourous. But the surgeons certainly felt impressed with his behavior. And so did the whole country. Reagan’s supporting rate soared to 73%.

2. To how to choose the prism of life

In a course on improvement and production management that I had the opportunity to attend, the specialist divided a group into 3 sub-groups. Accordingly, in any organization, there are always 20% positive thinking, 20% negative and up to 60% lie between those two extremes.
 
Most of us belong to 60% in the middle, like Paul. Difficult to feel happy in unusual situations in life.
 
Meanwhile, the first 20% group are people like President Reagan, who can still remain optimistic when they forget to miss a bullet. Those are positive people.
   
People with positive thinking, like magnets, attract good things with the following expressions:

• When you see everything, they always see the beauty and the good inside;
• They can see good things in unfortunate events;
• They always act to make things better.

For example, there is a man who is quiet, but is very kind, and often helps people. Even though he is quiet, he’s careful and thoughtful with everything he does. Thanks to that, although he is good at verbal, he is trusted and loved by people.
 
We have just bought a new car, unfortunately we got bumped and the car was scratched bit. Pessimists will weep because of those scratches. Optimistic people will think “it’s lucky we are fine”. Safety itself is the best thing, other material things can be earned later.
 
Positive and negative - Optimistic or pessimistic? Each of us has both side, we switch from one extreme to the other. The important thing is which one is stronger. How we positive or negative is not our nature. We  form it along our life.
 
Where does the positive attitude start from? First, it is from thinking. We must believe that we will be better when looking at life with positive eyes. Seeing a wonderful personality in an oversized body, seeing the sweetness of love in the burn fish that our wife cooks. Whether it is scorching day or rainy season, whether it is the fierced look of the opponent, they keep a calm and optimistic manner.
 
No need to force yourself to practice 10,000 hours of theory to reach a great level. “A leopard can't change his spots", our nature cannot change in a day or two. We just need to take one step at a time. And then before we notice, we’ve changed.
 
But...
 
Positive or negative are just two attitudes. No one can force other people to live one way or the other, because that is the hobby and choice of each person.
 
If we keep complaing about the sun, the rain, there is no day that we can enjoy our life. Our perspective is just a matter of choice.
 

3. Does positive thinking mean looking life through rose-colored glasses?

There are suggestions that: Those who are positive and optimistic are good but often uneasy, carefree, innocent, have no critical thinking?
 
It’s true, but not enough.
Positive is a living attitude.
Critical thinking is a way of thinking about the problem.
We can criticize things with a positive attitude, or negative.
 
For example, when we assess the working environment in the company, we can use critical thinking to dissect outstanding problems in the company such as unreasonable working hours, inadequate welfare regimes according to regulations, technical machines are not enough to meet the requirements of production process.
 
Negative people look at it and see that the working environment is not professional, this is not the place for me. On the contrary, positive people think that those factors are signs for the company to have better improvements and changes. The optimist looks at other good things that the company is trying to do for its employees such as meal quality, bonuses according to the dedication, to find motivation to change and contribute to the team.
 
Thus, positive attitude and critical thinking are not contradictory but complementary.
Whoever has both of them is precious.
 
So, half a glass of water is still half a glass of water. Half full or half empty is just the way we choose to view it.
 

Life is like a glass of water.
The glass of water is always half and our life is not perfect.
Half full or half empty is just the way we look
Looking at the half empty glass of water, we focus on the things we don't have and find it hard to feel happy.
Looking at the half full glass of water, we cherish what we have and naturally, happiness will come to us.

 
The glass is half full or half empty?

Paper boxes design inspired by story of positive and negative attitude: