Good Grief, Mr. Grinch

Happy Festivus!  

Skipping the backstory to explain the origins and purpose of the fabricated holiday, and argue the merit with which it deservedly finds its place among celebrated holiday traditions, I want to let you know the grievance I'm hoping to denounce this coming year:  negative attitudes.  

We're all guilty of being a bad attitude bandit at some time or another.  Whatever the reason, we allow ourselves to condemn any situation we face or idea we're presented with.  If we allow ourselves to be subjected to such poor opinions, for no reason other than contempt, we fail ourselves and those around us.  Nobody benefits.  Who wants to have friends without benefits?  Zing!

The main reasons I've found for a negative attitude to saturate a person's logic are:
1.)  They don't care about being an asshole, thus having no inner drive for life improvement and are content with holding a general disdain for life.
2.)  They're surrounded by such an environment habitually and know nothing different.
3.)  We fail to recognize the manner in which we're acting, within ourselves.

Wow, Reed, that's some real groundbreaking shit!  Yeah, yeah... stick with me.

We can all agree that we enjoy being in one of two social scenarios.
1.) A positive environment of happiness, encouragement, thankfulness, respect, care for others, recognition of accomplishment, etc.
2.) A negative environment of gossiping about our contempt for others, an institution (work, school, religion, politics, etc.), or the inability to find enjoyment in something.

Guilty as charged!  It's so easy to get sucked into the negativity which has become commonplace in our society, and thus our everyday lives.  The fact that we've accepted the use of the term "haters" as slang for people trying to bring you down only reinforces how normal it's become to be a pessimistic jerk-face.  While it may be a good way to vent, trying to use the disparity of personality, style, achievement, social standing or appearance of others to pacify your inability to accept your own standing in life, is a pretty shitty tool in the proverbial toolbox of resources for self-fulfillment.  Wouldn't it be cool if everyone was cultivating a positive environment full of acceptance, understanding, helpfulness, appreciation, recognition and encouragement, so we could enjoy feeling like we have a stellar foundation of support for our lives, all the time?  

Yeah, dude.  That sounds wonderful.  How you gonna pull that off?

By recognizing that it starts with me, myself and I - the man in the mirror (thanks MJ!).  I have to decide to be positive.  If I can be what I want to be, with a steadfast determination that resists any attacks to the contrary, others will follow suit because attitudes are contagious.  Negative people don't stick around to kick it with the positive ones.  They either get a better attitude and enjoy themselves, or they piss off and go throw a pity party with Negative Nancy, Bitter Bob, Hatin' Hank, Sour Sally, Pauli Pessimist and Gloomy George waiting to get their self-righteous gifts from the fictive Grinch.  Unless I'm delusional or misinformed, I recall that even he couldn't overcome the power of positivity diffused by Cindy-Lou Who and the Whos of Whoville.  This is the year I decide to let my heart grow and be more positive, for goodness sake!