We can define positive thinking as actively directing one's attention towards some goal (e.g. striving for that which is beautiful). Positive thinking can be contrasted with reactionary thinking— simply responding to bad news rather than actively working towards something.

Language Learning

Allow me to provide an example from language learning, a topic of at least a few posts here. Now, the goal of most language learners of modern languages is to gain communicational competence and hopefully "sound native" in some target language.

The positive thinking learner focues on what being a speaker of that target language is. The most obvious way to do this is to observe the language being used. Real life face-to-face conversations are best for learning conversation, of course, but videos, podcasts, and other forms of media are pretty good too—and often more convenient when native speakers are readily available on a day-to-day basis.

Positive thinking involves getting an increasingly clear idea of what "using XYZ" language is. A person that does not speak Icelandic could not give you examples of what Icelandic language usage is like because they don't speak Icelandic.

What would negative thinking look like with respect to language learning? Being focused on finding one's errors and then coming up with rules and explanations for why such and such is wrong would be one way to see this.¹

Some rather fatalistic viewpoints have been advanced in linguistics. One such idea is the "critical period"—there is a certain time window (usu. ends around age 13 or so) before which a person must learn a language, or else they will never learn that language "natively". This is probably true in many respects, particularly if we involve discussion of trauma and abuse.

However, to tell a 16 year old high student that their Spanish will never be "native" is simply demoralizing and (I think) just plain false. Resigning to the fact that language learning will be a futile struggle and that achieving native-like command is impossible is a recipe to lose sight of a very reachable goal—visiting YouTube you can find all sorts of very successful second language learners for any major language.

Computer Stuff

Positive thinking is important to empower computer users as well. You may have met someone who had simply decided, "I'm not a computer person" or "I don't do technology". ² This is a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy.

While I don't expect everybody to be willing or able to troubleshoot any computer problem that comes their way (and hence why I don't do any "UNIX evangelism"), I do think certain workflows are accessible to anyone who is capable of doing things like writing a short essay or driving a car. It is not conceptually difficult to understand what it means to,

• Send and recieve emails or messages on some chat service
• Use some sort of calendar (e.g. Google calendar)
• Do basic word processing/writing (e.g. through MS word, or some boomer program like emacs)
• Organize files into folders

Having positive (projects) such as,

• Keeping a daily diary
• Maintaining regular corresponce with some people/groups
• Organizing a digital library

...will inform you on the skills you need to develop.

Solutions often don't need to be complicated. There are professional programers whose computers are total messes outside of their programing projects; clearly these people know how to deal with complexity in some one domain, but they don't readily apply tools they already know how to use to other more accessible domains. ³