The good word for the workplace today is: Learn to stay positive even in a negative environment.

You know, many times you can go to work feeling really positive and up, but you leave in a negative, complaining mood. What are the things in your working world that cause you to have a bad attitude?

It can be co-workers or management who irritate you, who cause you unnecessary problems, who don’t do their share of the work, or who are very negative people themselves. Most of us have some of those people in our life.

Or perhaps there are times when you have an impossible amount of work to accomplish, or difficult deadlines or pressures, or unrealistic expectations, and that certainly can bring you into negative territory. Perhaps it’s your environment: The temperature is not right, or it’s drab and dreary, or noisy and hectic. Whatever these things are which tend to make you negative rather than positive, you need to identify them.

Then, look at those things and ask yourselves three questions:

1. Can I confront this situation and try to change it? I find that most people gripe and complain without making the first effort to find a solution. They give up without trying. I don’t think you have grounds for complaint unless you’ve at least tried to find a solution.
2. Is there some way I can compensate for this situation? For example, if you have a dreary office, how can you perk it up? Maybe plants and posters will help.
3. Ask yourself what goes with your territory. Every job, every industry, every profession has certain aspects which simply go with the territory, and those you must learn to accept without allowing them to bring you down.

Think about the things that make you negative and ask God to give you the grace and wisdom to rise above them and be the positive person you need to be for his glory.