There were many times when my kids were young and small things went awry. We were on our long-awaited amusement park vacation and it was pouring rain. Our flights were delayed and we had to spend an unexpected night away. We are all very familiar with this kind of situation, when things don’t always turn out the way we planned.

I would always say to the kids, with as much merriment and as much sincerity as I could muster, “Think of it as an adventure!” Often that worked, both with them and with me. Maybe we became intrepid explorers in the rain forest. Perhaps we were setting off to discover places that were, heretofore, unknown. The most important thing was the attitude, that we could make things fun, that we could see the negative as a positive.

What I’ve come to realize is how often we need to do that in our lives, to reframe a situation and find a way to move it from the dark to the light. I freely admit that I am an “all in” worrier. I can visualize the absolute worst consequences in almost any circumstance and can instantly go from 0 to 1000 or beyond. In nearly every, if not every, case, the reality is far better than my imagining. Either things change or I find a way through it but the outcome is rarely (maybe never) as dire as I initially predict.

I call it my “the sky is falling” mindset and, while I usually keep my anxieties to myself, those closest to me sometimes are the recipients of the recitation of my “worst case” visions. I’m not sure if I am looking for them to buy into my viewpoint or if I am looking for them to say something akin to “dial it down” or “you know you’ve go this.”

Regardless, I have come to realize that there are alternatives to my “doom and gloom” certainty, I realize that I have to give myself the equivalent of “Think of it as an adventure” at a different level. I have to ask myself “What if it isn’t as bad as you think?” I have to challenge myself to focus on “What can I do to change this?” I have to make an effort to reframe my usual “end of the world” into something more akin to that next adventure.

Changing my internal dialogue to change the way I feel. Changing the way I feel to the way I communicate and function, Changing my focus from the negative to the positive, to remembering to always fill my full heart.