Toxic energy is hard to overcome. If you are trying to create something of beauty, or reach a goal, it is almost impossible to reach it in a toxic environment. Just ask any recovering alcoholic in the AA program. They will share with you of their constant effort to keep their focus on their higher power. They will also tell you that they don’t hang around with the same old crowd of drinking buddies. They don’t want to have their energy pulled down.
Your abilities to achieve depend entirely on what you believe. Do not let a pessimist influence your beliefs with negative energy. Reflect on these words of Gandhi: “Men often become what they believe themselves to be. If I believe I cannot do something, it makes me incapable of doing it. But when I believe I can, then I acquire the ability to do it even if I didn’t have it in the beginning.”
We hold the keys to our success. Don’t leave them sitting around for someone to steal. As Emerson cautions: “A low, hopeless spirit puts out the eyes; skepticism is slow suicide. A philosophy which sees only the worst believes neither in virtue nor in genius; which says it is all of no use. Life is eating us up, its only question who shall be last devoured…”
If you must be in the company of negative people, keep silent about your goals. The energy you have generated for reaching your goals is precious. Don’t let it be drained away into the darkness. Let it build inside you until you have succeeded in your quest. Then you can let it shine for all to see.
An example that best illustrates this is the story of Arundhati Roy. She is the Indian author of the novel, The God of Small Things
‘The book keeps all the promises that it makes.’
-The Booker Prize Citation, 14 October 1997
‘A novel of real ambition must invent its own language, and this one does…’
-John Updike, The New Yorker
‘A masterpiece, utterly exceptional in every way.’
-Harpers and Queen
‘A banquet for all the senses we bring to reading.’
-Newsweek
‘A sad story, told very hilariously, very tenderly and very craftily.’
-The Pioneer
‘It is rare to find a book that so effectively cuts through the clothes of nationality, caste and religion to reveal the bare bones of humanity.’
-Daily Telegraph
I knew she grew up in Kerala, India, where the book is set (loosely based on her family). So when I worked with United Airlines, and I was assisting a man from Kerala, India, I asked him if he knew Arundhati Roy. He said she was his cousin. I asked him if he had read the book. He said everyone in the family read the book and everyone got really pissed off. He said no one was speaking to Arundhati.
Toxic energy never had a chance to speak until it was too late. I think that is an important lesson–seeing what would have happened if she talked about her goal to her family. The book might not ever have been finished. For four years she let that energy build until it was complete. She didn’t let any negativity get in its way. She had a vision and no one was allowed to diminish it. And she succeeded-big time!
Like Arundhati Roy, give yourself the breathing room to succeed. Protect yourself from negativity. If you find yourself around negative people, keep silent.
