Do you remember the first self-help book you ever read? I do. It was the classic Norman Vincent Peale’s book The Power of Positive Thinking, translated to Arabic. I read it one summer when I perhaps was 14-15 years old at my grandmother’s house where I used to spend summers with my sisters. My aunt Stella bought it or borrowed it from someone. I remember being mesmerized by the idea that we need to pay attention to the quality of our thoughts. I remember my excitement reading it and enjoying this shiny new type of non-fiction books I got my hands on.

I usually give credit to reading the more recent controversial book The Secret for turning on the lights for me how my thoughts were powerful and that I needed to watch them. This classic book I read as a young teenager, however, was actually the first to tell me there were two kinds of life outlooks. The positive and the negative.

I now wonder why I had to stumble into a book to learn this key life lesson. How can I teach this skill to my kids? I believe the way I behave and talk to them and to myself infront of them is crucial in teaching them this view. But is it enough?

Thinking about this book today I realize I need to be more vocal about how to view our life’s ups and downs and let my kids find out the good news from their mummy first.