How to Build an Abundant Mindset
By Dr. Scott Lyons, DO, PhD, MS, MFA, CHT
We all want love, that abiding sense of being cared for, thought of, and desired. That sensation that you can lean back in the throes of life and feel safe in the arms of another. Even just writing that makes me swoon in the fantasy of it.
Love fills in the gap of loneliness and generates a euphoric sense of belonging, creating one of the strongest, naturally produced pain relievers. As humans, we are also hardwired to seek out and maintain these social bonds as a means of preservation. The irony for many of us is that just because we desire to be loved and have a biological drive for it does not mean that we can receive it—or for that matter—even tolerate the presence of it.
I recently flew to Los Angeles from Lahore, Pakistan. Something about these long flights turns up the volume on my emotions, especially the negative ones. Perhaps it's the altitude or the uncomfortable proximity to so many other humans with no interaction. It's as though all my thoughts and feelings, typically overridden by the busyness of the day, suddenly have space and time to circulate through my brain like the stale recycled air I am breathing in.
On this particular day, the turbulence of my thoughts ranged from what am I doing with my life? Am I really making any impact on the world? Why am I 40 and perpetually single? The mix of these repetitive thoughts, coupled with watching one-too-many Pixar movies, created the perfect dramatic storm. Upon landing, I couldn't shake this pervasive sense of lack, and as I gathered my luggage and stepped outside, it carried over into focusing on all the "happy couples" in line for a taxi and my scarcity of love.
The saga continued as my best friend arrived at the airport to pick me up. I was still stuck in this mindset of not having any love in my life, even as she gave me the warmest greeting and handed me a bag filled with my favorite food, saying, "I bet you could use some of this after a long travel." I want to say I snapped out of the delusion of being alone, right there and then, and realized I was surrounded by love and lived happily ever after, but that was not the case. It took well into my second or third cinnamon roll until I could slow my thoughts down enough to recognize I was spiraling and if I wanted to feel loved, it was right there waiting for me to receive it. The challenge at that moment was that I was so flooded with negative thoughts there wasn't really room for love.
Even though I’m a psychologist—who is clinically trained in understanding the inner workings of the mind—I am just like you. My emotions can get the best of me. Rather than let my inner critic rage warfare in my head, I choose to work it out. My deepest work is to understand universal feelings and then translate them to you. Here’s what I unveiled: The scarcity of love doesn't necessarily mean love is absent; it could also be the inability to allow yourself to feel it. When unpacking a mindset of lack, it's helpful to look at what I call the scarcity trifecta; a negative bias, body armoring, and reenactments.
Our brains are wired to attend to the negative, called a negative bias¹. Evolutionarily, it's imperative to be on the lookout for the things that hurt us, and when we have a history of heartbreak, loneliness, and pain, it's as though we have a built-in beacon scanning for it. The more we are on the lookout for pain, the more we find it; it floods our attention, not letting much else in. The result is that the lack always feels bigger than the abundance. A negative bias in relationships might look like:
Focusing your attention more on insults, problems, challenges more than compliments, successes, and positive interactions.
Attending more to people’s slip-ups/faults rather than their positive behaviors/qualities.
Assuming the worst about people, or assuming they are thinking the worst about you.
Constantly giving more weight to negative events than positive ones.
The scarcity of love doesn't necessarily mean love is absent; it could also be the inability to allow yourself to feel it.
When hurt, emotional bruising and boundary ruptures have been part of the repertoire of life experiences, often armoring results². As we heal, armoring is meant to be a temporary process, like a Band-Aid. However, sometimes, it becomes a more permanent fixture and might show up as bracing, muscle tension, or even a shallowness of breath. It results in less or no ability to take things in, including the love that's here. It's like saying you're thirsty, not drinking the water right in front of you, and then feeling devastated that you're still thirsty. When love has been coupled with pain or lack of safety, love can feel like a threat, making it intolerable and creating a chronic tension between wanting it and being triggered by it. The result is a nearly impermeable wall creating a distance between the love that’s here and the love you want; rarely letting you take it in and absorb it.
The final component of the scarcity mindset is called reenactments³. It is subconsciously returning to the patterns of our past and reenacting them in our present-day relationships. When we find ourselves in a repetitive loop of disappointing and painful experiences and relationships (i.e., unavailable, ghosting, cheating, etc.), we are often in a reenactment, meaning we unknowingly seek the people or create the conditions that will reinforce the wounds of our past in hopes for healing. The familiar is wired as comforting, even when it hurts. In other words, we repeat what we haven't healed; and our past becomes our painful present. The continual hurt gives us a sense that there is a lack of love in our lives, proving the scarcity of it. Our beliefs around love are constantly reaffirmed by the situations and people we encounter, distracting us from the hard truth that we are contributing to our own suffering and sense of lack.
So, how do we shift from scarcity to an abundance of love?
While there is no quick fix to a scarcity mindset, we do know that the change processes will most certainly involve energy, awareness, radical honesty, responsibility, commitment, healing, and acceptance.
Let's start with an intake of love. Scan through the various aspects of your life (family, friends, communities, work) and make a list of where there is love. When the list is complete, notice what your immediate response is. If you defaulted to focusing immediately on who is missing or lack of the size of the list, that's important information. Perhaps see if it's possible to connect with who is on your list. Being able to attend and take in love present in your life is a good assessment of your scarcity mindset.
Change of any sort takes energy. It takes more energy to change towards something healthier than to stay in our old patterns. So, part of committing to shifting towards a mindset of abundance is honoring the energy it takes to do so. While you're in the process of healing, simple things like the right amount of sleep, proper nutrition, and stepping back from substances can help build the reserves needed for this redesign.
Awareness is the art of being able to both sustain and shift your attention. Sustainability of awareness is like working a muscle; if you spend a little more time each day (even if it's just a second) focused on where there is love or the feeling of love, the capacity for it will grow exponentially. So, if you find your focus locked in scarcity, it's about shifting your focus to include abundance (i.e., going back to your list).
Radical honesty and responsibility are about redirecting the blame on other people (i.e., partners, parents, etc.) and our conditions and bringing a soft, compassionate focus back to yourself. It's not that other people didn't contribute to the sense of lack; it's just that focusing on them keeps you further from the place of change, which is you. Bringing the attention back to yourself means that you will then encounter the emotions and pain that have likely been unprocessed and are fueling the scarcity. Accepting what is present in you, not around you, is what deserves your focus, and staying with truth is the act of acceptance and permission for the stage of what happens next. Encountering your feeling and past wounds and giving them space and time to process is the stage of healing in which the aches of the past will come to the surface to be liberated. Resources, including social support, will be integral in helping you move through it. In this stage, you are disentangling the idea that pain and love are the same things or that they cancel each other out, but rather that they can coexist.
Once you've moved through these various stages, clearing weeds from the garden and building new skills, resetting your brain for love comes next. You've spent many years flooding your brain with the thoughts and beliefs that were a reflection of the underlying pain; now, we want to fill it with feelings that lead to a sense of abundance. One of the most powerful ways of doing this is absorbing and savoring the good⁴. When there is a presence of being cared for, thought of, and supported, it’s essential to receive it, also known as absorbing. It's the difference between having that glass of water and holding it versus sipping it in. Absorbing that sense of being loved and savoring the sensations of it helps build a bank of positive images and feelings, which will tip the imbalance with the negative bias in your favor. Take the time to receive it and marinate in it like you might a sunset; over time, this is bathing your brain in an abundance of love and rewiring it as your baseline.
1 Baumeister, R., Bratlavsky, E., Finkenauer, C. & Vohs, K. 2001. Bad is stronger than good. Review of General Psychology, 5:323-370. Rozin, P. & Royzman, E.B. 2001. Negativity bias, negativity dominance, and contagion. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 5:296-320.
2 Conger, John P. The body in recovery: Somatic psychotherapy and the self. Frog Books, 1994. Dublin, James E. "“Beyond" Gestalt: Toward integrating some systems of psychotherapy." Psychotherapy: Theory, research & practice 13, no. 3 (1976): 225.
3 Levy, Michael S. "A helpful way to conceptualize and understand reenactments." The Journal of psychotherapy practice and research 7, no. 3 (1998): 227.
4 Bryant, F. B., & Veroff, J. (2017). Savoring: A new model of positive experience. Psychology Press.
About Dr. Scott Lyons
Scott Lyons, PhD, is a licensed Clinical Psychologist, Doctor of Osteopathy, and Mind-Body Medicine practitioner who specializes in therapies for infants, youth and adults. Scott is the author of the upcoming book, Addicted to Drama: Healing Dependency on Crisis and Chaos in Yourself and Others.
Scott is the founder of The Embody Lab — a hub for embodied education, self-discovery and healing — and developer of Somatic Stress Release™, a process of restoring our biological adaptation system. Scott is also the founder of Omala, a wellness brand dedicated to creating sustainably sourced tools for transformation.
If you’re interested in understanding more about how somatic practices can help you, consider working with a Somatic Therapist or Practitioner. The Embody Lab’s Somatic Therapist and Practitioner Directory can help you find the right practitioner to support your journey towards more self-compassion, connection, and authenticity. Explore our directory and find the support you need.
