Here’s a nice mental model that I came across recently.
What “mental subtraction” calls for, is to imagine that certain situations have not happened in our lives.
Many times we feel low and depressed. But how to get out of this rut? Mental subtraction of course!
So just think of the most important and the happiest events and situations that happened in your life.
Could be when you got married, or when you graduated, or got a promotion, or got your first child, or any of 100s of other such situations.
Now mental subtraction requires us to slowly remove each of these incidents from our lives. The positive triggers that pushed our trajectory forward? Yes, remove them.
How would we have felt? Where would we be? Surely not in a better position than we are in today?
And thus the need for gratitude and faith. Nothing is truly in our hands, but still, we are in good hands.