Many factors influence your day-to-day mood and feeling. They may be caused by your struggles at work or an issue in your personal lives, and these can diminish considerably your feelings of positivity and well-being.
While you could not totally escape the pressures of jobs, life’s conflicts, and occasional bouts of depression and anxiety, it is heartening to learn that much of your emotional well-being is not entirely dependent on external circumstance. This means you have control over them yourself. To find more happiness, here are some of life’s truths that could help you ward off negative mood swings:
• Life is great despite its imperfection. In fact, these freckles on life’s complexion make living more interesting. Had everything been flawless, life could be somewhat boring, don’t you agree? There would be no more challenges or motivations to improve. In reality, you should consider imperfections as blessings because they add spice to your life. They provide you the opportunity to savour the sweet taste of success in the pursuit of perfection (which you would never experience if everything was perfect).
• Minding your own business. This is despite the fact that sometimes you seem to be centre of others’ business. Paying attention to what others think of you is just a waste of time and emotions. Refuse to be manipulated by others as they dangle you like a puppet on strings of their opinions of you. What and how they feel about you is clearly their problems, unless you allow them to adversely affect you as well. Regardless of what you do, there will always be fault-finding critiques so why waste your time fighting pointless and unconquerable battles?
• To every life, some rain must fall. Setbacks and defeats are inevitable parts of life. Being aware and accepting this fact will make them more bearable. Better still, learn from them so instead of being nuisance, consider them very good mentors in life. The free on-the-job training they offer on life’s vicissitudes is actually a blessing for you. No other mentor could offer you better lessons.
• This, too, shall pass away. This may be a double-bladed statement that can either be taken with joy or regret. Nothing is permanent in this life and everything has to go eventually. For those presently suffering, this is a welcome news because it will mean deliverance from pain; for those presently enjoying life, however, this is a warning to expect rainy days soon. However, anticipation of rainy days ahead will also bring hope because the cycle of life guarantees so. Remember that life has to go on regardless of all eventualities. Taking them in stride is your best option to ward of negativity for your survival.
• You create of your own happiness; unfortunately, and so do your misery as well. Your life is a series of choices—yours. What you are now and how you feel today are outcomes of your earlier personal choices. Free choice is one factor that differentiates us from other creations, use it to the fullest for your own happiness.
• Work is a blessing. It makes you enjoy the sweetness its completion. Also, the harder and more difficult the work is, the greater is the anticipation of its accomplishment offers. Dreadful are those days you spend in idleness because they leave you nothing to expect and to look forward to. How could anyone stand such a boring and unexcited existence? In reality, work is a double treat because besides providing you with productive diversion to fill your days, it rewards you with a sense of accomplishment that boosts your self-worthy.
• Nothing is wrong with being wrong. Besides being stressed for constantly proving to everyone that you are right, you also miss the lessons what being wrong can teach. If you are ignorant of the adverse effects of committing mistakes, you become complacent and careless. Awareness of the unpleasant repercussions of errors helps you avoid or minimize their disastrous outcome. You can effectively free yourself from negative thoughts if you learn to accept the possibilities and importance of making mistakes in life.
• Challenges prove you are alive. Rather than being stressed by negative events that come your way, take them as proofs you are still struggling and very much alive—others are not so lucky. Life is a series of steps from one trial to the next. When these trials stop coming, then you are definitely out of life’s race, either virtually or physically.
• Be with the right crowd. One of the best ways to maintain a happy disposition during life’s ups and downs is to surround yourself with positive people who love you. Mingling with a happy and positive crowd is definitely an effective way to escape negativity in your life. Science has proven that a smile, even a forced one, triggers the release of the happy hormone “serotonin”. This is responsible for the regulation of several nervous system functions such as appetite, sleep, and a happy mood. Join in the fun!
• “Judge not for you would be judged” is not just a biblical admonition but it also a formula to avoid negativity in life. Besides waste of time, being judgemental brings unnecessary, and often negative, thoughts about others which you should not concern you at all. Unfortunately, “what you do to others is also done to you” so you become anxious that perhaps, others are judging you negatively, too.
• So you think, so you are. The human brain is such a formidable powerhouse that it can change lives —including yours. It can dictate how to run your life and control your future. Fortunately, you can control and harness its power for your benefit. You can train it to look at things positively and, therefore, prevent negativity from creeping into your life.
Perhaps, you could not prevent some rains to dampen and ruin to your lives. However, by keeping in mind these life’s truths is an effective way to maintain positivity, and your sanity, in your life.