Caring healing Aggression against ourselves.

There is this trend in our society to declare, that we do not care about anything anymore. And to be honest, I have participated in this. And it does make sense. We assume the worst in everyone. We assume, we will get hurt. But if we do not care, we cannot be hurt, right? Obviously not. Because what happens is, that we feed into our hatred for ourselves. We naturally care. Because we are passionate. And because we do care, we end up hating ourselves, because we don’t even manage to not care. But this is not the worst part of it. there are so many things, capable to bring us joy, if we choose to not care about them, we will end up in a cold, joyless world, left with nothing but pain.

There is nothing wrong with caring for things. Caring about our health, our relationships, our hobbies and our work. Because after all we have the right to care about our lives. We don’t have to numb ourselves towards everything around us, just in order to not get hurt. Because our dependence on our hobbies and relationships may hurt us, but not caring about those things at all will hurt us more in the long run.

Why is that? Why do I claim that we inherently want to care? What do I know? Well, it is not just about caring. It is very much about a purpose. And about a direction. It is about individualism and self-identification. We all intuitively know, that what we do and how we think, defines who we are. And that is exactly how caring defines who we are. Which is, why we should never blindly care about something. Which is, why there needs to be research in order for us to be sure about something. But we all need to care. Because we all need a goal. Because we all need something that is worth fighting for.

Here is what may happen, if we do not care. We isolate ourselves from everyone around us, which will hurt us, because no one can live depending only on oneself. But we will ignore that hurt, because we decided to not care about those people that we pushed away. The pain will grow, but will will keep choosing not to care. But there is also nothing else, that we can focus on. We end up trying to focus on identifying ourselves as the person, who is cold and does not care.

Someone said, we should not drink a whole bottle of our favorite high volume percent alcohol? Oh well, we do not care. And with not caring we damage ourselves. But we don’t care about whether or not we damage ourselves or not. And we end up in addictions or self-harm. But we don’t really care, but now we have the perfect way to identify ourselves with not caring.

I know this is harsh. I know it is scary to care. It is scary to just be ourselves, because it is so much easier to desperately try to not care. But not caring and the constant need to prove how much we do not care is so damaging to us. Yes, we may get hurt, if we start fighting for our hobbies. Yes we may run into people who judge us for taking care of ourselves. But I think we should rather take care of ourselves, than end up hurting ourselves, just because we are afraid, what people think of us.

Why do we despise ourselves for caring? Why do we feel, if we start caring about things, we loose our independence? Because we don’t unless we let someone else choose what we are supposed to care for. Choosing what we care for means choosing who we are. And it is power. It is like a woman choosing to be cute and kind. She may have dreaded that her whole life, because she has always feared that being cute may be viewed as being immature. Or weak. When frankly that is a decision entirely up to her. And the world envies women who make the choice to be cute and beautiful, rather than badass. Because there is an undeniable appeal to someone embracing who they want to be, despite of their fears.

There is a distinct appeal to someone choosing to care. Because it is well known how much strength it takes to make that step. We don’t end up vulnerable when we care. I have wondered for too long why I was fascinated so much by all those protagonists in books and movies. I knew my life was perfect but I could not get rid of the feeling that it was not as good as those protagonists’ lives. But why? Because no matter the heart-ship and pain and confusion those characters were undergoing, they were always motivated. By hate, by pain or by love. Those are strong emotions. Emotions, that we are not able to use to our advantage unless we care. Yes, we can hate ourselves for caring, but that will only destroy us.

Caring for something can also help us, to stop feeling uncomfortable with it. I have experienced that myself. I used to hate my feet and find them very ugly. At some point I started caring for them. Nothing fancy. Just taking a little time every other week to put some polish onto my toenails. And guess what: I don’t hate my feet anymore.

So when we hate our bodies, we can start battling that hate, by caring for it. There are so many ways of caring for your body. My favorites are applying body lotions and peelings. But there is also water intake and nutrition and exercise. Understand that taking care of yourself is the polar opposite of engaging in self-harm (with exercise potentially being an exception to this). And that is, why it helps to get more in tune with ourselves. It helps to not hate our bodies so much. And for me the next step always is to take care of things mentally. Be it my blog, my studies or the stories, I want to be writing. This can also be the people around us. Our family. Our pets. Caring for and about them will decrease our level of aggression, will give us a purpose and will define who we are.

I like the thought of being able to define who I am. It is work. But it is so much better than being at the mercy of my own hatred.

Pain. An explanation.

Be it physical or mental pain, it is our body screaming that whatever it is that is hurting us, needs to stop.

When we put ourselves in pain, we want to tell ourselves to stop asking so much of us. We want to tell ourselves, that we need to protect ourselves better. Protect ourselves from other people, from pressure, from our own perfectionist thinking.

We are asking for permission to cuddle up and hide somewhere. We are asking for a break. Asking to be allowed to rest.

Who is it, we need permission from? Who are we asking, to give us a break? Mostly ourselves. It is mostly a way of telling ourselves, that whatever is going on is too much for us to handle. Telling ourselves, to allow us to breath. To stop having unrealistic huge demands for ourselves.

We are also asking the people who know for protection. From our own perfectionism. We are asking them to tell us that we don’t need to push further, without rest to be worthy of their care. We should be able to do that ourselves. But we are not. So we ask for it. In a way that is probably the most desperate in existence. We are in a position, where hurting ourselves and begging for help is way easier than loving ourselves and taking care of ourselves.

Mental pain is not taken seriously unless it is actively affecting our lives. And that is so very subjective. So we reach for the blade to make sure the existence of our pain cannot be denied. Because we ourselves, are the first person to deny that pain. Telling ourselves, that everything is just fine. Telling ourselves, that whatever it is, we can handle it. Telling ourselves, that everyone around us is handling it just fine, so why should we be any different? And that is how we spiral down into a dark place. Trying to be strong. Trying to survive.

Until we reach the point, where we are in incredible pain. Pain we cannot handle anymore. And we slide down into hating ourselves, for not taking care of ourselves. We start hating. And hatred makes blind. We are unable to rationally grasp what we need and we start screaming for help.

We need the pain to stop. But we do not have the strength to make it happen. There is no pain-killer-pill for mental pain. But if there was, it would be the people closest to us. Because they are the only way we can escape the parallelization, we are in before it would naturally stop. But once we have escaped the trap of pain, we will be the ones, to protect us against it in the future. People can help us get out. But only we can help ourselves to not fall in the first place.

Multi-Tasking and living in the NOW

When we become more like the person we want to be, we like what we do and we therefore can appreciate it more. We love what we are doing. We love who we are. We do not want to go back to a past version of us, nor do we care for a future version. We appreciate the life we have.

The only reality is the now. Now is the only time that counts. Now is the only time we can make a change. The past is gone. It lives on only in our memories. Let it be there. Don’t keep wishing for it to come back. Because it never will. And the future lies ahead. Only our plans can influence it. And those get messed up more often than not. Longing for the future to come will only hinder us from appreciating the present.

We should learn to live in the current moment. To fully appreciate it. But to fully appreciate we need the present to be aligned with our vision. With who we want to be and we need to be fully living that very moment. Our attention is this very precious thing. It is essentially the same as our time. We have to be mindful of what we spend it on. And when we are multi-tasking, we decide, that something is not important and not good enough to completely focus on it. And we end up not living those moments. We end up wasting them.

Not only does half-heartedness not lead to happiness. But it deprives us from feeling fulfilled. Because we never allow ourselves to get emotionally involved in anything. Because we are doing something else at the same time. Or because we are thinking about the past or the future. Maybe we just have too many commitments. If we cannot go to class without constantly being on our phones planning the next party, we most likely will neither listen to what we are actually wanting to learn nor are we planning the party well. We will have to re-plan the party and read through the materials of that lecture again. And in the end we will end up loosing time and hating ourselves for it.

I get a lot of weird looks because I decide to first and foremost be a student, because I love studying. And that is my commitment. I rather commit to one thing and do that right with good to amazing results than do three things at a time, messing at least two of them up and not enjoying it.

The other point is: If you are not committed to what you are doing. It will make you plain unhappy, because frankly you’d rather be somewhere else. This is why we have to be careful with what we commit to. Because we may slip into commitments that do not suit us. And of course this is a journey of trial and error, but we have to be aware of that.

And finally multi-tasking prevents brilliance (granted not always). If we cannot focus on the one thing we are doing we have a harder time understanding it and it is nearly impossible to do our best. Which means that our growth is hugely limited and therefore multi-tasking will prevent us from reaching our full potential. And that is just a waste of our resources and plain sad.

I believe there are things that work great together. Like riding a bike and listening to music. Or looking out the window of a driving train and listening to music. I even think that depending on the music it can even be listened to while studying. Though that last part is extremely debatable.

But I also have experienced how just being in the moment focusing on only one thing makes me feel at peace. Makes me happy. In fact I am texting, writing this post, listening to music and singing along from time to time right now. I could also imagine drinking a cup of tea as well. But it works for me. However I am slowing down to notice how good it feels. Slowing down to tap into how I feel deep down. Taping into my body a lot more often than I used to. And with the realization that it feels good comes the gratitude and the love for my life and inevitably happiness.

I am aware it will not always feel like this. But the more I practice it now. The more it becomes a habit. The more often I take a few heartbeats to take insanely deep breaths and just be there, the easier it will be to appreciate my life when it is getting harder again.

So all we need to do is know what we like doing. And do it well now. Appreciate it. And smile.

It’s never enough. Or is it?

I realized that I should be happy and am not. My pain is not one big thing that destroys me in a matter of a few hours or a day. It scattered little things. Restlessness. The yearning for more. The yearning for purpose. Loneliness. Emptiness. All wearing me down. Slowly. Crushing me.

I took a step back and then realized that right now I am living my dream. I am doing what I love every day. I am surrounded by people I love and care about. Why am I so restless? Why am I so afraid of doing the wrong thing? Why am I so afraid of failing? Why is my present not enough?

There really is nothing I can do but realize how much my life right now is what I want. Remember that every day. And trying to be grateful. And by remembering maybe I can trick my emotions into feeling that happiness, that is supposed to come from my dream life. And I think I can learn it. I can teach myself to be happy. Because every day that I realized how much I want exactly what I have, I become a little happier. And hopefully this way, some day I can wake up and say: “I want this and nothing else.” and feel the happiness floating my system.

So, yes, it is never enough, unless we believe it is. Unless we see that we do not need more. And we have to teach ourselves to feel that. Because inherently we always want more even if we have enough.

Emotional Violence

Where is the point where we actually are sick? When is our suffering “big enough”? When is it real? Is it enough if we break down and cry on a daily basis? Do we have to hurt ourselves? Be deprived of our sleep? When does “Pull yourself together!” turn into “Ah you poor thing!”. When is it time to stop trying to push through and admit that we hurt?

There is not a lot I can say. Because pain is subjective. If you feel like crying. You are not making it up. If you feel like screaming and tearing down the place in anger. This is a valid emotion. Sure there are places where such emotional outbursts are plain inappropriate. But for the majority of the time this is our reality. This is how we feel. And it is exactly as real as we feel it. There is one thing I can say and that is that there is no point in making it worse by putting the blade to our skin. Because the people around us either support us for what we tell them we feel or they will not get what the cuts mean either. Someone who really loves us will never need bloody proof of the pain we are going through.

And we shouldn’t either. We should not be questioning our own emotions to the point where we just want to put a label to it. To the point where we cut ourselves, just to justify that we are not feeling alright. Just to prove how awful we feel. Just to prove how worthless we feel. How misunderstood we feel.

We are not sick the moment we cut to know and prove we are not alright. We are sick the moment we consider doing it. It is not about whether or not we have the strength to withstand that thought. We always feel that we have to be strong and that we need to fight it. And I agree, we do need to try to get better. But that does not mean, that if we feel down we are worthless. Because our emotions are absolutely valid and anyone how does not see that does not belong into our close circles because they are bound to hurt us.

I know I am a person who always tries to explain and justify anything I feel. And sometimes I get mad at myself for getting frustrated by something as little as a messed up nail-polish. But isn’t this kind of mindset just an emotional act of violence against us? And can this not even lead to us cutting? Because we want a label. Because we want to stop justifying why we hate ourselves. And we cut to make it obvious. By this logic cutting can start with emotional violence against ourselves.

If someone tells you “You are to harsh on yourself.” They may have seen exactly this. And most likely have a valid point. The thing is: we cannot expect that we just flip a switch and are in total love with ourselves. And again: we are not expected to. But I think that the first step to healing. Really healing. Not just stopping to cut, but healing on the inside, is to start acknowledging our emotions and allowing ourselves to have them. To be kind to ourselves.

Minimalism: The art of appreciating one’s possessions

The term minimalism has been thrown around the internet a lot. But why? Why does everyone suddenly want to de-clutter and have tidy spaces. Why are Instagram and Pinterest filled with the most beautiful pictures of homes? And why do people look at these picture envying the people living in the spaces depicted?

The movement seems to come from the notion that people who have less can be perfectly happy and that therefore it is not stuff, that makes happy. I think in fact it is our relationship and our approach to things that can contribute to our happiness. And this is exactly the point that makes minimalism a top for this blog, where I constantly stress the importance of a positive mindset. A positive approach to life, to the universe and… to everything, really. So let’s explore how minimalism can help finding the right approach to our possessions.

Everyone who has jumped into minimalism will have come across Marie Kondo’s “The Life changing Magic of tidying up”. It is basically a book on how to de-clutter and finding everything you keep a new home. And this thought I found so very inspiring. She talks about possessions almost as if they were conscious beings. If she discards something she thanks the item for its services. And I find that this gratitude is very helpful. Not only in discarding things but also in our everyday approach to items. But in order to be able to be grateful for something we need to not value our possessions in the first place and this is where minimalism strikes.

What items do we need? Marie Kondo’s hero-question is: “Does this spark joy?” And sure, there are things that do not in particular spark joy, but thinking about it, those items do make our lives a lot easier. For me the first thing that would come to mind are tissues. But usually “Does it spark joy?” Will help to discard many things, that we keep because we feel obliged to and yet, we never use them and we feel guilty about that and as time goes by we feel more and more guilt and we start trying to avoid those things.

But it is not only the things that make us feel bad about ourselves, that we need to let go. The things that we do not care about as well. If we have a shirt that we love and one that we feel “Meh” about, we will always reach for the one we love. So letting go is the right choice. Why though? Why let things go that we don’t care whether or not we have them? Because the more things we love we have around us, the more we can appreciate what we own. And the more things that are Meh and surround us, the more we feel Meh.

We do not need things that make us feel Meh. Because Meh is just another word for “kinda empty” and the latter is definitely an issue when it comes to dealing with tension and self-harm. That we do not need things that make us feel bad is obvious.

But what if I do not need 9 white T-Shirts, but I love every one of the ones I own? Do I have to toss them if I want to be a minimalist? Certainly not. It is not about having only a few things. It is about having only the things we really want to have. And this will contribute to our happiness. Minimalism should never be a source of guilt. Never. If we like pens and like to have hundreds of them in pretty containers and display them somewhere. Sure. We should do that. But we should always have a designated home for anything we own. Because that is the first step to expressing gratitude and if we cannot find a home for the item, how much do we really love it? We shall never just stuff things away, because chances are that we don’t need those things.

This way we will be happier with less possessions. Not because we value having only a few things. But because we value the things that we own. Because eliminating the things we do not like will give us the mental space to appreciate what we own. We can have a completely positive mindset towards our possessions, because we love everything we own. Everything brings us joy. And thinking about it… even if we discard half of what we own we still will be surrounded by so many things. So many things we love. And this means, we can go through life more positive. Which is exactly what we want.

The concept of having less and valuing it more can be applied to anything. It can be applied to every action. It is about being mindful. Doing one thing and giving it purpose rather than doing a hundred things but not caring for one of them. And not only will we be happier as an individual but also as a social being. Because if we meet a friend that’s all we do. Meet a friend. If we work we are more productive, because we are not doing five things at the same time. It will take pace and stress and pressure out of our daily lives and therefore leave us happier.

And again with caring for the few things we do more than for the hundreds of things we can be more grateful. With the few things we own we can be grateful for every single one of them. And eventually this fills us with peace. Having a few meaningful things in our lives, rather than just having stuff around us, that we don’t know what to think about.

Happiness: An elaboration

Here’s the thing: We all strive for happiness. But I think the term “happiness” is overused and therefore without meaning. So let’s have a closer look. I have found there are three kinds of happiness:

Momentary emotional happiness: excitement
Long term emotional happiness: base level happiness
Rational happiness

Excitement is the kind of happiness where someone is jumping up and down in joy, because the happiness cannot be contained. This kind we experience, when we for example see something pretty, or when we get a phone, or dress. It is the kind of happiness, that lasts for minutes, hours and in rare cases for a day or two. And it needs a trigger.

Base level happiness is way less outgoing. It is a state where a human being is content and no matter what happens in one’s daily life, we trust, that it will be alright. And while of course, we get mad or sad from time to time, we still have that underlying happiness and peace to keep us from letting the negative emotions get to us. It is however an emotion, because we feel happy at the core, even if we are going through a though patch.

Rational happiness is tricky: This is when we do not feel happy. We may even feel sad, but we know that we have no reason to feel that way because our life is more or less very good. It is when we keep telling ourselves, that we are fine. When we try to feel better, because we cannot see the reason for not being happy.

How do these affect our mental health and how can they be utilized?

Excitement is, what we get, if we are depending on someone or something for our happiness, this is why depending is an issue. Excitement can keep us from becoming base level happy. While it really only makes us momentarily happy. And that’s how we develop addictions. We feel happy for a bit, then it goes away and whatever it is that made us happy: we need it again. That can be drugs, alcohol, shopping, sex and watching TV or even things that we would not typically be viewed as potentially addictive like studying or reading or playing with a pet.

The problem with excitement really is the dependence, which again only occurs, if we are not happy on a base level. Let me explain: There is nothing wrong with having a glass of wine to loosen up once in a while. But we have a problem if we do not feel comfortable when we are sober anymore. This also ties in with my latest post about relationships: of course we get excited about our relationships. And of course we experience happiness beyond description. It is natural and great as long as we do not depend on that to make us happy. Because excitement is not base level happiness, which is really what makes us happy in the long run.

Rational happiness is what many of us have. We nourish it by practicing gratitude and by focusing our mind on the good things in life. It is what we can experience even when we are at our lowest emotional state. This can lead to frustration. Because we feel bad, but we know we should be fine. And we start faking. We start hating ourselves, for feeling down for no reason. It can also lead to us questioning if we are actually bad or if we make ourselves miserable.

On the bright side however rational happiness can help us tab into base level happiness. Because we can actively tell ourselves that our lives are good. And if we tell ourselves often enough at some point we will believe it. Of course we need experience to back this up, but in essence that is how it works.

And finally there is base level happiness. And I have hinted at it a lot: it is what we want to achieve. Because the others are either not emotional or they are to momentary. Both of them can help to achieve it. Because with excitement we can experience why we are happy. And rational happiness helps us to preserve that excitement. Helps us see, why we are actually happy. So in essence base level happiness is what we get when we combine excitement (pure emotion) with rational happiness (pure rationality). But there is another aspect to it: and this is the longevity of base level happiness. And this is what ties happiness to positivity and awareness: We experience the calm of this happiness, because we stopped searching for happiness outside our lives. We stopped thinking: “Once I do this or that life will be better.” or “Once I get this or that, everything will be easier.” and instead started loving what we are doing on a daily basis.

To start doing that rational happiness can help. It helps to identify the nice things. And then we can start feeling that happiness. When we go to bed, we can look forward to getting up because we can go do our jobs. Whatever that may be. At this point there is one important realization: We are not getting up, for our alarm clocks. We are getting up, because we chose to. Because there is a day awaiting us. And it will be an awesome day. And sure, there will be moments, when we wish we could just walk away, but isn’t there a reason, we are not walking away? Are we not sitting through that meeting to get ideas on how to improve? Are we not trying to understand that mathematical formula to be able to solve problems later on? And are those goals not what we genuinely want?

This is the beauty of base level happiness. It allows us to be happy with our life for the sake of our lives. It makes us independent and self-confident. And it gets us through the rough patches, because it is not only the exciting things in our lives, that we love, but also the constants: the things we do on a daily basis. And even if these things fork (Good Place equivalent for f*ck) us up hard, we trust that it will be alright. Because when it comes down to it, we chose them for a good reason. In my experience this makes life so calm. We stop thinking about what others think of us, because we are content. The fear just goes away. And deep down we know that when it comes down to it everything is just fine. We stop hating ourselves, because we are living the life we want to live.

How the heck do we achieve base-level happiness?

Create a vision of yourself. A vision of our lives. I elaborated on this in a previous post. When we start doing what we want to do, which is exactly what happens when we start working towards our vision, we can love what we are doing, even when it’s hard from time to time. And the other point is to enhance the other two kinds of happiness. For example: get a hobby that we love doing and gets us feeling good. And of course, enhancing rational happiness by trying to make our mindsets more positive.

Noticing how independent we actually are, because at any point in our lives we have the possibility to just walk away. This means, we do have the power. Even if we are fighting some sort of mental illness, we can still walk away. We can still choose what our life looks like, which is really all we could ask for isn’t it?

Love and Our Self-Image

Love is complicated. No kidding. Therefore all I am trying to do is answer the following: Can a mental illness make us fall in love for the wrong reasons?

This answer seems to be a simple “yes”. Because with a mental issue like self-harm oftentimes comes self-hate and we end up relying on someone else to give us the approval and validation we cannot provide for ourselves. Here is the problem: while self-harm enhances that issue it is not the reason. In fact it is the other way around: self-harm and seeking validation from others both are a manifestation of our low self image.

Does this mean that we are not allowed to fall in love? Does it mean we have to get healthy and confident before we allow ourselves to fall in love? What would the natural consequence of that be? Say we never really recover, does that imply we never may give in to love because we could be doing it for the wrong reasons? If we have experienced falling in love and completely depending on that person, it may be understandable that the fear of falling for the wrong reasons might keep us from falling at all. But just because we made one mistake in the past does not mean we have to make another one in the present.

Depending on one’s loved one is natural to some degree. But I find it important to remember that we still are individuals. And as such it is crucial that we keep improving. That we keep working on our self-confidence. I think it is also vital that we talk to our significant other about these issues. A relationship is supposed to make us better as individuals. But the moment we stop improving we are getting worse. So if our relationship makes us dependent on the other person. If the relationship is the only reason we can love ourselves, it is not making us better. On the contrary. And that’s the point where it has to end.

How do we know if our relationship has turned into this? Because it may very well be that it started out as a healthy relationship. I think the best indicator is how much we are depending. And this however is individual. There is nothing wrong with not wanting to make a decision once and just go with whatever the loved one decides. But if the other one makes every single decision that is a clear indicator for dependence. Another one is when one is miserable without the other. And I am not talking about the normal missing someone. I am talking about that moment where you are constantly waiting for the other. The moment where your world is limited to the relationship we need to work on our independence. And this does not mean we need to break up. By no means. But it means that we should take action in some form. Most likely it is also a good idea to talk about it with out loved one. Because looking at it from the other angle putting this pressure onto someone is not fair just as much as it is unhealthy. No one is even remotely capable of being someone’s only reason to be happy. I am not saying that our relationships don’t make us very happy. But the point is that they add to our lives and are not the sole purpose of them.

One more sign would be that the relationship has become purely physical. And then we might just be holding on to it for the physical comfort. Which means we are not dependent on a person but on hugs or sex. Again: as long as we have a life outside our sex-life (my apologies for the explicity) that’s fine. And we have to decide whether or not that is a relationship worth having. Now, I am saying this because I never wanted a purely physical relationship, but I did not notice that I was in one until I got out of it. If we are in such a relationship we often do not see what is going on. And we cannot see because we are depending on it.

There is the possibility of being in a relationship for the wrong reasons. Or having a relationship conflict with us building self-confidence as an individual. But usually that is no reason to end our relationships or forbid ourselves to engage in one. As long as we don’t feel like our relationship is the only good thing in our lives. As long as we have other hobbies and passions, we are fine. In a good relationship we will always be safe and supported when we need it but at the same time we will be encouraged to have our own lives and we will be better as individuals just as much as we are better as a couple.

What determines what we are worth?

I am not going to deny that I am a huge fan of the TV show The Good Place. This show makes me laugh out loudly and at the same time makes me think about right and wrong. It allows me to remember my own moral compass, which I find outspokenly reassuring.

My quickly written list on things that allow me to to know I have unspeakable worth even if I do not feel like it.

One of the actresses of the show Jameela Jamil has started a motion where women think about what it is that makes so amazing. So today on the bus I figured I might write my own little list. I ended up writing down two main points and a couple of points that specify those.

I am aware that this is not something we are always capable of doing. But I think writing it down (again preferably on paper, just like the gratitude log) helps to radiate positivity. To remember why we want to keep fighting. To remember that we are too precious to hurt ourselves. Remember that we are worth being protected.

This again is just one tiny step towards positivity, towards a positive mindset. It helps us to get motivated to recover. Helps us, to become better versions of ourselves, because it helps us to focus on the things that are great about us and it helps us making those things even better.

Again: and I feel like I cannot repeat this often enough: We cannot always force ourselves to be positive. And that is alright. There are so many instances were people around me try to lift me up and I just wish for them to stop and let me cry and be my miserable self. But I also think that it is important, to be positive, if we can. And to remember, that positivity is a thing. And it is an important thing. Not to be forced, but to be celebrated, when we get the chance.

Happy by Choice

I have spoken about positivity before. And in my last post I talked about how a vision can help fighting negativity. So I thought I might elaborate on being happy a little more. Because I find, that I choose to be sad and hurt and angry most of the time. I let all those negative emotions get to me. And feeling them is not evil per se. But there is a limit to it. And we overstep that limit, if we find ourselves, being more sad than we are happy.

Please do not get me wrong. I am not saying that someone who for example suffers from depression is choosing to be sad. I think we all have phases in our life, where choosing to be happy is pretty much impossible. We all have to decide for ourselves, whether or not we are able to work on choosing happiness… because we really are not always in a position to do so. But sometimes we are. And I think, if we can, we should be happy.

But how? I think it is a mindset. It means that we focus our mind on the positive. Like our vision of ourselves. Or the beautiful sunset. Being positive by choice means choosing to not complain. I often do that. Just complain about everything. Finding a reason to pick on everyone around me. And yes: I know this is toxic behavior. This is why I am trying to work on it. Because at some point I realized, that complaining is for immature people. Because either we do something about whatever is annoying us, or we shut up. Why talk about something that makes us unhappy and thereby remind us why we could be unhappy? There is literally no benefit to it. There are so many awesome things in this world we can go on and on about for hours. That will wake the fascination and love in us and make us feel happy. Why talk about something that does the exact opposite? Sure sometimes we need to face a problem. I am not talking about productive criticism. I am talking about pointless complaining.

I used to carry this stone to University with me every day. I used to have it right next to me while I studied. Just to remember that I was not being forced to do that. But that I had chosen this myself.

The next step of being happy by choice is believing that we can do, whatever we want to. It is working on us becoming the person we want to be. Becoming our vision of ourselves. Sure thinking we are absolutely invincible is not helpful either. Some occasional “If I do not work hard enough I will fail.” is perfectly normal. But can you see what this sentence implies? It actually comes from the mindset of “I can do this.” because it gives the condition under which we fail. Not the condition under which we succeed. And it also implicitly explains how to not fail: Work hard enough. So, if we doubt ourselves, which is normal. Let’s try to figure out in what cases we fail and formulate it such that the very same sentence that presents the problem holds the solution.

Now why would we go through all that trouble with all those details? Why does it even make a difference how exactly we put our doubts into words? Because what we say has a direct impact on our mind. And positivity is a mindset. So formulating the problem alongside with our solution will make ourselves understand that there is a solution to whatever problem we are facing.

So choosing to be happy in the end comes down to acting and talking like a happy person. Because after doing that for a week or two. Our minds believe us that we are happy. Doing this alongside with having a good vision of who we want to be, sets us up to actually becoming happy. And it boosts confidence incredibly. This I say from experience. I am not just rambling here… I once was very happy. I once had pretty much reached my vision. I stopped being positive. And I stopped being happy. Ever since I have been trying to get back into that positive mindset.

All I am saying is: it is possible to be happy. Despite everything that is hard. Despite all the pain that comes our way. Because happiness can be worked for. Yes, there are times, when all we do is try to get through the next day. Through the next night. Through the next our. Next minute. Without hurting ourselves. Without hating ourselves. But when we finally wake up from our pain. We need to remember that positivity is a choice. A mindset. One that we need. Because it will make us happy.