When It Feels Like It All Sucks, Can You Find Positivity Anywhere?
Yes, but it probably won’t feel all that positive.
If you’re reading this, chances are that today feels like a really awful day. Let’s be honest. A terrible, unkind, hateful, spiteful bigot is swearing an oath we all know he can’t and won’t uphold today. The future of the United States, and the world, feels incredibly, frighteningly uncertain.
Even his supporters are feeling the misery, negativity, and depression. He carries it like a badge of honor and doesn’t give a shit about anyone but himself. This is massively upsetting, depressing, and scary, all at the same time.
It feels very much like it all sucks right now. How did we get here? Did the CERN supercollider somehow suck us into an utterly backasswards alternative universe when they turned it on? Are reason, common sense, and logic out to lunch for good?
These are, of course, rhetorical questions. Yet we all still ask them in one sense or another. Particularly when it feels like it all sucks and there is next to nothing that we can do about it.
What can you do? Only this: Take hold of your life and keep living.
Maybe not just another day, but…
Unless you live under a rock, have hermitted away somewhere for the last year, or otherwise are disconnected from the human race (and if you’re reading this then I know you’re not) you are feeling it today. The tension. The concern. What happens next? What will he do? Will all his billionaire buddies fuck us all over that much harder?
These are all scary questions with no answers. Because until whatever happens, happens, it’s going to be an unknown.
But worse than that, there’s not a damned thing you or I can do about it. Nada. Zilch. Zero. Hopefully, you voted. Maybe you are giving or will give money to organizations creating roadblocks to some of the more awful goals presented thus far. You might attend rallies and protests.
And that’s all that you can do. Frustrating, right?
So, what can you do? What positivity can there possibly be in the face of all this?
You. Your life. You are here. Right now, in this moment, you live. Only you are in your head, heart, and soul. Right here and now, you can do something positive and good for you and your life.
What would that be? Maybe read a book. Watch something that makes you laugh. Eat something that makes you feel good. Take a bubble bath. Go for a walk in nature. Do something, anything, for you, that makes you feel good.
Selfish? Not in any way, shape, or form. Here and now, living this one life you have, the only genuine control you have is for yourself and your life experiences.
Even when it feels like it all sucks
No matter what happens, today is, in and of itself, just another day. What’s going to happen? We won’t know until we know. Tomorrow? Same thing. You don’t know until it happens.
You and I have no control over the world. From the people we care about to the politicians in DC to the weather to climate change, you and I control NONE OF IT. Sorry, we’re at the mercy of the unknown.
With one key exception. You. What you can control is you. When all is said and done you control who, what, where, how, and why you are. Ultimately, you make choices and decisions to be the person you are.
If you’re not content with this, you can change it. Maybe not easily, maybe not without some drastic measures. But you can. It starts by becoming more consciously aware, right now, of yourself.
This is mindfulness in action. It begins with looking within and seeing what you’re thinking, what and how you’re feeling, what intentions you have, if your approach to any given thing is positive or negative, and actions that you do or don’t take.
The thing to remember is this – so long as you do no harm, and aren’t intentionally taking more than your fair share – while leaving little to nothing behind – this approach isn’t selfish. In truth, by being better connected to your inner being, you can better connect to the world around you.
This is not easy, and it feels disingenuous. But it’s that, or make yourself sick, depressed, scared, unhappy, lost, uncertain, and generally negative questioning all the “What if?” horrors and possibilities ad nauseam.
It may not feel all that positive, but it’s better than the alternative. And if consciousness creates reality, what would you rather see come to pass?
Recognizing you can find positivity when it feels like it all sucks isn’t hard
It’s all about practicing mindfulness of your thoughts, feelings, intentions, and approach to direct your actions.
When you recognize and acknowledge that all you can control is you and your life via your choices and decisions, even when it feels as if it all sucks, you can find and/or create positivity in the moment. Knowing that now is the only time that is genuinely, truly real, and you can only control your mindset/headspace/psyche self, making choices and decisions – here and now – for yourself is all you can do to combat the feeling that this all sucks.
This empowers you, and your empowerment can empower others around you.
Consciously choosing your approach to life towards positivity or negativity – from the vast cylinder that exists between them – shifts life in a way that opens greater dialogue. From that broader dialogue, you can recognize, explore, and share where you are between the extremes and how that impacts you here and now.
Choosing thoughts, feelings, actions, and intentions for yourself employs an approach and attitude of positivity for realizing amazing potential and possibilities for your life.
The better aware you are of yourself here and now, the better you can choose and decide what, how, and why your life experiences will be. When you empower yourself, it can spread to those around you for their empowerment.
Thank you for coming along on this journey.
This is the five-hundred-and-seventy-first (571) entry of my Positivity series. I hope that these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone. Feel free to share, re-blog, and spread the positivity.
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