If you’re stuck in a rut today, there’s always tomorrow. However, that’s annoying to hear and hard to accept when you’re feeling lousy at present. Yet, a number of activities and shifts in perspective help those down in the dumps get as high as the sky.
We create our own realities – well, at least we have great control over how we perceive and accept reality. Here’s how to turn that frown upside down.
Keep Positive Friends and Family
You can’t choose your family, and some friends are ‘grandfathered’ in from childhood; we can’t lose them despite our own maturity. However, we can choose who we surround ourselves with and can keep an emotional and physical distance from those who are not positive or have a tendency to view the ‘glass as half empty.’ It’s not always easy to distance yourself from those toxic relationships but sometimes making those tough choices will greatly improve your quality of life.
Those providing insight in The Secret focus on keeping a positive mindset and believe we create our destinies along with the tones and auras of situations and people around us. It’s a good read for those of you that are not religious.
Discover Your Purpose
What is your purpose in the next six months, year, etc? Do you feel fulfilled when you go to sleep at night and look forward to a call to duty when you wake? Discover a purpose. For some, that means rediscovering a former hobby, career, path of education, etc. A sense of purpose coincides with inner happiness.
You make money, get awards, and do well in several areas of your job and life yet feel unfilled and wish for purpose. Take the time to ask yourself, “What is my purpose?” If you don’t have a clear understanding, along with an immediate and future path, you need to find the answers. Consider reading “The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here For?”
Rediscover Your Youth
For some, a return to happiness or a discovery of a higher sense of satisfaction comes from returning to youth, a simple time free of stress and worry. Feeling young is contingent on looking youthful too. Some maintain a steady regimen of exercise while others seek solutions at Botox Cosmetic to maintain a youthful glow.
Aside from physical fitness and beauty maintenance, a return to sports and hobbies of youth inspires the happiness reminiscent of days gone by. What sports, hobbies, places, and pastimes made you especially content and hopeful? Consider a return to those places and activities.
Get Spiritual and/or Religious
Many shy away from religions formerly ‘pushed’ on them as kids. For example, some Christians harbor harsh feelings regarding memories of strict priests and nuns, yet a return to culture and religion unites many people with a lost sense of fulfillment and newfound reason to rejoice with churchgoers and family members who are equally passionate about their faith.
Grab a rosary, open up a Bible, ask your Jewish friend to attend a Bat Mitzvah service or find a local Bible-based church service to satiate your curiosity about faith. Religion is a reason to rejoice and be happy. For most, it is a lifelong and rewarding practice and tradition as well as a means of salvation and the promise of eternal life.
Treat Yourself
Don’t forget to be kind to yourself. Treat yourself to a gift, spa service, or weekend getaway cruise. Feelings of depression and periods of melancholy plague those who are overworked or forget to take a break and feel special. For some, a forgetful or neglectful lover or spouse could be the root of feeling lousy.
Take the time to take a break from work, the kids, a needy friend, etc. You need time to replenish your sense of happiness and focus on a very special person – you!
Subtract is Adding
In some cases, you have to subtract to add quality to your life. As insinuated above, some feel lousy due to a spouse or abusive boyfriend or girlfriend. In addition to horrible lovers, some are surrounded by unsupportive friends or family members, those, who despite proximity of distance and emotion, do more harm than good. Survey the people, activities, and places in your life. If a person, place or thing does not deliver happiness or pose a threat to your sense of hope and happiness, make a point to do some subtracting. In some cases, less is more.
Do Things for Others
It sounds simple, and in most cases, it is. Allocate time to volunteer, give to charity, or rove your neighborhood for opportunities to help those in need.
It’s an incredibly rewarding feeling to give to others. It also reminds us there are others who are worse off and in greater need of help.
Get Some Sun!
Seasonal depression is real folks. If you live in an area where the sun is limited during the winter months and you find yourself cooped up indoors day after day, you may have a serious lack of vitamin D in your systems which can cause a whole array of problems including depression. Make sure you try to get outside in the sun for at least 15 minutes a day. That direct sunlight on your face can not only improve your mood, but it can improve your health as well. You can also take vitamin D supplements during those winter months to make sure your body is getting what it needs to keep you happy and healthy.
Those feelings of sadness are here today and gone tomorrow when we adhere to a number of positive mindsets and subsequent actions. Find a religion, free yourself of bad company, and begin a new hobby to get to feeling great again.
