“Exhale the pessimism”

During a conversation with one of my friend after so long, I found several differences in her behaviour. She used to be an enthusiast, always filled with tons of positive energy, ready to do something adventurous each second, but now seemed to be gloomy, a doom-monger, despairing and despondent in her hopes.

It’s obvious that in life, we come across various phases. Some are full of joy and happiness, while some seem to be hopeless and incurable. However, our focus should not be centralized only on “what is the problem”, instead on – “how could it be solved.” One’s emotions and feelings are controlled by oneself only, regardless of external environment and internal stimulations. Although, both of these have an effect on us by rendering the feelings of fear, anger, anxiety, stress or depression, it is on us, however, that we can overcome these feelings of negativity even without medication or several years of psychotherapy too.

It is well said by anonymous that -“Our actions decides our directions.” What we allow to do with ourselves, leads our lives to the respective directions of positivity or negativity. So why let our choices to be the one which takes us towards despair? Let our choices be the ones who motivates us, who makes us breathe the optimism, which we inherently meant to.

Pessimism occurs when an individual fails to view oneself as competent, efficient and sustainable to accomplish life goals.

So whenever you find yourself on the pessimistic edge,

• Analyze ‘why ‘– Take a deep breath. Think what is going wrong in your actions or what is affecting you. Analyze the factors and reasons, which are responsible to make you feel in such a way. Most importantly, don’t think that the world is over for you. No, you’ve got to see beautiful things which you haven’t seen yet. 🙂

• Categorize the factors – Once you analyzed the factors responsible for the negativity in you, categorize them into reasonable and unreasonable factors. Some of the factors are reasonable enough to affect you mentally. By reasonable, I mean the factors which are actually affecting you. A simple coping strategy is to take an action and resolve it, which I would be describing further below. But as you already be knowing the popular idiom – “An idle mind is devil’s workshop“, our mind inculcate negativity when it’s empty, and that is when unreasonable factors arises. We tend to become anxious, frustrated, stressed and depressed without any notable, physical or mental cause. This can happen because of a mental state which builds up things in an exaggerated manner, i.e., over-thinking.

• Take an action– As you recognize the factors which are affecting yourself in a negative manner, act upon them to resolve them and to refrain yourself from undesirable feelings. Remember to not let the pessimism overrule your thinking power. Always strive to get rid of negativity by taking an action. Isolate yourself from the unwanted environment for a while, talk or discuss with the person related to the issue, to inhibit the misunderstandings and barriers to communication.

• Release the negative energy– If the observed factors seem to be unreasonable to you, like feeling sadness for no good reason, you need to lay off the negativity from your senses. It is the most important measure to cope with negativity when you find no cause for a given behaviour. Let it flow out from your senses with the help of different activities which are also referred as ‘art’. Engage your senses in some activities you are fond of. Learn to cook a new dish and serve it to your close ones, draw your favourite type of sketch (landscapes, portraits), learn a new song, practice your favourite dance moves or curate whatever hobby you like to develop. Making your senses busy in various activities would overpower the negativity and will inculcate optimism & encouragement in oneself.

• Mark your achievements– During this phase, it is most important for an individual to develop a sense of self-worth in oneself. Reminding yourself of your achievements and abilities will preserve self-confidence in you and you won’t acknowledge yourself as worthless as you used to do. Also, if you feel that you lack certain abilities which you need to have, don’t worry. Just pen down them on a paper, think what capabilities would it require to achieve the ability and write down the ones you need to curate. Now start working on them. Remember that smaller steps will help more than bigger ones. Accomplish smaller things daily, be continuous with practice, don’t give up when it doesn’t seem to happen, try again and again and there you are! A warrior with a shining sword! xD

• Be yourself– It’s quite common in today’s world that people get influenced by other people’s way of living . We often compare ourselves from other beings, in terms of looks, societal standards, wealth, living style and in other things, overlooking our own goodness we are born with. We neglect our own uniqueness as an individual, and get affected by the outer sham of the society. Always keep this in mind, that you are perfect on your own. A person is beautiful by his thoughts, his abilities & his good nature with other beings and without these qualities he is always incomplete as a human. Curate yourself with knowledge and ideas, strive each day for your betterment, keep learning new things in life and never forget to appreciate yourself.

The level of contentment, self-worth and self-satisfaction in an individual determines the level of happy living throughout his life span.

In the end, we all know TIME heals everything! For things which are out of your control, shall be delegated to the Universe. Time is the ultimate healer. We never know what we come across the another moment. So, Embrace the Mystery at the center of the universe. Make “don’t know” your mantra. Life becomes a great adventure full of wonder and joy when you haven’t got a clue what’s coming next. 😉