★★★★★
First off, self forgiveness and acceptance. Years ago, I was about 12 years old at the time, I did/said something to my mom that was uncalled for and certainly not a way a person should ever treat their mother. As it's embarrassing I'll keep the details to myself. I had apologized and everything shortly after... But it wasnt enough for me... I spent a week or so allowing myself to be torn apart by it. I was depressed, I was beside myself crying when I was alone, praying for forgiveness, and not finding any peace at all. I ended up opening up to my mom about it. And I'll never forget what she said, "How can you expect forgiveness if you cant even forgive yourself?" It became clear to me, that the only reason I couldnt find peace and let it go, is because I hadnt forgiven myself. I was expecting the feeling of peace and forgiveness to come from some outside source. The issue was entirely with myself. I had to accept that I had made a mistake and I had to forgive myself for it. My mom had forgiven me the instant it happened as any good mother would. Regardless of the situation, you always have to be able to live with yourself. You always have to accept, forgive, respect, and love yourself. You cant expect peace or happiness if you're disgusted with yourself.
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Next... Dealing with external things... When I was a kid, there was a popular saying, "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words may never hurt me." As time goes on, western culture seems to stray further away from that simple philosophy. We have slowly placed more and more power in words, events, and circumstances. It used to be glorified and shown to us in media such as movies and TV shows, someone would make a rude comment and the hero would go and start a fist fight to defend their honor. A fight with a loved one would result in the protagonist turning to alcohol to cope. Or some horrible event would turn the protagonist to a life of depression and alcohol abuse. In our modern day, it is almost virtuous to be offended or to be a victim. It's a matter of duty to be outraged or to be hurt and to let it be known that you have been wronged.
What we have forgotten is that NO ONE HAS THE POWER TO DISTURB YOU BUT YOU. Absolutely NO ONE. Every word that is spoken to you, every event that you encounter, and every circumstance that you endure, you are faced with a choice of how to perceive it. You have the power to dwell on it and let it disturb you or you have the power to pay it no mind and go on. When someone says a bad thing to you, you have the choice to be offended or not. You have the choice to take that with you and dwell on it. You have the choice to let it define who you are or not.
Every time you allow yourself to be disturbed, hurt, offended, angered etc by words, circumstances, and events, you are giving those things power over you. You are allowing those things to control you and to define you. You are allowing those things to steal your peace and happiness.
Every moment of every day, you have the choice to seek out happiness. You have the choice to dwell on peaceful things. You have the choice to forgive and to forget. You dont forgive as a favor to those that wrong you, you forgive as a matter of health/wellbeing for yourself and as a way to maintain control over your emotions. It harms you mentally and physically to harbor negative feelings.
Awful things happens, far worse than words people say. Circumstances can be hellish. But you always have the choice to control how deep you allow these things to disturb you. Its not always easy. But how you respond to them, will certainly affect how quickly you recover and the damage you sustain from them.
Next time something negative happens big or small, and you're tempted to let it push you further into that pit of despair, stop yourself, and remind yourself that you have the power to change how that affects you.
On top of the mental diet, sunlight, try to stay around people you love and enjoy. Avoid isolation. Join in fun activities whenever possible. And allow yourself to enjoy them. When thoughts of "hiding" how you really feel creep up, shrug it off and remind yourself that you are enjoying yourself. THIS IS how you feel.
An anxious mind is one that dwells on the future, a depressed mind is one that dwells on the past, and a mind at peace is one that is present.
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Look for the good...
If I told you to look around you, where ever you're at and find everything thats blue. You'll likely find plenty of things that are blue. But then I tell you to close your eyes without looking anymore and told you to tell me everything that you saw that was brown while you were looking for the blue.... Did you even notice anything that was brown? Probably not near as much as you would have had you been looking for stuff that was brown.
Your mind will see what you are looking for. So if you go through life with this idea that only negative things happen to you, you're going to see every single little negative thing to reinforce that idea. You catch a cold, check... they screw up your order at a restaurant, check. You have a bad day at work, check. You stub your toe on the coffee table, check. Someone makes a rude comment, check. And you'll likely gladly accept the negative things that happen to others as part of it.. a friend gets sick, check. A coworker gets divorced, check. A friendly coworker quits, or gets fired, check.. The list goes on.
But in all of this negativity how much good might you have missed? You got a free drink through a mix up at the drive thru. The nice person at the cash register rounded your change up from .95c to $1 so they wouldnt have to count change. You had a good day at work. You havent been sick in months. Your family was happy and healthy today. Someone complimented you, ("Hey, I really like that shirt! "). A friend or family member had a new baby. etc...
Chances are there isn't near as much bad as you believe there is and chances are there is just as much good to balance it out or completely tip the scales the opposite direction, you just refuse to see it.
Your mind amplifies the negative while overlooking the good or brushing it off as if its a lie or a rare fluke. You can flip this on its head and train your mind to look for the good while overlooking the bad. You just have to start looking for the good. And when you see it, dont brush it off or make excuses for it. Let that be "just your luck". Let that be the normal occurrence that you look for.
