Tag: Downs

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“I think everybody has ups and downs in their lives. We learn from the biggest disappointments, right? You learn how to be humble to yourself and to be humble to others.” ~ Carolina Kostner

You know, lately I have been feeling very strange. Strange in the sense that one moment I’m up, flying high as a kite, feeling ecstatic, grateful and full of love. While the next moment I am down, feeling all fearful and anxious, as if something horrible had happened, or is about to happen.

And I have to confess that I’ve learned a lot from these ups and downs and that’s why I decided to write this blog post. What follows are 10 clever ways to deal with the ups and down of life.

Enjoy!

1. Stop looking for the source of your unhappiness.

Life has it’s ups and downs. It’s perfectly normal. Trying to find the source of your unhappiness will only bring you even more unhappiness. So stop it! Stop asking yourself: “Why do I feel so bad? What is causing me to experience al these ups and downs? Why am I so unhappy. And instead, ask yourself: “What makes me happy? What are the things that cause me to experience joy and gratitude?” And let your mind look for those things, the things that make you feel good, and no longer the things that cause you to feel burned out, anxious, fearful and unhappy.

“No one should ever ask themselves that: why am I unhappy? The question carries within it the virus that will destroy everything. If we ask that question, it means we want to find out what makes us happy. If what makes us happy is different from what we have now, then we must either change once and for all or stay as we are, feeling even more unhappy.” ~ Paulo Coelho, The Zahir

2. Cut yourself some slack.

There’s nothing wrong with feeling down from time to time. There’s nothing wrong with feeling cranky, angry and irritated. You can’t always be happy. I used to think you can but I no longer think so. So just cut yourself some slack. Allow yourself to feel whatever you are feeling without judging and condemning yourself for not being ‘perfect’. For not being the ‘positive’ person you thought yourself to be. Understand that positive people get angry too. Positive people have bad days as well. So just be gentle with yourself. Don’t burden yourself in vain. Allow whatever you are feeling to just be, without labeling it as good or bad.

“As a human being, anger is a part of our mind. Irritation also part of our mind. But you can do – anger come, go. Never keep in your sort of – your inner world, then create a lot of suspicion, a lot of distrust, a lot of negative things, more worry.” ~ Dalai Lama

3. Don’t believe everything you think.

I am a person of extremes. When I’m feeling high, I can’t imagine my life being any different. When I’m feeling down, I can’t imagine my life being any different. And this kind of thinking is beneficial when I’m feeling high, but when I’m low, it’s not really helping me. And I’m learning more and more about faith and about trusting the wisdom of life. I’m learning more and more about recognizing that fearful thoughts are damaging thoughts, illusionary thoughts. And that only those thoughts that come from love are real.

“The primary cause of unhappiness is never the situation but thought about it. Be aware of the thoughts you are thinking. Separate them from the situation, which is always neutral. It is as it is.” ~ Eckhart Tolle

Don’t believe everything you think. Especially if your thoughts come from a fearful place. Instead, look for reasons to smile, to be grateful and to appreciate all that life has offered you. Look for things that will help you think kind and loving thoughts. For that will help strengthen your trust and faith.Trust that things will eventually change and that the Sun will shine on your street again. Be led by your hopes, dreams and aspiration. Not pushed around by your fears, problems and difficulties.

“Faith includes noticing the mess, the emptiness and discomfort, and letting it be there until some light returns.” ~ Anne Lamott, Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith

4. Blame it on no one.

Blaming external forces for what you feel is not a good idea, for that only puts you in a weak spot. Making you feel powerless, a victim of your circumstances. Blame it on no one. Stop giving your powers away and start taking responsibility for whatever it is that you are experiencing.

“Because of your belief in external things you think power into them by transferring the power that you are to the external thing. Realize you yourself are the power you have mistakenly given to outer conditions.” ~ Neville Goddard, Your Faith is Your Fortune

5. You are never upset for the reason you think.

Life has an interesting way of being. Of showing us the things that are hidden deep within ourselves. An interesting way of ‘presenting’ us the things that require our attention, healing and forgiveness. There’s a great line in A Course in Miracles that goes like this: “I am never upset for the reason I think.” And it’s true. There’s always more to that which bothers us. We are never angry, upset, because of the reason we think.

If things in your life aren’t going the way you have hoped for, do not despair. Do not get mad. Instead, look to see where you aren’t behaving in kind and loving ways. Look to see if there are past wounds that still require healing, people or experiences that you haven’t yet forgiven and things you are clinging on to but need to let go of.

“You must understand the whole of life, not just one little part of it. That is why you must read, that is why you must look at skies, that is why you must sing, and dance, and write poems, and suffer, and understand, for all that is life.” ~ Krishnamurti

6. Pain demands to be felt.

If there’s pain and discomfort in your heart, in your body and in your life, give it your full attention. Don’t try to run away. Don’t fight and resist your uncomfortable feelings. Love your pain away. Embrace and accept whatever you are feeling. Welcome the bad just as you welcome the good, with love and appreciation. Because pain, just like joy, happiness and many of the other positive emotions we so desperately seek, wants to be acknowledged. It demands to be

“That’s the thing about pain,” Augustus said, and then glanced back at me. “It demands to be felt.” ~ John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

7. With discomfort comes growth.

With every problem and with every challenging situation life sends your way, comes a great lesson. Something you need to learn and master. Something that will help you grow, expand and evolve into the wonderful being you were born to be. So start looking at your bad days, at your problems and difficulties as opportunities for growth.

“View all problems as challenges. Look upon negativities that arise as opportunities to learn and to grow. Don’t run from them, condemn yourself, or bury your burden in saintly silence. You have a problem? Great. More grist for the mill. Rejoice, dive in, and investigate.” ~ Bhante Henepola Gunaratana

8. Forgive the past. Release yourself.

Forgive the past. Let it all go. Release yourself from the chains you have been wearing around your ankles. Releases yourself from the self made prison you have placed yourself in all this time by not wanting to forgive. Let it all go. Let go of anger, bitterness and resentment. Forgive yourself. Forgive your life and forgive those who might have treated you unkindly. Forgive and you will be free. Cleanse your mind and heal your heart.

Understand that forgiveness is a gift, a precious gift that you give to yourself to be free, to be at peace and to be happy. You don’t forgive because you are weak, but because you are wise enough to understand that holding on to anger and resentment will only deprive you of the many wonderful gifts that life has to offer you.

9. Embrace your dark side.

Jess C. Scott once said that “The brightest light casts the darkest shadow.” And I’m starting to think this is true. As you start working on purifying, cleansing and healing your life more and more each day, wanting to live a meaningful, happy, healthy and balanced life, more of your shadows start to surface. As if they’re asking you to bring light where there was once darkness, ‘forcing’ you to face, love and embrace all that yo are. With both the good and the bad. With both your darkness and your light.

“We all need to look into the dark side of our nature – that’s where the energy is, the passion. People are afraid of that because it holds pieces of us we’re busy denying.” ~ Sue Grafton

10. This too shall pass.

No matter what you are currently experiencing in your life and no matter how bad and painful it may look and feel, it is very important to remember yourself that no storm lasts forever. It will eventually come to pass. And until that happens, to make things easier for yourself, look for things to do, things that will take your focus away from what you are currently feeling and experiencing. Do something that makes you feel good, something that makes you feel happy and excited. Go out for a walk. Watch a funny movie. Eat some ice cream. Go for a massage. Do things that don’t require too much thinking and too much intellectual work. Put your mind to rest and just go have some fun. De-stress yourself and de-stress your life. And always remember:

“Life isn’t as serious as the mind makes it out to be.” ~ Eckhart Tolle

Source: “10 Clever Ways to Deal with the Ups and Downs of Life,” from purposefairy.com, by Luminita D. Saviuc

The Unbounded Spirit

How to Make the Most of Life’s Ups and Downs (and Enjoy Every Moment)

On March 7, 2014

In Motivation

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“You are already naked. There is no reason why you shouldn’t follow your heart.” ~Steve Jobs

As a human and quite normal one I was very much fond of the question: “What would I like to do when I grow up?” Each time my mind came up with a new profession in which to endure, and every time I was filled with ecstasy as I tried to live it through my young mind. These wide ranging options from a spy to a scientist from code words to cancer treatments. I’m sure these ranks must have played a jingle in your mind too and not just once or twice.

Now look at yourself, what happened? The time passed as many would say, and what society deems it to call it, we “grew up” and began to tie our dreams to materials, killing our vivid lives for fancy watches and cars with drivers, setting ourselves on the well-paved but heavily trodden path. This house and that bike, this car and that place. No longer were we provoked by the action of giving something, rather we transformed ourselves very comfortably into structures which are based on the action of taking things. We restrict our lives to sharp edged cubicles and flat tables. To glossy powerpoints and business class washrooms. We restrict ourselves to daylight conferences and midnight homes. A story of such a man is who had his future ‘secured’. Until he met his old friend one day, only to know he died on his way home.

We live in a reality where we believe there is ample amount of time to be happy, but just not today. Because today we have to work, store, pay and one fine day, when we are decorated with grizzled beard and white mane, we can spend the rest of the time like kings. This is the best plan ever to be constructed if someone was to assure you that your world won’t part into two, ever. That the building you’re working in won’t blow up, that the person you may find next you won’t have a desire to kill you. Only if someone would assure you that you won’t die in a simpler way such as a car crash.

If you ever have the opportunity to ask the dead, did they know how much time they were left with? Let’s say somehow how you survive, somehow you make it up to sixty, and somehow you are healthy and fit. Somehow everything goes according to ‘the plan’, but what good is a king who never learnt to rule as a prince?

When we start living in a distant future we stop taking life as a blessing and more as a curse. We numb ourselves today in hope to feel better tomorrow.

Let’s go back to our childhood, and then a little further.Why did we stop dreaming all together? For the chattels the society offered? Did we surrender our lives to these inanimate things? Or are we just too afraid of them, considering how flawed we are? Or are we afraid, realizing the number of people who have failed on their way? Are we so sure that there is no failure on the path we have decided to travel? Perhaps, already travelling. It’s called being delusional, isn’t it? Believing our fate is more blessed?

Dream. Chase it and fail. Fail and understand what caused that failure, come in terms with it and for once try to learn something new again. Even failure feels like an intense victory when we learn something out of it and we do what we love to. I believe we are just out of the habit of learning something new since the day we put on those uniforms and tried to be like everyone else. Knowledge is important but so is learning.

“Life is a roller coaster ride,” you probably must have heard it before. But have we ever thought of it like this before? A roller coaster ride, very much like life, with its ups and downs, and if you have ever taken the ride you would know that none of them lasts forever.

There are two kinds of people who take that ride, one who buckle themselves up to the front seats and the others who bury themselves at the back, waiting for it to get over. A good possibility says that the ride might break or you might fall off. But the whole point of it is having fun. Using life’s unpredictability and your own fear for your own good. Enjoying the ups and downs, this is guaranteed only when you do what you love to. When the ride ends both are unknown how it finally came to a stop, one emerges with a smile and the other one with a failed heart. We can scream, laugh, cry, have fun, or we can sit back and be scared through the ride.

If you still think this is the way life was meant for you and this is exactly what you should be doing, then why does it ache? Why does the stress come into play? Why the silent cries and frequent lies?

Everyone agrees to the fact that we leave everything behind. Everything we acquire, whether we reach the heavens or our bodies disintegrate and breathe peace with nature, it’s pretty logical to live it the best way possible, for this is the only time where you are allowed to feel and breathe. Often we encounter this question, “Hey man, if I’m going to die and leave everything behind, then what’s the whole point of living?” The best answer to it lies in the question itself. If we are supposed to leave everything back, behind in this world when we die, shouldn’t we work on things or the ideas which, after we are gone, will in this world stay? I’ll leave you with this thought.

“If you are not busy being born, you are busy dying.” ~Bob Dylan.

This is a guest post written by Sasmit Powale. Sasmit is a science student from Mumbai, India. He is a budding writer and a poet. His other interests lie in philosophy, stories and music.

The Unbounded Spirit