Stryde

“Change is inevitable. Growth is optional.”

– John Maxwell

The only constant in life is change. Everything is changing all the time. Some changes have patterns, some are unpredictable and some can make you the person you want to be.

There are two different types of changes, natural and forced. A natural change is any change that happens unintentionally, typically happen over longer periods of time and are uncontrollable. A forced change is a change that is intentional, they start as short term and turn into long term changes, are controllable, and have way greater potential. Since forced changes are intentional, you are also responsible for those changes.

The challenge with changing, for the positive, is that it is solely your own responsibility. Positive natural changes do happen, it’s not too often, and they take a long time. Changing negatively is easier. Failing to act and not doing something is the primary cause for negative change whether they are natural or forced. You either let change happen by itself or you choose (force) to not make a positive change.

Choices result in change. Any negative changes that you have forced can be counteracted with a second, stronger, positive forced change.

No matter what you want in life, whether it is success, wealth, happiness, health or love, you are responsible to force the positive change to achieve your desire.

Change is not always easy, as we are creatures of habit. We can brainlessly walk through the majority of our days with little critical thinking. Even though we love habit, our bodies are you designed to change. The phrase ‘growing pain’ applies to more than physical growth, and even though change is difficult and painful, it is extremely useful.

A good way to start forcing positive change is to start small. Forcing change is a skill, and like any skill you can practice and train at it. Force small changes as often as you can and work your way up. Start with cutting one unhealthy thing out of your diet, make it a point to brush your teeth twice a day, meditate for only 10 minutes, take the stairs instead of the elevator. It does not have to be anything specific or significant, but this will put you on the right track.

Whatever direction your life goes in and wherever you end up, you pick the path and are on control of every step and every stride.

“Turn your face to the sun and the shadow falls behind you.”

-Jan Goldstein

Referring back to the two different kinds of people, where one focuses on the negatives and one turns the negatives into positives, I will be discussing on how to develop into a happier person. Here are some exercises to help become more optimistic and not stay angry or upset for long.

Finding the Lesson

In the example I discussed (yes, this happened to me) in the last post, we can assume that if I got to work on time, I would have hot been pulled over and received a ticket, my manager would not have gotten mad at me for being late and I would not have lost my pay for my missed time. A lesson I can pull from all the negatives therefore would be to make remembering and knowing my work schedule a higher priority in my life.

You need to be able to identify what went wrong in order to think about what you could have done different to avoid that happening. Most people assume little to no responsibility for events that happen in their life, especially bad ones. If you really believe that there was absolutely nothing you could have done different, think back a little further, and then a little further. For the freak accidents that do happen that are out of your control, breathe, divert your focus and thoughts on something happy. Remember this: Life is too short to worry about things that are out of your control.

You can practice this with past experiences or realizations and here are some examples of things and the take away lesson;

• Doing bad on a test – Study and prepare better
• Realizing you’re physically weak – Start working out
• Self-fault car crash – Acelerate/decelerate at a slower rate, stay off your phone, don’t swerve through traffic
• Getting fired at work – Be on time, keep calm and courteous, do your work

It Could Be Worse

With the billions of people in the world, there is someone living in a situation worse than you. It is not just a hypothetical that you could be off worse, it’s a possibility.

If you’re reading this, you’re most likely in a first world country (being on the internet and all). You most likely do not have to worry about your next meal is coming from, deadly diseases and animals, a large portion of you also live away from threat of natural disasters or have been unaffected.

Assuming you’re relatively healthy, you could be paralyzed, deaf, blind, or living with a severe mental illness. You could be suffering as the victim of horrific crimes and injustices.

I absolutely acknowledge that horrible things happen, and bad things happen to just about everybody. Almost everyone’s situation is different than the next, but to think it could not be worse is foolish.

A good method to practice having gratitude/being grateful is the stereotypical Thanksgiving exercise. Just take some time and think what you are thankful for having, whether it tangible items or your health for instance. Now, imagine if you did not have them.

One Bad Apple

One of the biggest injustices you can commit towards yourself is letting a couple rotten seconds, minutes or even hours, ruin your entire day, week or month.

Imagine that apples are the most finite resource in the universe. If you have a bag of apples and you find a bad apple, you would not even think about throwing out the whole bag. You would not even throw out the whole apple. You would cut away the bad parts of the apple and continue on with the remaining good apples.

Time is the most finite resource living beings have. If you can fully understand this idea, it becomes nonsensical to stay angry or upset.

If you combine all three of these, finding lessons, focusing on the good instead of the bad, and not letting the bad infest the good, you will find yourself much happier.

“Once you replace negative thoughts with positive ones, you’ll start having positive results.”

— Willie Nelson

Imagine this; You wake up to the sound of your alarm clock at your regular, scheduled time. The beginning of your day goes as normal. You get out of bed and follow the same pattern of acts you do every day after getting up. Your phone buzzes. It’s a text from your significant other asking what time you work. You decide to double check since you can’t fully remember whether it was 11:00 or 11:30. You start at 10:00. It’s 9:45, you’re not dressed for work, in the middle of making breakfast, and it’s a 25 minute drive to work.

You call your manager to notify her that you’ll be a little late as you’re running out the door. You start racing to work, speeding and swerving in between cars. You’re just about 2 miles away, sweating, as your ready to floor it, sitting in front of a red light. Green! As soon as you touch the gas pedal, you see red and blue flashing lights in the rear view mirror.

The officer is polite but shows little mercy, and writes you a ticket for having expired tags on the new car you tricked yourself into thinking you could afford.

You get to work 30 minutes late, your manager is annoyed at you, and you have to start planning how you are going to manage the $170 ticket you just received as your bills are right around the corner and you’re barely scraping by.

What a SHITTY day and it’s only 10:30am!?!?

Now there are two different types of people. And it is important to know which one you are.

One kind of person will let the previous, however many minutes and seconds ruin their whole day. They accept that the entire day will be bad. The universe is out to get them, they woke up on the wrong side of the bed, or it’s just their unlucky day. Happens to everyone, right? And there is nothing you can do about it.

The second kind of person acknowledges that shit happens, just as the first. But instead of letting such a small portion of their day, roughly 4% in the example, ruin the remainder, they find a way to embrace the negatives. Maybe the negatives are learning experiences, they realize that they could be off way worse, or they see that the other 96% of their day has great potential with the right attitude.

I will be willing to bet that the second type of person is a much happier person overall, enjoys life more and sees or will see more success.

The good news is that even if right now you are the first type of person, you can change that. All it takes is honest effort and time with some exercises.

If you find this blog I hope we are like-minded in the fact that we strive to be come a better version of ourselves. I do not want to become someone else. I want to be me, but at my fullest potential.

I will be researching self-improvement techniques and writing about my findings as well as some personal antidotes and life lessons that were met with deep thought. I will cover everything from thinking to living a healthy lifestyle and anything else I can find.

I welcome constructive criticism and differing opinions. Feel free to follow my journey. I hope I can make a difference in other people’s lives as well.

Part of me is hoping that I make a big enough difference that I can do this full time for a living. To get to that point will be difficult and I will try to post something at least once a day. If I fail to do so, feel free to call me out on it.

If today you say tomorrow, what will you say tomorrow?