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The Yin and Yang of Happiness

There’s no reason for me to complain. I am the happiest I’ve been in a long time, possibly my whole life. But after the year I’ve had, I always have the next possible disaster in the back of my head. As an example, the moment I am writing this, I am on vacation in Latvia and sitting in the beautiful landscape of Sigulda. As my friend and I were both too lazy to organize a trip, we’re winging it. We drove to the airport without any kind of plan and ended up buying last-minute tickets to Riga. Now, I worry about what’s to come. For the love of god, I can’t shake the feeling that the next hotel we’re staying at will be an absolute schabracke.

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The place this post was written at. And no, I don’t own a fancy Moet blanket. I ‘borrowed’ it from a bar.

If today sucks, I think of a better tomorrow.
Earlier this year I came pretty close to the edge when I was sick for a month and later found out I had Diabetes Type I. Not gonna lie, that time sucked and I believe I spent quite a few blog posts venting about it. In the end, I had no other choice than to move on. I had the find good things in the future I could look forward to: I made a tattoo appointment and plans for a summer vacation (driving to the airport blindly thankfully doesn’t require a lot of planning).

Forget your expectations.
My life is currently changing pretty fast and I don’t really know what’s to come. I believe that happiness and sadness don’t have to be mutually exclusive. I implemented a system you could call the Yin and Yang of happiness: When I’m happy, I still struggle to appreciate the good things in my life. But when I’m sad I am also aware that the future’s gonna be better. Everything’s gonna be fine unless you die and then it’s over anyway.

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I will never lose my will to live and you shouldn’t either.
As a teenager, my life wasn’t fun as I was being bullied in school. Dark thoughts appeared quite naturally as I slowly drifted into a place of depression. On the worst days I cut myself to make me feel something again. But I never really wanted to kill myself. I thought about the future lying ahead and all the things I don’t know yet and still want to experience. I often escaped reality and lived a phantasy life filled with all the things missing from my life. Eventually, I decided to go to a new school which was one of the hardest decisions I had to make up until that point. However, it was worth it and I never looked back.

In the end, it is true what they say: you cannot enjoy the good days if you don’t know what a bad day feels like. I may see the bad in everything good that happens and you may think that’s depressing. To me it’s a coping mechanism that’s oh so familiar. It made me come this far but it may be time to be a little more optimistic.

How do you deal with feeling low? And do you sometimes struggle to appreciate the good things in your life?

BenLeander

 

Compulsive nonconformist who left the 9-to-5 world after studying psychology and has since then devoted himself to design and writing on a freelance basis. Has at least four different kinds of chips at home at any given time.

Comments

  • 6. September 2018
    reply

    I remind myself that this is but a passing mood, a temporary mindset and distract myself with a super-decadent chocolate dessert (the culinary kind – NOT my spouse)! Naked hugs!

  • 6. September 2018
    reply

    Life has been both good and bad tome, but so much more good. Appreciating life itself is the end goal for all of us. We are fragile, especially when ego is involved, but hopefully we just learn to hold on. Life always has been and always will be a rocky ride. So take hold of what makes you happy and hold tightly.

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