Someone recently said to me, ‘what if something good happens today?’. For context, I was having a rant about bad things always happening in threes and how I was expecting one more thing to go wrong. My mind immediately went to ‘nothing good will happen’. I then stopped myself for a second. Is it true that every bad thing that has happened to me has only negatively affected my life? Am I always expecting something bad?
I know I can get trapped in negative thought patterns. I prepare for bad things to happen. There is comfort in preparing but it can also leave me feeling a bit hopeless and down. I start to spiral about things going wrong. As time goes on and I have gotten to know my anxiety, I know that these spirals are temporary and will pass. Yet, even still I cling to these thoughts as if they were the ultimate truth.
I am so prepared for the worse-case scenario, but once in a while, things surprise me. Something good happens.
I have thought about this for the last couple of weeks. I never know when something good is going to happen. I tend to always think the worst. I think I will fail the exam, or things just won’t work out. I think this comes from a place of comfort in knowing that if something does go wrong, I can have a plan. The ironic thing is something the best things happen when things don’t go to plan. Sometimes a win comes from nowhere and, sometimes, a win is because of all my hard work.
I can’t control all of the good or bad things that happen to me. One of the things I have really worked on is being able to congratulate or celebrate my wins and take a step back when things don’t go my way. For me, stepping back means saying to myself that I tried and I can be proud of myself no matter the good or bad things that happen to me. This is a way that helps me distance myself those negative thoughts. It is not easy to change and I can find myself being down in the dumps feeling as if the whole world is against me, but sometimes that glimmer of positivity can be the reason I keep going.
Often, in retrospect, I see the silver lining. I know silver linings can be quite controversial. But for me, it really helps to try and see something good that happened out of a horrible situation. For example, I have experienced a lot of grief and pain in my life. That pain left me feeling so broken. Overtime, and lots of tears, I came to realise that one of the reasons I hurt so much is because I love so much. Through my grief, I learnt what it is to care and nurture the people in my life. I believe without my grief I would not be as understanding and empathetic to others. It still sucks that I had to go through all that pain and hurt. That pain will not go away, but it also taught me how to love.
Life can be challenging and it has its twists and turns. There will always be good things and bad things that happen. I guess the question we all have to ask ourselves is how do we keep going?
I think the reason I keep going is because I have hope. I have hope things will get better. So maybe today something good does happen. Maybe despite the tough times, you can see that someone really cares. Maybe the good thing could be that glimmer of hope. Or maybe sometimes things surprise you.