Forcing a Smile

Image by notkeith at notkeith.com

 

So how do you stay up when you’re feeling down?

How do you force yourself to be happy when things all around you are making you feel sad?

Because that’s the real trick. That’s why self-help is such a giant industry, despite being a complete misnomer. If it was really self-help, it wouldn’t be in a book written by somebody else. But of course, when people feel sad, they do need help. We all need help once in a while.

I’m going through a difficult period at the moment – more difficult (much more difficult) than I’d anticipated. Because I’m naïve, unrealistic and wholly impractical, I had just kind of assumed that, once I’d moved into this little house in the country, things would fall into place a lot more easily than they have. I’m talking workwise primarily. Moneywise.

But they haven’t. And now I’m struggling and scraping around looking for morsels of unappealing employment like someone half my age. And it’s at times like this that your whole life comes back to haunt you. You begin to think of everything you’ve ever thought and done as a ghastly mistake. You begin to think of yourself as a colossal fool and a mighty, mighty fuckwit. The old self-loathing creeps back in, surprising you with its intensity. It seems like while it was away, it was working out, sharpening itself, just waiting for an opportunity to march back in and poke you in the guts.

So how do you stay positive when the whole world is screaming misery and failure in your face?

Fortunately, I do know the answer.

Unfortunately, it’s hard work at the best of times, bastard hard work at the worst.

And it’s that same short list of daily activities that you see absolutely everywhere these days:

• Exercise

• Socialise

• Be grateful

• Be generous

• Learn new things

• Look outside of yourself – which is to say, cultivate your awareness of being part of something bigger than yourself – meditate, chant, whatever it takes…

And that’s it. A simple matter of training your brain to be resilient and generally more positive.

Piece of cake.

Except it isn’t a piece of cake. Like any long-term training, it’s damned hard until it becomes a solid habit, and even then it’s damned hard.

So.

Resilience. Determination. Two little mice.

…

I am now going to cycle to the doctor’s surgery so that ultimately I may learn if this recurring pain in my left testicle is really merely stress or actually something much more serious. However it turns out, I’m hugely grateful to the NHS for not charging me a fortune to find out.

I hope you’re having a good day, whoever you are.

Thanks for popping by.

x

Filed under: REAL LIFE Tagged: Christopher Walken, Frank Abagnale Snr, hypochondria, money, NHS, stress, work