Convert negative feelings into a laser beam of awesomeness

I often find days when I am in a low mood and totally demotivated. The days in which I think ‘what’s the point?’ and everything just feels a little shitty. I wanted to post this as a reminder that this feeling can be hijacked and used to our advantage. I want to type this to reflect on, as well as possibly help others stuck in this rut.

The good thing about these problems is that they are all in our head. The problem with these feelings is, well… they are all in our head. For me the mind can be a pretty claustrophobic place, no matter where I walk or run the bad thoughts are right there around me. Physically escaping them is virtually impossible. This is why it is much better to instead of try to escape the thoughts, mold them into something of worth.

This is the very reason why I blog and started to back in 2014 after my father died. I use it as a machine to transform all of my negative emotions into something of worth. I am tired of wasting time because of negative emotions and doing nothing until my mood lifts. We simply do not live long enough to spend hours of the day procrastinating and being slaves to our mental health. If we can use this feeling-down time as rocket fuel alongside our feeling-good time, think of how much progress we could make every single day.

Whether this is to blog, or to work out or whatever the passion. Negativity only pushes us further from the finishing line. I mean no matter how we feel, we want to get to that finishing line, right? Whether it is a career or marriage or whatever we want in life, feeling sorry for ourselves for not being there won’t get us there. What will get us there is taking steps. One by one.

Now for me personally, I want to build my blog so it is successful enough to do it at least part time. I also want to be successful enough to publish a book with a big enough audience that want to read it. I can’t get that overnight, so I blog every day. Some days I ask myself why I spend so much time here without pay. Why I think I am even capable of doing this. But this is a natural state of negative self reflection and the reaction to these questions determines if those thoughts are right or wrong.

I could respond by saying ‘you know what, I am doing this for free. What is the point?’ and never pick up my laptop again. I could let those few down days a year demotivate me and convince me that I am not capable of going further. Even if I am not convinced I am going anywhere 36 days of the year, that is just 10% of my time. To allow 10% of my time to dictate the other 90% would be utterly crazy and I would be doomed to fail. When I am in that 10, I think of the other 90. Nine times out of ten I am moving forward, no matter how fast or slow towards the goal. The finishing line never moves, it is always in that same spot for us to reach. It is down to us to keep making that distance smaller.

If I am angry, I think of how I can convert it into blog form. Writing it down and using it to come up with a post others can relate to and feed off. Why am I angry? Is it because I am not where I want to be? Well, anger doesn’t help. At all. What does help is knowing that if I keep at it, I will be where I want to be. Again, where some people stop or even leave the race, these moments in which we decide to keep going despite everything determines how quickly we get there. We can put it off for another day or get there a day earlier than we would have. In time, these days accumulate into months and years. Today deciding not to do something, and that day next week, and the five or six days next month will determine whether we achieve our dream in 2020 or 2025. Or never. Just because we can’t see the finishing line over the peak doesn’t mean it isn’t there. And how fast we climb that hill determines how soon we will be able to enjoy the descent down the other side.

The same goes for feelings of frustration, jealousy and sadness. We can use them as an excuse to put a hold on things, but all that means is we either fail in our aims, or just delay reaching them as fast.

To help with this, I picture myself being in first class on a long haul flight. It is always something I have wanted to try and I have never afforded it. I have always peered into that section of a flight since being a child, between the countless grey seats directly in front of my face and wondered what it would be like to be there one day. Just once. I will be there one day. But will it be next year or in 30 years time? Whenever I feel like slacking I picture being there in 30 years time. ‘Are you happy with that decision, Sam?’, I think to myself as my productivity meter plummets to zero. And then I picture myself in the seat thinking to myself ‘I could have been here 30 years earlier if I tried’.

Regret is a horrible feeling, but what is beautiful is being able to know that in the future I don’t want to look back on laziness and regret it. Aim to predict where regret would lie in your future and change the future by closing that gap to success today.

The reality is we won’t be where we want to be today. But the day will come, how soon that day will come is determined by how much we put into today. Every day wasted is a day further away, and every productive day means we get there a day sooner. Negative emotions such as the ones I have experienced recently should be a motivator to not experience them again. And what better way to escape these feelings than to pin them to the ground and use them as a stepping stone to that goal. The main reasons as to why I am sad is because I am not currently where I want to be, and knowing one day I will be where I want to be makes every bad day a catalyst for progress.

 

Man on road photo by Christopher Burns on Unsplash

Airplane photo by Gus Ruballo on Unsplash

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