One Night of Negativity

As we go to bed and think over the various happenings of our day, we only choose to look at how hard life has been for us; the dark and depressing events. But why hasn’t it occurred to us that maybe we’re not buried in this dark place of our lives, perhaps we’ve been planted, and that is why our view is so dark, unclear and confusing? Why are we always looking at the problems instead of the possibility? There is no use of going into utter despair and feeling dumb and useless at every problematic challenge that comes our way.

Giving up everything you have at every obstacle that seems like the hardest thing you will ever have to face and in the process letting down everyone who supports and believes in you with one illogical action won’t solve anything.

The empty space you leave in others after taking your life is more significant than any feeling of emptiness you could ever feel in the darkest nights of your life. The helplessness, guilt, and pain that the people who know you will go through is many times more than what you might have felt through your worst days. One night of negative thoughts can lead to a bad day the next morning, followed by the massive cloud of negativity looming over you for the next week, to the next month, to maybe the following year, to what feels like a lifetime of pain and suffering.

Humans learn through imitation; we grow by adopting the same habits of the people around us. The action of every individual has a considerable effect on another. Observational learning is one of the favorite topics for behavioral psychologists to probe upon. With imitation, comes the need to please others with one’s actions. In a better word, validation. Social media is brimming with youth trying to get validation of others through perfectly edited pictures, large number of streaks with people who they haven’t even met, perfect tweets, filters over filters on Instagram posts, constant updates of one’s Facebook status as if people care about how great their overpriced Starbucks coffee was, or their new Yeezys that most definitely won’t last more than a month or two.

The present generation runs on validation, turning people into someone they’re not to be adored and accepted. The obsession of being validated takes you deeper into a tunnel with no ‘light’ at the end. Why is there so much fear of being hated, or even merely disliked? Why change yourself to give others an image of a self you aren’t? Why don’t we value the people we have and cherish the memories we’ve made rather than mourning over people we’ve lost and forcing their memories to fade?

Ask yourself these questions and realize how important it is to first accept oneself before seeking approval from others. You are your biggest supporter. No amount of likes on an Instagram post can outdo the happiness and satisfaction of self-love.

There is no way to get out of doing a task other than just getting done with it, one can’t avoid a storm coming their way, you cannot get rid of a problem without facing it; likewise, you cannot get away from your negative emotions by dismissing them and carrying on as if there is nothing eating you up inside.

Acknowledge what you are feeling, let yourself go through the hurt, there is nothing wrong with feeling pain, talk it out with a trusted one and give yourself time to heal. Time and tide wait for none, but healing is a process that takes place over time, and it is what gets us through the high and low tides of our life.

We cannot expect our lives to have only the best things to offer. Life is (approximately) 75 long years of happy and sad emotions being compiled into a series of events that we either enjoy to the fullest or detest so much that we want to shut everything out and give up. But we must realize that we cannot experience our highest point of happiness without initially going through our lowest point of sadness.

We cannot reach the dawn of self-discovery and newfound inner peace without going through the seemingly endless dark night of self-doubt and confusion.

To quote Matt Haig in his work ‘Reasons to Stay Alive,’

Your mind is a galaxy. More darkness than light. But the light is what makes it worthwhile. Which is to say, don’t kill yourself. Even when the darkness is total. Always know that life is not still. Time is space. You are moving through that galaxy. Wait for the stars.

So instead of burying yourself in all those negative thoughts every night, empty your mind of them, and let your heart be at peace. If the universe didn’t need you, you wouldn’t be here.