Hi, everyone
This is my entry for @zord189's #HiveCreativeContest. You can see the details here
Even though I may strike the casual reader as a rather pessimistic person, judging by my constant criticism of daily life events and issues, even realistic and skeptical people like myself (which I like to think I am) need some self-encouragement, or as @zord189 put it, "fuel" to keep going, especially in times of hardship.
I am not sure we can call it a "Happiness Mantra", but this is what I tell myself and those close to me when things get really ugly:
This too shall pass, and we'll laugh about it when it does.
No matter how imposing obstacles or adversities look ahead of us, we can find solace in the conviction that even the most atrocious of circumstances come to an end, and that end is usually followed by times of ease, prosperity and change.
Throughout my life I have done a lot of introspection and I have studied history and people around me to try to determine how much weight we should put into expectations that depend on natural Vs. supernatural phenomena to occur. Experience and logic tells me we cannot rely on supernatural phenomena to act upon conflicts or obstacles and operate needed changes around us. What happens to us and to others, good or bad, happens because there are people making those things happen or preventing other kinds of things from happening.
Even accidents or natural disasters are eased or aggravated by human action or inaction. If we accept that, there is a greater chance that we can be more proactive in the future and carry ourselves better throughout difficult times. For those things that affect us and about which we have little to no power to make them change, we can only choose whether to remain calm or create a storm in a glass of water, where we'll most likely drown.
The only thing about asuming adversity will pass is that we rarely know how long it will take. It may be days; it may centuries. Some countries have been liberated from oppression in a matter of hours; others take decades to see better times. Some wounds heal in a matter of days; others never heal at all. If we look at countries like Haiti, it seems like those people have never got a break. But we know that even Hatians laugh and keep on living. Venezuelans are doing it as I write this. We suffer, we struggle, we cry, but we have to pause at some point and think that whatever is going on shall too pass and we will laugh about it. Even if don't make it, we can laugh about it before it kills us and inspire others to face life's problems with a more possitive attitude. If we look at children and how they face all kids of situations, we can see the best therapy for depression. Kids enjoy and laugh at even the bumpiest of roads.
Since we don't know for sure when things will change for the better, we can enjoy whatever little things we have available and in the mean time do things that may improve the way we look at our lives and at the problems that affect us. We laugh every day about a tragedy from the (near or remote) past that is no longer affecting us directly (even the death of relatives and loved ones come in the form of fun anecdotes or memories). That same feeling can inform and redirect how we feel in the present about a current problem.
Of course, it is always better to laugh with company, so whatever is going on, hold someone's hand and laugh about it because that too shall pass and it will be insignificant in retrospect.
Thanks for stopping by
