How to Stay Positive when You Know Your Life Sucks

1. Ground Yourself.
The most common reason why people think their lives suck is that they aren't living their own lives. Look deeply into whether you are acting to please others - to please family, friends, and society. Realize that you need to get to know who you are and what your needs are, and make the choices to follow your own path. To know these things, a path of meditation and inner exploration is invaluable.

2. Look on the inside.
What are some qualities you have that you like about yourself? Are you funny? Are you intelligent? Are you sincere? Are you generous? What do you have pride in? Try focusing on the positive things in your life. You may be having a positive influence on others even when you think you're useless.
   
3. Prove those negative thoughts wrong.
When you find yourself in a bad mood, you could think of the negative things such as, "I'm dumb and annoying", "I'm better off dead", "I'm ugly, I wish I looked different", etc. Even though it's not true. Change your mind. Look for your good features, think about the ones that you know love you, look on your greater side. Realize that nobody's life is easy and that there will always be ups and downs, and moments of low self esteem. Don't automatically assume that nobody cares. Every person matters to someone. You're alive for a reason.
 
4. Appreciate what you see.
Look in the mirror. Find some beautiful things about yourself.... Do you have nice skin? nice nails? beautiful eyes? full lips? Find stuff that appeals to you. When you can't change something, change your attitude towards it!

5. It's all how you look at it.
Jealous of the people with 'amazing' lives? They chose to be that way! Remember, there are people living in mansions who are miserable and people living on the street who are perfectly happy. It's all on how you look at it.

6. Determine how your life could be better.
What can you do to make your life better? What do you desire to do? How do you want to feel? Make a few reachable goals and your own strategies. The first step is usually the hardest - getting help or admitting you need it.

7. Sometimes it's just luck.
A lot of things in life are just luck. Where you were born, whether you had a kind loving family or an abusive one where your mind or even your life is in danger, whether you belong in your community or were born into an out-group by religion, race, etc., whether your family was rich or poor are all random things. It's what you do with it that matters. Remember that there is something epic and heroic in rising from harsh circumstances to do something well. Just surviving a rough situation and coming out of it with a heart is a triumph, a story that could move people long after you lived. That matters.


Sometimes situations that look good from the outside, like a wealthy but emotionally abusive family can inspire both misery and jealousy from others. Accept that's the situation. Remember that your life is your own and its direction is your choice. You don't have to be who other people tell you that you are, whether that's Future Criminals of America or Ruthless Cut-Throat Capitalist. You can change your life by choosing the direction that matters to you and pursuing it one small step at a time.

1. Get motivated.
What motivates you? What gives you energy to go on everyday? Music? Love? Family? A 1km run? God/Allah? Your attitude? Your pet? Friends? School? Give yourself a boost by focusing on what is important to you personally. 

2. Remember that some things can pass with time.
There will be a tomorrow. There will be a next week. There will be a next month and perhaps by then, things will have changed for the better. If you are underage in a bad situation you have a definite release date after which your life is your own, all the things you could do to better it will come into reach even if they're difficult.

3. Reminisce.
Whenever you feel like the future is 'hopeless', think about happy memories. It will help make you feel better and remind you that in the future, there will be good things, too. Think about all the good things you've experienced, felt, and achieved, and consider how many more good things could be waiting ahead. There will be many great moments in your life - don't let a few obstacles get in the way. If you don't have any happy memories, this is relative - don't judge them by things other people think of as "happy memories." Think of the moments it wasn't as bad, even if those were only in solitude.

4. Don't stop yourself from feeling the joy.
It's okay to step back once in awhile and just enjoy the moment. Even in tough situations - it's important to smile and laugh here and there. Don't restrict yourself from doing things you love because they're "not important" or because you think you'll be criticized for doing them. Let yourself enjoy life even if you're not at the best place you could be. You only live once - make the best of it.

5. Develop a gratitude journal.
It's pretty simple. At the end of every day, write down five things that have made you happy or appreciative that day -- not necessarily big things, even small ones count. For example: nice weather, being praised by my boss for getting an urgent errand done, my playful dog, kids and hubby kissing me goodbye before they went to school/work, a hilarious joke a mate shared, etc.

6. If you feel persistently sad, unmotivated, anxious, hopeless or fearful, seek professional help.
You may be suffering from a mood disorder or nutritional deficit which could be contributing to your situation. Chronic physical pain can cause these symptoms too, if an aspirin lifts your mood then go to a pain clinic. Remember there is always somebody there who wants to help you. You are valuable!

What Drives You to Success?

Ten reasons people are driven to succeed.

"There's no success like failure," wrote Bob Dylan, "and . . . failure's no success at all." Here are 10 of the most compelling "drivers" that account for the correlation between success and excess.

1. You need to make money - and to make meaning.

"Today's generation of businesspeople is the first to face a double goal: profit and a meaningful life," says Caroline Myss, a psychologist and author of the best-selling book Anatomy of the Spirit: The Seven Stages of Power and Healing (Harmony Books, 1996). "Never before were leaders allowed to have a heart or to ask, 'Who am I?' Nobody is immune to this crisis of spiritual seeking. Business has always been the solid foundation of life. But now this rock-hard level of society is finally experiencing its own spiritual cataclysm."

2. Welcome to the United States of Anxiety.

Today there are more than 3.5 million households in the United States with a net worth of $1 million or more. Between 1983 and 1992, the number of millionaire families doubled. The stock market is skyrocketing to all-time highs; the IPO market offers the promise of instant wealth. But how long will this trend continue? Will you get yours before it all comes down?

3. If you thought climbing the career ladder was tough, try climbing without one.

The end of hierarchy has left people liberated - but also confused. "Up until the 1960s," says Myss, "the longer you were with an organization, the more respect you gained. Now experience doesn't count. To get to the next level of success, you need to make a quantum leap, which requires a burst of energy that many people just don't have."

4. The "Brand Called You" has a dark side.

Brand management is a tricky proposition. Look at what happens to brands in the marketplace: They achieve prominence and success, but they also receive criticism and suffer from mismanagement. Nike goes from being brand-management darling to being a brand problem child. How would you like that to happen to the brand called you?

5. Work is (still) alienating.

In the early 1900s, factory work was said to alienate dislocated farmers from the source - and the satisfaction - of production. Work today is perhaps no less alienating. "We have no role as workers anymore," says media consultant John B. Evans. "To be divorced from doing meaningful work, such as raising a family or participating in your community, makes you feel like an imposter."

6. Mortality has become the new morality.

After age 30, you achieve new levels of professional success and business power. After age 30, you confront your own mortality. Feelings of high accomplishment arrive simultaneously with feelings of great loss. You control your company, you control your department, you control your territory - but ultimately, you control nothing. You confront the biggest fear in your life: the fear of your death.

7. Leadership has become dangerous to your health.

Leaders today feel trapped in a role from which they cannot escape. "People start projecting on you," says addiction-compulsion specialist Mary Bell. "Sometimes, when you go to a dinner party, the people around you are enthralled by all that you do and say. Everybody's seducible. Other times, you feel like you're invisible." Followers and leaders fall into patterns of helplessness and powerfulness - and wage a civil war through sabotage and mutual distrust.

8. Chaos - if it's out there, it's in here.

The world is changing so rapidly and so unpredictably that a product that's hot one moment will be cold 10 seconds later. At the birth of the Information Age, Marshall McLuhan made a point that's more true now than ever: If it works, it's obsolete. Fleeting success is a prescription for insecurity.

9. Your life is one extended report card.

"At the halfway point in your life, a qualified success is subjectively not much better than a gross failure," says Daniel Levinson, author of The Seasons in a Man's Life (Alfred A. Knopf, 1978). Either you've made it big or you haven't. You no longer fit into the category called "Shows promise."

10. You believe that you've sold out.

"Whether in the Harvard establishment or at the heights of American business, people feel that they've embraced authority and sold out a fundamental aspect of their own soul," says Jungian analyst Nathan Schwartz-Salant. "They feel they might have been a different person, a better person, if they had gone another route." You feel the need to justify the choices you've made - so you end up wanting to destroy not who you are but who you never became.

How to Survive (and Thrive!) in a Job You Hate

Somewhere, sometime in life, everyone has a job they hate. Whether the hours are terrible, the pay is awful, the coworkers are wretched, or the boss is horrid, hated jobs are very much a thing of the present. We work them for different reasons, for different lengths of time, and with different levels of satisfaction, but almost all of us work them at some point. For many people, these jobs are a drag that make them feel like hollow shells of their former selves. However, there are a few people who manage to survive and thrive in jobs they really don't like. Here are a few of their secrets for making that hated job easier.

Know Why You're There

Whether you took the job in the first place because you thought it was something other than it turned out to be or because you absolutely had to make rent and couldn't do it any other way, knowing why you took the job will help you maintain perspective while you're there. Remembering the process that led up to your current situation: the job search, the interviews, your conversations with others about the job, your conversations with yourself about it, hearing that you had the job, your acceptance of it, and anything else you went through during that time will remind you that you are more than your job. YOU took IT for a good reason. If that reason isn't so good anymore, well, then it's time to reevaluate. But you can do that, because you are more than the job.

 

Know What You Really Want

Often, a terrible job will help you know what you would want in a good job. So go ahead and note what these things are! Are your current coworkers loud? Note that you would like a job where you can have quiet time to focus, at least when working on large projects. Is your boss always second-guessing or changing your decisions? Note that you would like a job where employees are trusted and tasks are truly delegated. Go through the process of actually writing these things down. When you have a physical list of what you want, your current job won't seem so worthless. After all, it helped you learn what to look for next!
Once you have this list, add to it the things you've dreamed about doing. Would you like a job that requires a lot of problem-solving instead of a set group of tasks? Include that. Would you rather work for yourself? Note it. Have you always dreamed of writing for a living? Put it down.
Whether you're in a position to actually go out and look for another job or not, this list shows what you know about yourself, job-wise. And knowing what you want is often the first step towards getting it.

 

Know Your Motivation for Staying

If you're planning to stay in a job you dislike, it's important that you know why. Is your current job the only one in your area that fits your skills? Or do you need it to keep your children fed and clothed? Whatever the reason, remembering what it is and keeping it at the forefront of your consciousness makes working a difficult job easier. When you do this, you end up working not for the job itself, but for whatever the motivation is behind your being there. The job becomes more than a job: it becomes a way to fulfill whatever desire moved you to take it in the first place.

 

Make a Conscious Choice to Stay

Knowing your motivation also makes it possible for you to evaluate it. Maybe you wanted a job close to home because you were newly married and wanted to spend as much time as possible with your new husband. Now, he's working regular hours and taking some night classes, so your short commute doesn't net the two of your more time. While working the hated job might have been worth it for the time together, it's not when it doesn't produce that result. Or maybe you realize that you qualify for lots of different jobs of the same type that you're working now, and you realize that a different work environment might make things much more tolerable. Whatever your motivation, consider carefully whether it's enough motivation to stay at the job.
If your motivation is enough for you to keep the hated job, make staying a conscious choice. Own your choice. You do not HAVE to stay at the job, but you CHOOSE to. And you know the reasons behind your choice, and that they are enough to outweigh the fact that you hate what you're doing. Deliberately choosing to stay will help you own the job. It will help you to feel, in some small way, like you are doing what you want to do (because you do want it, even if only from the perspective that it is better than any current alternative).

 

Make that Choice Again If You Have To

Even after you choose to stay, there will be parts of the job that you dislike. Those parts may even make up the majority of your time there! If you can notice those parts and notice the feelings of frustration/rage/anger/sadness/hopelessness/whatever that rise up in you, you can choose to make your choice again. Run through the motivations, and the reasons why those motivations are worth it. Remember that you are more than this job, that you chose it.
This is really hard (particularly when you're used to letting the negative emotions take over)! Stick with it. Remember that you will fail sometimes, and go home complaining and pissed off again. Over a long period of time, though, your choice will become the habit instead of the emotions.

 

Feel Your Feelings

 

When something comes up in your job that you hate, feel that. Let yourself feel whatever emotion comes over you. Don't try to hide it inside, or it will just blow out later. If you need to take a walk, or go to the restroom, or even put the emotion on an internal shelf to feel later (just be sure to take it back out!), do that. Letting things build up until they might explode is never a good idea. So let yourself feel. And, in the midst of your feelings, remember your choice. Remember why even these awful feelings are worth sticking it out.

 

Have Realistic Expectations

 

Don't expect yourself to ever love your job. Don't think that you should be loving it so something must be wrong. Instead, expect that you won't like it. Expect that the things that have frustrated you since the first day will still frustrate you now and will probably continue to do so as long as you stay at the job. If you expect that, the job will never sink below your expectations. However, at this point, you know that you are more than the job. You don't expect all of your satisfaction to come from that, because there are more areas in your life than just that.

 

Take Advantage of Any "Extras" the Job Offers

 

Some jobs suck, but have great perks. Right now, I work a job that I actually like (well, most of the time!). But, even if I didn't like it, I'd probably work here because it gets my husband huge discounts on his grad school tuition (I work at the university). Knowing that my working here helps us financially like that can make a big difference when I want to throw in the towel. Different jobs have different perks, but almost every job has at least one. My husband is a server at a local restaurant. He doesn't like it, but he gets to bring home any mistakes they make. Knowing that we'll get delicious pasta for lunch the next day often makes his shifts feel lighter and go faster. I know it sounds crazy, but taking advantage even of these small things makes staying easier.

 

Personalize Your Space

 

Put up pictures of the people who are your motivation for working. Decorate the walls of your cube with colorful material. Decorate your computer screen with sayings that inspire you. If your workplace won't allow any of those things, wear a locket with a special picture in it or carry one in your wallet. Put something small and special in your pocket so you can at least touch it whenever you want. These things help make your space, your computer, you person YOURS, and if they're yours then they don't belong to the horrible job that you hate. Once again, these things help you feel like you are more than your job, help you remember why you're really there, and help you choose to stay.
It's pretty clear that no one wants to stay in a job they hate. But if you choose to, whether because it satisfies some deeper motivation or because it's the best of a bad situation, these ideas should help you thrive there without feeling dead inside.