Move on to Better Things

So this silly picture on the right is a recent snapshot of me being plain ol' goofy with my girlfriends. (Those are our bartender's glasses, and I'm trying to make pigtails with my hands and hair...) I have friends who I can just cut loose with, who I can let my guard down with, and just be myself. I know they'll always have my back, and I don't need to worry about anything when I'm with them, because I know I'll always have a good time.

It's easy to be relaxed and carefree when other people and things are distracting you. But what happens when you're alone and with your own thoughts? Are you able to destress and carry on with your day in a constructive manner? Or do you worry about people, your job, something that happened earlier in the day, what you just ate, or anything else?

It's so easy to become derailed by our thoughts, stresses, and fears. One minor incident at work has our mind spinning off into worrying about whether we'll be fired or not, and we might even have a nightmare that night about it. And how many people do you know who when they eat one bad thing, they freak out, get down on themselves, and/or give up on their diet plan all together??

I've gotten better, but I still have to constantly remind myself to not worry so much, to let go of the small stuff, and to do something productive even when I mess up.

I went through some rough times with food and my body, and I remember sitting at the kitchen table at my parents' house, crying to my mom about how fat I felt because I'd given in to some "bad" foods and had gained a little weight. It was really affecting me, and I kept beating myself up over and over and over and over.

Finally, my mother looked at me and said, "So what?? Get over it! Make a better choice next time and you'll be fine! Stop worrying about it so much!"

Of course, to an angsty, barely over the teenage years, highly-emotional female, this did not seem like the best advice at the time.

But looking back, my mom couldn't have been more right.

Life is tooooo short to stress over the little things that we DO have control over. So you messed up your diet. Doesn't mean you're a failure, you're going to be fat and doomed forever, just get back on it tomorrow. So your friend showed up 15 minutes late for dinner and you're pissed. Would you rather spend dinner feeling resentful, or can you shrug it off and just be incredibly grateful to be spending any time at all with her?

You have a choice, right now, and in every moment, about how you react to situations that arise. You can choose to be positive or negative. You can choose whether you are going to stay stuck in your stress and worries or move forward and do something about it!

It's not always pleasant to hear, and it might be stirring a little something in you right now, but that's GOOD! Hopefully it will spur you into action.

Now go do something about it!

Be kind and patient with yourself, and know that tomorrow is a new day!