Totally out of my zone

[Soni_miss-1980]

How to face things that is not in your control

[Emily16]

I have yet to figure that out myself.😔

[faulhallen]

I think that there’s a couple of ways to handle it... sadly they won’t sound very appealing or easy...

First, you have to accept that you can’t control them. Stop questioning it because by questioning it you’re only adding extra stress and anxiety on top of your preexisting problems. You can’t control it and that’s ok. It sucks, but it’s ok. Lots of things are.

Second you have to find a way to control what you can to improve your life. Maybe you can’t control something right now but you could in the future. For example, Maybe you’re limited by how much money you make but by improving your situation and going through the miserable experience of finding a new job you could make more money and control it eventually.

If there’s something you can’t control and it will be months or years before you can do anything about it what can you control right now to improve your life? Is there some time you can take for yourself, can you find new friends, spend less time doing what makes you miserable, exercise and eat right so you feel better about yourself despite the things you can’t control.

Even the smallest positive changes when made consistently can add up and feel like a victory. Sometimes when you’re struggling in life it’s important to remember that just surviving and working towards something better is a victory all on its own.

[Soni_miss-1980 in reply to faulhallen]

But what if you are falling apart even when you are trying to improve things . Your mind is not stable

[faulhallen in reply to Soni_miss-1980]

I’m sorry if this accidentally comes off negatively. My head is killing me this morning...

But if you didn’t feel like you were falling apart even while trying to improve I’m sure you wouldn’t have found yourself here. One of the hardest changes to make is trying to take control of our thoughts and the words we use to describe everything. I have a post on word choices so I’ll focus on the other.

It is impossible to control all of our thoughts. If it weren’t we also wouldn’t be here. But you can make a conscious effort to change and fight those thoughts. It can be exhausting and extremely difficult. I won’t lie and say it’s not.

But choosing to alter how we think is one of the biggest things we can do to help ourselves. I used to despise myself. Everything I did was pointless, I was a failure and everything. I had a realization that I’m the only one who sees me that way and I’ve been trying to change how I see myself. A lot of my depression is situational so it doesn’t always work but here are a couple things you can try that are probably also in that post. They’re in one of mine anyway.

Choose better words to describe yourself (see the post for more detail).

Actively force yourself to think positive thoughts. (This one is nearly impossible for me when I’m down even though I’m normally a somewhat optimistic dreamer anyway).

Every time you have a negative thought pause and think of an example of a time you thought the opposite about yourself.

Or my favorite....

Think of one or more things that makes you feel honestly and truly happy or ideally proud. When you start to feel like a failure picture that thought in your mind. Remind yourself that if everything you did was wrong you wouldn’t have that thought. That you’re doing something right in your life because of that.

My children are my example in that one. Sorry if it doesn’t work as well for you.

It’s not easy and I’m sure there are other suggestions out there but it can be done. It’s just hard.

[Emily16]

I have yet to figure that out myself.😔