I woke up on the positive side of the bed today, which I am grateful for because it is my last day as a 26-year-old. I was struck with this crazy sensation, which I’ve recently forgotten, called motivation. I felt motivated to get out of the bed and not because of anything particularly special happening today. The moment was just that, a moment, but the magical thing that happened was when I felt like staying in bed just a little bit longer and I felt the tiredness and laziness wash over my body like a subtle weighted blanket, I had another thought. What if today I let myself experience this little weighted blanket without fighting it, but tomorrow, the first day of my 27th year, I say no to it?

Setting an Achievable Goal

The beauty of the moment and thought process I experienced this morning is that it truly appeared to be a wise and logical approach to addressing my distaste towards my lazy morning feels. I hate, even loathe, the lazy aspect of my personality and I have a very negative mindset about it. When I feel lazy, I feel like I have failed. But how can a feeling be a failure when I’ve learned that I can’t be held responsible for my feelings? Laziness causes a complicated storm of emotions for me.

The wisdom of the situation was that I created a realistic goal for myself. Instead of saying, “In my 27th year I’m going to get the perfect body, be active every single day, eat healthy every single day, work hard every single day, etc. etc.”, I simply asked myself to face the one part of the day that I know, psychologically, tends to define my mood. I have learned about myself by spending hours reflecting over the course of my life, especially during my 20s, and I finally gathered and organized my findings in such a way that allowed me to create a realistic and achievable goal for myself. Each day, fight the lazy weight blanket so I can show up to work, breakfast, life on time.

I felt so much joy when I decided that this was how I wanted to start my 27th year because it is something I know I am capable of doing and I know that it is a practice that, over time, will grow, helping me take one step closer to being the person I want to be. It is also a disguised method for adding more positivity in my life.

Being Positive

Now I, more than anyone I know, absolutely hate if someone tells me or anyone else, “just be more positive”. Like, talk to the chemical composition of my brain which I have absolutely no control over. However, I had another genius thought this morning related to positivity. Basically, as I was setting my “wake up” goal, I realized that all it would take is allowing myself to feel positive that the day would be ok.

Being positive doesn’t have to mean slapping a smile on your face, it can be as simple as taking the less significant things less seriously. It can be as simple as shrugging a bad situation off. When my alarm wakes me up, instead of assuming that my day will be as bad or good as yesterday, I can just realize that the deep thought process required to analyze a day that hasn’t happened yet uses an excessive amount of brainpower that is really completely unnecessary. I don’t need to be pensive before I’ve had my morning coffee, not even after my morning coffee. I can be pensive when it makes sense and until that moment, I can just feel the sun on my face, appreciate the little aches in my body until I stretch and enjoy the act of living whether it feels euphoric or not.

I have never looked at positivity in the way I described above because I’ve always had very high expectations for myself in this area. When I was a little girl, I was the positive one. The little energizer bunny that always had a smile or was laughing, in public. However, I have always been pensive and thoughtful, just when I was by myself. As I’ve gotten older, I worry less about what other people think and sometimes am just pensive for the entire day. Therefore, in recent years I’ve felt shame for not being the beaming ray of sunlight I used to be. I’ve longed for the feeling of constant happiness and it has been counterproductive.

Today, I realized that I will never be the little girl I once was because I am not a little girl anymore. I have been through some sh*t and I am tired, just like everyone else. I can still be positive in a way that makes sense for me, though. It doesn’t have to be doom and gloom or bubbles and rainbows, it can be a middle ground, and actually, that would be perfect.

 

Happy Monday all!

 

Much Love,

Val