Positively Negative

I don't want to be surrounded by negativity anymore. Something that I have learned is the more you become accustomed to the negativity around you, the more negative you become as a person, because that approach to life just becomes normal to you.

Being a glass-half-empty kind of person is exactly who I am striving not to be, but is exactly the person I am currently.

I've been through some difficult times, and I know life isn't always going to be easy, but I could at least make my life easier by the way I approach these bad situations and experiences. Instead of catastrophising every single thing that goes wrong in my life (and believe me, I've had PLENTY of that recently) I need to start looking for the positives, even when it feels like there are none.

It's very easy to fall into the trap of self-pity and wallow away in my bedroom playing victim to my anxieties and depressing feelings, because (and this may be controversial) it's easier to. It's easier to listen to that voice in my head that tells me I'm worthless, I'm ugly, that nobody likes me and that I'll never amount to anything. It's easier to believe that nobody would miss me if I wasn't here anymore; it's easier to give in. Because fighting against all of that is hard, because fighting all of that can feel like a loosing battle some days. But that shouldn't mean that I should stop.

Like anybody else, I have good days and bad days. On a good day, I can stand up tall with my fingers in my ears to all the irrelevant, cruel comments and opinions that other people may have of me. On a good day I can laugh and joke with my friends, I can even try and be a positive influence on somebody else's bad day. But on my bad days, I am the worst person to be around. I can find a negative in absolutely anything. I could have been given the tools to have an amazing day but I will still find something wrong with it. Part of that comes from habit, the other part I can't explain. It's like any hint of happiness seems too good to be true, so it's become normal for me to ruin a good thing, because it's easier to do that than have it taken away from me anyway.

On a good day, like today, that sounds absolutely ridiculous! It's stupid that I've gotten so caught up in my negativity that I can't even fathom life without it. But I don't want to live like that anymore.

I'm probably contradicting myself with every sentence that I write, but it kind of makes sense to me.

Let me try to some it up:

I want to be happy and positive, but there is a voice in my head that tells me to be sad. I know this isn't okay, but it's easier to be negative than it is to be positive. I am capable of being positive some of the time, but out of fear and plain stupidity I go ahead and ruin it for myself anyway. I know I shouldn't and I try not to, but I'm trapped in a cycle.

So this is me actively trying to break this cycle.

---

Positivity doesn't just come from within yourself. The people you choose to surround yourself with will also play a part in how you experience things, and will naturally affect the way you feel about yourself and others. If you are constantly surrounded by negative people, who only ever have bad things to say about you or the way you live your life, no matter how much of a positive person you was before, that will inevitably wear you down. Negativity is contagious, and its a virus far easier to catch than it is to recover from.

There are people in my life who clearly have a negative impact on me, and on my mood. It's a horrible feeling knowing that there are people out there expecting you to fail, and relish in the gossip of your personal life. I'm not blaming them for the problems that go off inside my head. That's a ME problem, and that's something I have to deal with myself. But a part of dealing with that comes from distinguishing between those who are a good influence on me, and want to see me happy, and those who make me a worse person and make me feel like there's something wrong with me. 

Yes, that sounds selfish, but we only get one life and everybody should absolutely be selfish to some degree when it comes to making ourselves happy and becoming the best version of us that we can be. I've come to the realisation that not everybody is going to support you and there will always be somebody trying to hold you back. The truth is, there are a lot of people out there who actually get enjoyment out of bringing other people down, or people who do it without even realising, because it makes them feel better about themselves.

Not everybody around you is going to support you and help you become the best version of yourselves. People are going to constantly put you down, and not everybody will be a positive influence. 

And if there's one thing I don't need right now is more negativity. So I've decided the next step I need to take is to surround myself with better people: people who support me and want me to succeed. If you ever feel like the people around you are weighing you down or holding you back, then they are not good company to be keeping. I've had a lot of bad company recently, and I have surrounded myself with far too much negativity. I know what I want and the person I want to be, and I know what I need to do to achieve it.

So it's time to cleanse myself of the negative vibes and start living my best life: