The devil made a garage sale. He put a desk in front of his house and placed all his nice tools there. Envy, malice, dispair, hatred and jealousy were all on sale, one by one nicely lined up. But apart from those off to the side he had his favorite tool. It looked very used and was priced above all the others. It was very, very effective and it worked better than any of the other tools. It was labelled with the sign “discouragement”.
Why would this one be so useful?
Well, no one would recognise this as a devilish tool – and it would open doors to all the other gadgets. It’s well suited to break in where doors would not open for the devil.
What sounds like a childrens’ tale obviously has some dire truth to it.
We all have been there, in a position of hopelessness, where we would sit and just be without hope, devastated and without the drive to carry on.
Discouragement is poisonous.
It blurs our vision and we tend to see things much more negative than they actually are. We tell ourselves a story about the devastating hopelessness. But in most cases, we exaggerate and see things too dark. Actually, much darker than they truly are!
Feelings of discouragement may make us believe that we are incapable.
In a discouraged state we think we are a failure, in all and every thing, all the times and in all cases. Well. That’s never true, is it?
So we actually hurt our selfworth and fall short to appreciate ourselves.
Last not least, discouragement may make us believe, it’s someone elses fault.
And yes, this might be true! But maybe that’s not the full story.
Pointing fingers is the behaviour of a coward. Lousy behaviour.
It’s understandable that sometimes our expectations don’t get met. This fact can work as an engine to move us forward faster and better! These ideas may help:
– See things more realistically.
Check the facts. It may not be as dire as you tell yourself.
– Try to learn.
What exactly happened? Where exactly did it happen? And why did it happen?
These 3 questions help a ton. They help when you practice scales as well when you sort out an argument with your in-laws. You can always win by learning!
– Smile at yourself.
Smile at yourself that you ran into drama. Smile about your exaggeration. Smile about being a human, which means a being that fails.
It’s normal that things go wrong.
You are not a machine. And a machine does not smile.
So, there is always a reason the be encouraged. Really, there is, I promise!
Much love,
Anselma
