Let’s be honest here. Everyone has a sob story, everyone has something bad happen to them, so let’s put it into perspective. My story, whilst it can be considered devastating to some, it can also be considered nothing in comparison to others. 

I’ll put it bluntly, my life isn’t horrible and I don’t think the world will end everyday I wake up. I’ve had problems but nothing worth publishing in the papers. I guess the main thing I learnt from all my bad experiences in life is not to think positively and immerse my self in some false belief that the world is perfect and my life is gum drops and rainbows, but to acknowledge that yes whilst there are many terrible things that happen to people, there’s no point in dwelling on them because then we’ll never move on and we’ll never have the strength to actually try and make things better. By acknowledging the bad, we can then start to overcome it and realize the good.

And whilst this may sound like a ‘pessimistic, down beat attitude’, I much rather prefer the euphemism Realistic.

Here’s the difference:

Pessimist: I hate everyone. Realist: I dislike many people that have done something personally to me or simply portray annoying character traits.

Pessimist: The world is awful and I hate it. Realist: There are many problems with society today, things that people should strive to fix immediately

Pessimist: Everyone wants to kill me. Realist: That man wielding a shotgun and threatening to kill me wants to kill me.

and…

Pessimist: The glass is half empty. 

Realist: The glass is half empty, however the half that is there looks delightfully refreshing.

Cheers to a satirical point of view, and a refreshing perspective on life.

Now it’s safe to say I do feel emotions, whilst it may not come across as that. I’ve heard things that have happened to people related to me, great friends with me, acquaintances to me and even people I don’t even know, that have made me physically ill. It makes me wonder, why do these things happen to people? What is it that they have done that makes them deserve this to happen to them? A woman who has never been anything but generous and kind to every human being gets stage 4 cancer. An innocent, autistic child loses her parents to a drug overdose. A comical, uplifting boy is torn between two abusive parents. An honest, ethical and kind mother loses her youngest child.

Why do these things happen to people?

People sometimes think, “Everything happens for a reason” or “It shapes their character and makes them stronger”. But it doesn’t. Terrible things don’t happen for a reason, they happen just to inconvenience us. And we don’t cope with them well, it doesn’t make us stronger straight away. It makes us fall into a blackhole of self hatred, depression and remorse. And we keep on falling and falling and falling and falling until finally,

we stop.

We stop falling and think. We look at the situation and think, was it worth all those tears and pain and hardship? Yes. It was. Because crying those tears, feeling that pain and dealing with that hardship is what makes us human. Pain is the most awful emotion that people can feel but once it is felt, it makes it that much easier to feel it again until presto!

We are strong.

And if we can manage to deal with the most awful things that happen in our lives, we can do whatever we want. But it’s safe to say we were already doing that.

Glass half empty or glass half full?

Or is the drink just delightfully refreshing no matter what?