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How to Be Happy When You're in an Unhappy Situation : zen habits
Allow yourself to be unhappy
Wanting to get away from the unhappiness doesn’t make it better. It usually just prolongs the pain.
Instead, tell yourself that it’s OK to feel unhappy. Pause and allow yourself to feel it, to fully immerse in that unhappiness. Be curious about it, explore it, become intimate with it. It’s not pleasant, but it doesn’t kill you. In fact, it’s where the healing starts.
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Allow yourself to be unhappy
Wanting to get away from the unhappiness doesn’t make it better. It usually just prolongs the pain.
Instead, tell yourself that it’s OK to feel unhappy. Pause and allow yourself to feel it, to fully immerse in that unhappiness. Be curious about it, explore it, become intimate with it. It’s not pleasant, but it doesn’t kill you. In fact, it’s where the healing starts.
See the pain as aliveness
Being alive means feeling pain, feeling fear, feeling disconnected sometimes. Allow yourself to feel it, and imagine that this is what living feels like.
Because life isn’t numbness and avoidance, and it’s not all butterflies and sunshine.
Find gratitude somewhere
Find three happy things in this moment to be grateful for.
Even small things we take for granted, like eyesight and music. Having relationships. Being supported by millions of people. Being able to do all the things you can do. You can find gratitude for any of these things, at any time.
Find joy in being alive
Even in our worst moments, we can find some joy in this not-small fact, that we are alive.
Your heart is pumping. How freakin’ awesome is that?
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