We all have our phrases of motivation for our lives, along with our favorite words/terms that we use to describe our lifestyles in quick form. It's almost a way to build a simple picture for who we are for those who don't know us. Meeting someone for the first time, it lets them kind of get a sense of what to expect from us. Or hope to expect, as often we see some aren't who they say they are or want to be. For this to occur for each of us, though, I've found that knowing who you are or what you want to be is important. Throughout college, I said what I wanted to do and said who I wanted to be, but I really wasn't sure of myself or the things iw anted to accomplish until a few years in. Looking back, my word/phrases I know I had in my brain. But I just didn't truly know how to portray that and truly wake up with the sense that my days would be lived through them. My word is short and sweet:
Positivity.
My word. The one word that I, for one, use to drive the many activities going on in my life, and hopefully the word that I portray towards my peers. It's not something that I work to portray or force. But rather something that has been a part of my being growing up, and truly found leading into my early adult years.
Life is fun. But at times, a lot of times, can be hard. It can be stressful, upsetting, and trying. To stay above the current of life, we have to have our own sense of motivation. Something that helps us see the bigger picture in things. I live my life through positivity because through my own trials and tribulations, (as we, of course, all have our own) it has helped me find the light in situations where light doesn't even seem possible. It can be contagious. I surround myself with the people that I know to this day live by the same thing as me, or even those who I can see it in them. Even when they may not truly take hold of it themselves yet.
The "Shaka" emoji above is, along with the laughing emoji, the most used emoji I have on my iPhone. Knowing the background behind the hand gesture, I've used that for years to mean positivity. That, in turn, has provided jokes and laughs for my friends and I surrounding that emoji. But I know the reason we can laugh about it. I always use it. I think I would like to think of it as my signature emoji. May be slightly self coined, but throughly interactions with my friends I don't think that's the case.
Thinking and living through positive mindsets can not only uplift me even more during success and happiness, but through the darkest times of my life. Through those dark, ridged tunnels I've endured on my journey, it has always helped me find that luring light at the end. It may seem miles down the road, but I see the speck of light. Barely shining through at times, I know it is there. No matter what we go through, there are always ways to make light of a situation. Even when people talk about someone who is at their lowest points. At the lowest we think a person could possibly be, there is still room for observing them looking at their situation with joy. I notice the ones who may be injured/sick, financially unstable, going through a troubling career change, etc. that can set aside the obvious Devil induced darkness, and see it and their future in some kind of brightness. I can go back to a previous post about the foundation I settle within and the work I do with them. This is an example of the darkest place a child could be. Children's cancer shouldn't allow smiles and happiness. But just about every kid I have met has the willpower and positivity to not only smile and converse with those (nurses, doctors, parents, visitors) who want to help them, but to beat the one thing that the human race cannot seem to find a cure for. Something we may think like, "I don't know how they're smiling so much. I would be devastated". But that exact thing is what gives them the power to overcome. To push through the tough procedures and processes that come along with it. The power to drive them to ring that bell.
There are tons of examples that I could list, like getting cut from a team and powering through to settle on a new one and continue the dream. I figured I'd shed light on one that I obviously have shed light on already, but that that specific kind of observation strengthens my own positivity. Being around the thing you live your life by can only amplify that very thing for your own life. Being around the people that share your same passions, visions, and ways of life can only help you succeed in your own life. And when in times you are low and feel like just being low, (because we are all human and sometimes we just feel like being mad as hell) those people help make it easier to do so. With support.
Work to find your true self. Everyone has their own pace in doing so. Just like everything else in life.
Life. Happens. At. Different. Paces.
We have to remember that. Some have found themselves, some are trying hard to do so, and some never think they will. None are better than the other. Don't rush something that technically should come natural. Whether it is "Positivity", "Being a Christian", "Dedicated", or anything you absorb....own it. Own being you. Nobody in this world is the same, nor should they be. It's what makes our world so unique, amazing, and even at times scary.
Be unapologetically you and find the thing you live your life by daily.