The power of perspective and right thinking

Let me share a personal story of something that happened very recently to me. Starting with something that I am sure each one of you reading this would be able to relate with. All this past year, I have kept it pretty much to myself when it comes to in-person meetings. I am fortunate to have a few deep relationships with whom I can talk out aloud and be myself. Other than connecting with them over long phone calls every day, I have been in my own company enjoying reading, exploring new hobbies, or going on short drives.  At the workplace, we started working from home starting March and while I have been going for daily walks up until September but after that, the frequency started gradually decreasing coming to almost a halt by the end of the year. It must have been a handful of times only when I met friends 1:1 and that too outdoors during summer. Despite this secluded life, by God's grace, I have been able to keep myself quite busy and stay positive. 

However, despite this sense of gratitude and balanced mental and physical health this past year, there have also been times where a feeling of a bit of sadness dawned on me. One such moment happened yesterday. I had recently decided to meet my cousin and her family and was quite looking forward to that; only to wake up a week before that with a toothache. Ouch! 

It was very sudden and I tried to trick my mind into believing that this might be out of some hot/cold sensitivity. I tried some home remedies, which of course did not help given that issue was deeper and I ended up taking a dentist appointment. Long story short, I had to visit a dentist and that pushed my visit to my cousin's place for another few days. 

Yesterday for some reason this started bothering me and my mind started the spiral of whys. Why did I have this tooth pain? Even if it had to happen, why not after my cousin's meet? I haven't met anyone for almost a year and now when I am trying to open up, this happened, and so on. So, there's this energy of helplessness that you could probably sense in my thoughts and that was draining. 

Few minutes into this mode, I get a call from another cousin who hears me out and then tells me to look at this from another perspective. If something like tooth pain which was beyond my control would not have happened, then my plans were almost cast in stone. But seems like for some reason that we do not understand at the moment, the universe had something else planned out and wanted me to wait a few more days. 

Now what this thought process did to me was that it took me out of a sense of missing out on something to a feeling that something good has happened that I am not aware of and with that positive vibe, I instantly jumped out of that low mode. 

Now, I understand that everyone's situation is different and the impact that this pandemic has on each one of us is a multi-factorial thing influenced by different factors. My hope with sharing this post is to give one example from my own personal experience that shows the power of perspective and finding positives in every situation as much as we can. One may dismiss this by looking at the intensity of the experience I shared. Isn't that too simple, you ask. And I would not contest the fact that it was rather a passing feeling. But the lesson I picked up from it was around faith and to pay equal attention to the positive aspect of a situation as much as the challenging one. We are humans, not any saint to be completely immune to all hardships. But it can be worth to keep in mind the power of being strong and using the challenges of current times to cultivate stronger mental wellbeing. 

Take care and while you strive to become a stronger version of yourself, also do not be too hard on yourself. 

Dippy