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Thank You for the Bad Days

I know sometime in your daily mundane life this happened to you too. Out of nowhere you realize your job seems pointless, the whole situation you’re in is gray and meaningless and with a deep sigh you ask whether or not you should carry on. These are definitely one of those bad days.

These are the moments when you automatically go on rewind – as far as your childhood days - and one by one you remember your dreams and what you want your life to be and the things you want to achieve. Then your heart gets heavier and heavier - as you realize the list of the things you haven’t achieved and haven’t done seems endless.


Toxic days and bad moments
 

The art of talking to yourself

These bad moments does no good if it sends us deeper into our lifeless everyday routine where the “out-there” is ignored. But sometimes we need these bad days. They could act as bumps on the road – like those rumble strips on a monotonous highway. We need them because oftentimes we just go on and on and forgot to look at the world around us.

It was during those bad moments that I yearn for something that makes sense, something that will help me end the madness.  It was one of those bad days that threw me out there, and discovered the beauty of travel.

Happiness discovered thru bad days

I am a teacher by profession. I took teaching units after I finished my government scholarship in college and I honestly fell in love with this noble profession. I sometimes imagine myself teaching indigenous kids on remote mountains. I even enrolled Master’s Degree to guarantee a secure career on this field - but I quit on the last semester.

Our desire to be lost : To lose myself. I crave for the unknown, the unfamiliar, or the strange in both myself and my surroundings. It is an impulse evident in my gesture of following other travelers, for this  is  an action that promises  to transform the banal reality of my mundane days.

Burdened by pointless and debilitating frustrations about my past decisions, endlessly looking back at the unalterable, I decided yet again to lose track and just go with the flow – like fallen leaves on a crazy river. I decided not to pursue teaching career for hundreds of reasons. I let go of my small dream of giving my share in changing the world, instead I just keep the world from changing me.

I end up working on a shipping company, pathetically trying to climb the corporate ladder.  

Oddly, in a different way, I still crave in pursuing that small dream. I haven’t clearly lost what I thought I have lost. Back in 2009, out of extreme boredom and a series of bad days, I decided volunteering for Greenpeace. It is during my short stint at Greenpeace that I witness breathtaking actions and testimonies from activists. That is the time I told myself I have to get out there.



Enjoying Mt. Pinatubo's famous crater lake after the trek

It was also a bad day - and that need to remove myself from the mad rush of my daily routine - that I decided to join a group of bloggers in a trek to Mt. Pinatubo back in 2011. All I want is a breathe of fresh air that day but I discovered something more profound while walking on ashes of Mt. Pinatubo. After that trek, I decided I must climb more mountains, and that is when my mountain climbing escapades began. 



You could almost cry just by watching sunrise at Mt. Pulag
I also used to blame my boring routine on the need to work and earn money. It's a convenient and perhaps useful way to keep me working and working so I can earn. Well, that’s reality. I need to work – and sometimes I have to endure a whole hell week working – but I also need a break.

The adult world can make you sad, this is what I realized. This is the time when we worry about so many things – career, money, love life, gadgets, facebook likes, twitter mention, traffic, summer heat, salary increase and sex.

Bad day? Why not go underground.
This realization makes me discover the art of being a weekend travel warrior. It was during our weekend travel gig back in 2014 at the Bangui Windmills in Ilocos that I unexpectedly re-discover those long buried childhood happy memories.

Bring out the child in you at the Bangui Windmills
I learned that no matter how rich or successful we struggle to become, it is always important to remember the joys of our childhood and forget the awful remembrances of the arduous climb to the corporate ladder, and the haunting stampede of adult responsibilities.

Go out there!



I’m sure there will always be toxic days, impossible days, tiring and stressful days – bad days. But let us thank these bad days for giving us such an ability to confront, accept and transcend. These situations could actually help us find ourselves doing things that give us freedom and permitting us to discover things that can make us happy.

So let us go out there …transform this heart breaking bad days into winning days. There will always be bad days, lots of it. So do something about it before it’s too late – before you are compromised beyond repair.
 
So, how about you? How do you turn bad days in discovering best days of your life?



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