Are you pulling the plug on life?

by Beth McHugh | More from this Blogger

19 Jul 2006 04:45 PM

Do you find yourself unhappy and frustrated for much of your day? Have you lost that sense of joy in your life? When was the last time you were truly happy?

Here is a simply, yet effective way to increase your happiness quotient, and recapture the essence of your own powerful life-force. Take a sheet of paper and make two lists. One list should be of the things in your life that currently bring you joy and a sense of peace and wellbeing. Next, write a list of the people and activities that drain you and leave you feeling dispirited, tired, irritable, angry, or anxious.

Once you've done that have a close look at your lists, in particular, the balance of the pleasant versus the unpleasant. Everyone will have items on the debit side of the list, after all, no life is one of perfect bliss. But we all need enough on the credit side, enough happy activities, to make our lives bearable. If your list of negativity outweighs your positive items, then it is not surprising that you have lost that sparkle in your eye and the simple joy of living.

Time to take action, but what action will have an immediate effect on how you feel about your life? Look at your list again and this time note the negative feelings that you attach to all of the items in your list of life-draining people and activities. This is where changes can be made to improve your overall quality of life.

Where anger and resentment are attach to a particular person or activity, there is a corresponding amount of your thought and bodily energy being drained from your mind and body that could be otherwise put to use for enjoying life. Carrying anger and resentment against another person strangely has no effect on the person concerned, but has an enormous effect on you. You can expend huge amounts of your own personal energy in thinking, brooding, and plotting against people who have carried out imagined or even very serious actions against you. But in the end, you are the biggest loser.

Let them go. In doing so you are not letting them off the hook, you are setting yourself free to soar through each day as you were designed to do. People are often reluctant to forgive, believing that it somehow excuses the often heinous crimes that that person has committed. It is human nature to believe this, but in this case, human nature got it so very wrong.

As Robert Muller once said:

To forgive is the highest, most beautiful form of love. In return you will receive untold peace and happiness.

Learn more about Beth McHugh

Beth McHugh began her career as a geologist and worked both in industry and as a university researcher.

View Full Profile | More from this Blogger

Dale Harcombe (10327) 15 Jun 2008 11:06 PM

Beth, I've linked to this in blog http://christian.families.com/blog/change-what-you-can

Beth McHugh (13211) 15 Jun 2008 11:16 PM

That's great, Dale!