#38: LAUGH OUT YOUR SORROWS

Kuli Kuli is hard but life's even harder.

That's it.

God never designed life to be easy. Thus, knowing how to navigate through life's not-so-easy moments is very important. (Yes, at least, as important as eating a plate of fried rice and coleslaw.)

I've had my up and down moments in the past. Even as I write this, I'm not all that "happy" and in the mood to write.

That's life. As I'm trying to navigate myself out of this tiring and seemingly never-ending vicious cycle of doubt, pity and despair, I made an awesome realization.

I got to understand that our brains tend to fixate more on our negative thoughts than the positive ones.

You'd spend a whole day doing great things but it's quite unfortunate that one single mistake will overwhelm you and make you feel as though you've been messing up your entire life.

Yes, we all mess up from time to time. In an infinite space of time, we'll continue to mess up. Mistakes are inevitable. 

But life's already hard and not-so-easy. Complicating our lives by fixating on our problems and, well, overly thinking on things which diminish our self-esteem won't help in any way.

That's why you need to be grateful of the positive things in your life in your down moments. Pausing to reflect about all your “haha” and “aha” moments will do you better than fixating solely on your negative thoughts.

You need gratitude. 

“Gratitude is what gets you out of these toxic loops”, wrote Thomas Mondel. “Gratitude is what helps you resolve it.”

Simple as that. And, well, easier said than done. 

It's not easy to pause in the midst of such moments and just say "voila, let me be grateful”. Hell no. It doesn't happen like that. You have to put in a grand amount of effort.

Like now, despite that I feel like a pile of shit, I'm trying to remind myself of all the people who've told me how impactful my writing has been to their lives.

I can either do that or continue feeling like shit. That's not a path I intend to tread through. Thus, I'm on the side of gratitude.

Another profound realization I made is that life shouldn't be taken too seriously. 

I'm not saying you should live a stupid life. What I mean is, life's problems will never end. And the best thing to do is to stop being overly serious.

Have fun. Enjoy yourself (of course, in a good way). And when life hits hard, pray hard and find ways to move through it.

You can even laugh at your sorrows. Laugh at that mistake you made, however, learn from it.

Why?

Well, because life is already serious to be taken too seriously.

In essence, stop over thinking about your negative thoughts. Express gratitude to yourself. And please, laugh out your sorrows. (I canno com an kee myselv).

P.S. Kuli Kuli is a Nigerian delicacy. It's made by pounding groundnut. As to the processes involved in making it, that'll be a post for another day.