Take Action!

Action determines how you feel! Are you a creature of moods and sometimes find it difficult to shake out of a bad one? Those moods induced by feelings of self-doubt, uncertainty, low self-esteem, melancholy, anger, frustration and so on? My belief is that action determines how you feel, and not the other way round. If you wallow in your bad mood, waiting to feel better, you might have a long wait. By taking action, you can turn the mood on its head because your thoughts are occupied on something else. The next time you’re in a bad mood or feel one coming on, take some exercise! Go for a run or a brisk walk. If that isn’t possible for any reason, then listen to relaxing music: Vivaldi, Mozart or Brahms are just three that come to mind. Don’t sit around waiting to feel in the mood, change your mood!

Any action is better than inaction! It’s the first step in changing the situation that could engulf you and have you rolling around in self-pity! Another method is to laugh a lot! In fact, laughter might be the best medicine. You may be familiar with the adage, ‘Laugh and the world laughs with you, cry and you cry alone!’ I believe this old saying holds true today. For me, it brings to mind a man by the name of Norman Cousins who was diagnosed with having terminal cancer. He was apparently written off by the medical profession but decided to fight rather than lie down and wait for the inevitable. His way of fighting was to order an abundance of movies that had made him laugh over the years. Films featuring the Marx Brothers, such as “A Day at the Races,” and “A Night at the Opera.” He also played the many Laurel and Hardy comedies, and there were plenty of those. These movies he had running continuously in his room at the hospital. It is recorded that he laughed himself back to health! Perhaps we can take heed of that and believe that laughter is the best medicine!

There are so many excuses for not taking action and seeing people fixated on handheld listening devices whilst walking, sitting on a bus or train appears to be commonly accepted. If this is you, then give the device a rest; ignore the urge to get fixated on the television or focus on what has gone amiss. Life is not always plain sailing and situations happen to us all. Resist the urge to do nothing and hope that ‘things’ will go away. Help yourself to brighten the mood and become a person of action!

Hope these thoughts are appropriate for you to accept and take on board. For now, please excuse me as I prepare for my morning walk. Not that I’m in a bad mood or feel one coming on, simply that taking action has been one of my habits over the years.

Must run, John.