Practice and You'll Get Better Despite Yourself

I like to use "old sayings" for motivation. I have quite a few bouncing around in my head, and a few favorites that I regularly use. Many of these contain great truths that, if we learn to capitalize upon them, can help us lead happier, more fulfilling lives.

A martial arts instructor once told the class, "If you practice at something, you'll get better despite yourself." That has always stuck with me. The meaning is clear - if we practice, we can't help but improve. Our own incompetencies and weaknesses will give way to improvement if we just practice. I like this saying much better than "Practice makes perfect," which just isn't true. I understand the sentiment, but practice makes better, not perfect.

So, when you think of attempting something new, and you feel a bit anxious that you won't succeed, remember that "If you practice at something, you'll get better despite yourself." No matter what the activity is - learning a foreign language, how to play piano, drawing, putting in a ceiling fan, or having more compassion - you can bank on the fact that you WILL improve if you practice. It cannot be helped - it is the way our brains and muscles work. They learn to adapt to stimuli. Think of your own experiences in the past that will confirm the truth of this statement.

I plan on taking guitar lessons quite soon. Not only do I not play any musical instrument, I objectively do not think I will be a quick study at guitar. However, I do know this for a fact - after I practice playing guitar for a year, I will be much better than I am now. I can take this reality to the bank - as can you.

The Worst Thing to Do When Feeling Depressed

When you are feeling depressed, there are many things that you can do to help yourself feel better or to make yourself feel worse. I've touched on some of the things that can help you feel better before, but right now I just want to mention what not to do. If you reflect upon your own experiences, I think this will ring true.

The last thing that you should do when feeling depressed is to isolate yourself from others and think negative thoughts. Oddly enough, that's often what we want to do when we are feeling depressed, but it's usually the last thing we need. According to the very popular cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) model, our thoughts lead to corresponding emotions. Thinking negative thoughts is likely to result in feeling depressed, anxious, or angry (with the specific feeling depending upon the specific type of thought).

Isolating ourselves from others when feeling depressed often results in us ruminating about the things that are depressing us - a failed romantic relationship, rejection, job dissatisfaction, conflicts, our shortcomings, etc. As these negative thoughts cycle through our heads, we tend to get more and more depressed.

Most of our happiness in life in one way or another is derived from having satisfying relationships with others (and I'm not talking about romantic relationships -it's more broad than this). Isolating ourselves from others makes our world shrink. Our dark thoughts become our private little world. The thing is, relating with others allows us to get out of this dark world and to connect in satisfying ways with others. Most importantly, it will break up the cycle of negative thoughts as we engage in interactions with others.

So, the next time you are feeling depressed - even if you want to go home alone and drink a beer by yourself - try to call a friend and go do something - anything! Even if it doesn't exactly make you happy because you have a major struggle you are going through, you are likely to feel less depressed than if you had gone home, isolated yourself, and focused on the negative things in your life.

Taking Different Perspectives - A Walk in Someone Else's Shoes

Developing a subtle mind is critical to maintaining strong relationships with other people. By this, I mean that it is helpful to view problems and disagreements from different perspectives. Life and people are rich and complicated. Seldom is there just one "right" way to view things.

It is a given that, when a person holds a perspective or position, they think that they are "right." If the person believed that they were wrong, they would not adopt this viewpoint to begin with! To help resolve our differences with others, try in earnest to see the validity in what the other person is saying. This has many benefits:

1. The person will feel "heard." It is validating and feels good for that person just to know that you have made the effort to try to understand their point of view. Plus, no one likes to be thought of as "crazy" or "an idiot" for holding a particular view.
2. It is easier to reach a compromise when we see the merit in another person's position.
3. We are less likely to become polarized when we see things from another person's vantage point. That is, people tend to take more extreme stances - toward the opposite ends of the continuum - when they don't try to see the validity in the other person's perspective. Polarized stances are inherently divisive. Which brings us to the next point...
4. You are better able to maintain a relationship by getting into another person's shoes and walking around in them. Maintaining strong relationships with others is a key to our happiness. So, to put it in an odd way, we end up shooting ourselves in the foot when we don't get into another person's shoes and walk around in them!

Whether it's with our partner, friends, family members, or co-workers, try seeing things through their eyes the next time you are in a disagreement. You are likely to find that this helps you to stay connected with them in a positive way.

A Clarification about Suffering: Resignation vs. Acceptance

In my previous post, I discussed the importance of accepting the fact that an inescapable reality of life is that we suffer. I am not endorsing that we should just throw in the towel and give up when confronted with challenges and suffering. We should not just say to ourselves, "Ah, this is my lot in life...to endure this terrible suffering." That is what I would call resignation. In psychology, this type of resignation is sometimes referred to as learned helplessness. Learned helplessness is said to occur when we give up in the face of adversity because we don't believe that our efforts make a difference when, in fact, they still can. This type of thinking can often lead to feelings of depression.

When our efforts can make a difference, by all means, I think that we should try! There are usually ways to avoid or escape many types of suffering. For example, we cannot stop the aging process. Maybe someday science will even solve that riddle, but I don't believe that it's going to happen in my lifetime. What we can control is how we take care of our bodies. We can exercise, eat healthy foods, get plenty of sleep, put in smoke and carbon monoxide detectors, etc. So, we control what we can and learn to accept the things that we cannot control because fighting against that which we cannot control does absolutely no good. Yelling at the sky will not stop it from raining. In fact, it is harmful to our bodies to be chronically emotionally distressed. Thus, being distressed about growing older, ironically, will cause our bodies to more susceptible to illness, disease, and the ravages of time.

Control the controllables. Try to influence variables that legitimately can be affected by our actions. And know that there is tremendous power in accepting the fact that we cannot control some things. It is liberating, not damning.