Does your life suck?

Seems like everywhere I go, there’s always someone talking about how bad life is.  I know you hear it, too.  “My job sucks!  My spouse sucks.  This economy sucks.  My life sucks!”

You could really get depressed listening to that nonsense all day long.  Imagine if you were a psychotherapist.  Man, THAT would SUCK!  But, it really is amazing how in a country as affluent and rich with resources, opportunities and freedoms that virtually anyone could be depressed.  Yet, the Unites States consumes more psychotropic drugs than the rest of the world COMBINED!

How could this be?  Amid the affluence and freedom available to every American, we each should be far enough up Maslow’s ladder that depression or anxiety simply would not exist in America.  Even the poorest of American’s are RICH (not just well off) compared to most of the rest of the World.

Maybe we’ve just grown so accustomed to “Easy Street” that we’ve become self-absorbed as a nation and a people.  Seems like we’re either feel guilty because we have more than the rest of the World or inadequate that we don’t have as much as our neighbor.

What would happen if instead of comparing ourselves to everyone else, we simply compared ourselves to what WE each could do or be?  Then, the only anxiety in a person’s life would be that they are not living up to their own potential.  That realization should free anyone and everyone from depression and anxiety because once you realize that your only competition is yourself, you can correct virtually any problem you have.

Sure, there are some problems over which you have little or no control,  However, you DO have control over how you see those problems and how you deal with them.  That’s when you quit being a victim and become a participant in life.  The more you participate the less time you have to be merely a spectator in your own life.  Talk about adding meaning to life.  Wow!

A mentor once said “Comfort arrives as a guest, lingers as a host and stays to enslave you.”  Don’t become a slave to your own comfort zone.  Get off the bench and onto the field.  Taking the hits and making the hits add a whole dimension to the game of life that is never apparent from the stands or in front of the TV or PC.

Make life worth living by living it!