when your mind's made up

tuesday blew like a drunk guy workin' a breathalizer. no, really, all kidding aside, i had the most horrible day i've had in a long time. the worst part was that i had no idea why my day was so difficult. it just was.

first off, i must clarify--nothing is "wrong", things aren't "bad", and my life isn't "rough". i simply woke up, showered, and began to get ready. i got in a small fight with my closet and the few exciting peices it offers, but that's not new. all of the sudden, i felt odd... different... uncomfortable... i felt like my little world was slowly turning upside down, and i was entirely not surprised when it didn't re-adjust itself until later that evening. i instantly had a disappointing perspective on everything--i didn't like what i saw in the mirror, i didn't enjoy running through my day's to-do list in my head, and i could barely appreciate the few morning exchanges my husband and i shared before work. i just wasn't having it.

i made my way into the office and felt on the verge of tears all day. every little thing i'd normally brush off was given enough credit in my mind to takeover my thoughts. ugh. what an awful feeling. ultimately, i made a decision to bail out of work a couple hours early. i had permission, of course--there was no way i was going to add my bad day by playing an unadvised day of hookie. i drove home, plopped on the couch, and submitted myself to 2 hours of predictable chick-flickness. thankfully, my dose of "confessions of a shopaholic" was just the right medicine. well, actually, i owe getting out of my slump to the desperate prayers and a self-given motivational pep-talk, but you get the jist. the movie helped. i was finally able to detach from whatever had unnerved me and essentially hit the restart button on my day. i jumped on the good-attitude train for the rest of the evening, and have felt fine ever since. :-) high fives to that!

i'm not sharing the details of my crappy day just for the mere purpose of sharing. it was quite the impactful day, seeing as how it's thursday and i'm still thinking about it. there must be a lesson in this somewhere...

since tuesday, i've found myself thinking that i hadn't had a bad day like that for a while, so it was bound to come. everyone deserves to have a bad attitude at their discretion, right??? ehhh, not so much. as i mentioned, nothing is wrong, life is good, and i'm a happy camper. i believe that each and every morning God gives me a little window of time in which i get to make a decision. i don't think the decision is between "having a good day" and "having a bad day" so much as it is between "working to have a good day" and "not working to have a good day". i'm lucky that good days often come my way, but on the occassional day in which i am blatently presented with that choice, i'm going to force myself to take an extra moment, say an extra prayer, and work a little harder to stretch a smile across my face. that morning's decision may be tested throughout the day, and i'll probably find myself working hard to fight off the little grey clouds that so badly want to cling themselves on to my smallest worry, but i must make it a priority to not allow a bad attitude to win me over. it's draining and tiring, and i definitely don't want it happening when i have no stinkin' reason for it.

bad days will come, but their reasons will come with them. and on those days i'll find the loving arms of my friends, my family, and my God to comfort me.