I ask myself every new day: Today will I just survive or will I thrive? There are days when surviving is all I can manage. But with each fresh day, I come back to this goal of thriving, even if by the smallest measure. I find this especially important with the increasing chaos and panic in the world around me.
Surviving
Surviving, aka. Just Getting Through The Day, has two directions or outcomes: neutral and reverse. On the days that just aren’t going my way for whatever reason, I strive to survive the day with a neutral outcome. I’m no better or worse and tomorrow is a new day to start again.
But on some days, I get stuck in reverse: I take my stress, anxiety and frustrations out on my family or drown my self-pity with a bottle of wine or other behaviors in direct conflict with Thriving.
Thriving
I’m charitable with what I consider a Thriving Day. It might be that I respond more calmly and patiently to an outburst from my teenager. Or I start a new training on a technical subject that interests me. Or I push myself harder (but not too much!) than normal in my strength routine. Maybe I take a long brisk walk outside instead of 30 minutes on the elliptical indoors. Or make some small progress on a personal project…like a blog post!
But I have zero tolerance for pretending I can offset bad behaviors with good and still call it a Thriving Day. No matter how many wonderful, positive things I’ve done, a single asshole, negative behavior resets the day to Surviving.
I’m hard on myself. But I also feel I’m being honest, especially to those closest to me. An asshole is an asshole no matter how many great things you do behaving like an asshole.
So today, if I get through the rest of the day without going in reverse, I’ll consider it a Thriving Day and this post is proof!