Kudos positive attitude!

What is it all about when one has a positive attitude? A friend of mine shared this wisdom quote on Facebook earlier today and it flashed straight through me when I saw it. To me, the saying crystallizes the very meaning of the positive attitude perfectly; if you’re feeling blue there’s always an escape route of some kind to better. You may not find it right away but it’s still there – each time after all.

But why do some people then have a negative attitude? I’m a person with a sound positive attitude, so I’m thinking of it every now and then – especially when I bump into it by facing negative people, for example. Why would people like to complain about mostly anything possible? Why would they like to waste their energy in that way? The more you complain the more it stirs up the negativeness in you. And the worse it makes you feel. To me, it’s simply a waste of time in life.

I believe in two ways in life; some things happen for a reason how it’s meant to happen. Some things you can work on to happen how you like them to happen. But it’s a skill to see positiveness in things. If you pick a cup of coffee at the office in the morning and it’s too strong would it be worth moaning about it? Or would it be better to think, “Well, perhaps I could make it next time, so it’d turn out better.”

Being positive also asks for a bit of strength. If life gives you a hundred reasons to cry you’ve got to be tough enough to say, “Heck, you see I’ve gotten a thousand reasons to smile, so you just drew a blank!”

Life experiences have grown me a sound positive attitude as well as a good self-esteem. Beginning from the earlier years, I was teased in school because of my poor sight. But instead of that it’d have made me negative I kept thinking, “Am I really worse than the others?” And the more I was thinking about it the more I realized I really was not.

I believe that examining your mind and ‘being on the same level with yourself’ are the things that help you to reach both a good attitude and a sound self-esteem. That’s how I think I’ve reached them at least. I’m well aware of myself, my ways of thinking, my opinions, my ideas, my thoughts, my feelings, and my traits (both good and bad). Some of my friends say to me every once in a while that I tend to be way too philosophical. But I don’t see it’s a bad thing that I do ponder a lot.

I also believe that losses of life teach. Even if a loss is mostly always a negative thing you can make benefit of it. For example, if you break with someone it might be sad to lose a person. But it could also be better without such a person you had wanted to break with. If you didn’t want to break with the person but they did it would be sad. But on the other way around, it might be better without such a person who had decided to break with you. So, there’s never just one aspect. There are always more.

For me and my life, the past 12 months have been more or less rough. There have been issues in the family, broken relations, passing, losing very important things, and difficulties at work (not caused by me that I have to specify here just in case). And to be honest, mostly I’ve been innocent to all the happenings.

But after all, when life has thrown me the hundred reasons to cry I’ve found the thousand reasons to smile – maybe not right away but at the end of the day. Each time I’ve managed to find the escape route from the sadness even if it may have seemed more or less impossible at first.

Wisdom quotes are very good to exist. They can say so much, they can give so much, and they can make you feel better when you start thinking of their meanings, analyzing them, and interpreting them. That’s why I wanted to share this wisdom quote that became one of my favorites at the very moment I first saw it today. It may be these thoughts could give positiveness and strength to someone else too. At least thinking a bit again made me feel better.

Everything happens for a reason

I certainly do believe in that! Every once in a while I get a proof of it, so I’ve learned already long time ago that it simply is so. The latest occasion having happened to me is such a good example that it simply has to be shared.

At the end of February, a few keys of my laptop keyboard came off. The laptop is four and a half years old and it’s been in daily use, so it was no wonder. I called to the customer service of the shop where I’ve bought the laptop and asked how much the new keyboard and its installation would cost. I wanted to see if it’d be reasonable to fix the laptop or buy a new one. After all, the laptop works still very well.

On Monday the 3^rd of March, I got the price estimation which was decent, so I agreed. The guy in the customer service of the shop registered the details that I’d take my laptop to the repairing department of the shop. I took the laptop there on Wednesday the 5^th. And here comes why I believe that everything happens for a reason.

Wednesday the 5^th was a crazily busy day at the office. I had to be in the switchboard taking calls for three and a half hours; from 12:30 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. It was really busy, which made the bosses anxious, and it made me worn-out. Top of all, I missed my lunch break because I had a meeting from 8:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. and there were a few urgent tasks, and then I was called to help in the switchboard.

I'm used to hectic days and a hectic rhythm of doing things at work. But when I popped in to pick coffee, visit the bathroom, and check if there were some urgent tasks waiting TWICE between 12:30 p.m. and 4:00 p.m. in both times my boss came to my office and said, "Why are you here? Go back to take calls." For God's sake, I was away from the line for hardly five minutes in both times. It really made me upset and wonder if I was just being paranoid or that was a bit inhuman to treat me like that.

Usually when there's a rush in some switchboard team and I'm called to help I just drop everything and go because it's mostly from half an hour to an hour how long I’m needed. So, it's okay because I’d be back to my tasks rather soon. But that day it was the whole afternoon I had to be there on the line. And during the whole day, I only had one break that was about 10 minutes plus the two breaks when I went to pick coffee and check the tasks at my office. I simply didn’t have time for anything more.

From work, I then went to the shop with my laptop. But the guy in the repairing department said there was no information about the laptop or even my name. And in that way, he didn't agree to take the laptop in. I explained him the situation but he just shrugged his shoulders because he couldn’t find any information.

So, I made an hour way there and had to wait there for 20 minutes just to hear I had gone there in vain. Then I made an hour way back home. Before that, I had had to work one and a half hours extra at work, so that I'd get the most urgent tasks done – those tasks I didn't have time to do within my actual working hours because I had had to be in the switchboard.

If I hadn’t been given such rough time at the office by my boss I would have made a great fuss in the shop. Such misunderstandings easily get my blood to boil. The mistake was obviously made by the shop and not by me. But I was simply too tired by the time I got there. The day at the office had nearly knocked me out, so when the guy didn’t agree to take my laptop in I just left. The only thought I had was that I’d like to get home, take a hot shower, and go to bed. On my way home, I was really feeling blue and worn-out.

On Thursday morning, I called to the customer service and told what had happened. The guy there was totally puzzled and he said the information was there in the database that he had registered on Monday. I asked how I could make a complaint and he gave me an e-mail address. Just an hour later from when I had sent out the complaint the manager of the repairing department answered me and said the guy who had served me in the previous day had messed something up – he was really sorry for it and for all the trouble it had caused to me.

He said I could bring the laptop in and they’d surely take it in that time. I asked if it really was so that fixing a couple of keys would take even three weeks – that’s the estimation of the time I had gotten. He said it was so because they have to order a whole new keyboard for the laptop and it usually takes that long until it arrives at the shop.

I asked if it could be done in the way that they ordered it and when it arrived I’d take the laptop in. In that way, I could keep the laptop instead of taking it to the shop to wait the new keyboard there. He said it’d be okay. He asked the exact details of my laptop, so that they’d get a right keyboard ordered.

I found an external keyboard that I could borrow. Finally, on Monday this week I got an e-mail from the shop that the new keyboard has arrived. I took my laptop in on Tuesday morning at 9:00 a.m. At 11:30 a.m. I got a text message that the laptop was ready. So, even if I had been told it would take one to two days it took two hours!

Some people think the kind of way to believe is silly. But I don’t think so. Of course, you can also work on things to happen in the way you want. But sometimes things happen just in the way it’s meant to be. I didn’t think anything good would come up from the fact I had been turned away when I was on my way home from the shop on Wednesday the 5th. But when the whole thing was settled on Thursday morning I realized it had gone just like it had been the best.

Later on, I told my boss that I was actually grateful to her for keeping me on the run on Wednesday the 5^th and sucking all the energy out of me. She said it hadn’t been her purpose to be so curt to me but sometimes it simply happens when the situation gets nearly impossible. So, the bad busy day actually brought up a lot of good. The bad Wednesday the 5^th surely made things to happen how it was meant to be.