There is a common feeling that many young people and teenagers experience. It is not sadness or grief, but a sense of emptiness. This strange feeling can lead you to indulge in the false belief that you are alone in this world, or that your life has no meaning.
The inability to see something does not disprove its existence. Yet, we trap ourselves into seeing the world as its darkest and bleakest aspects, and lead ourselves into believing that the world can exist in no other way.
There is no difficult situation that will last for very long, but sometimes, instead of waiting for the situation to pass by as quickly as possible, it is important to analyse it and find the positives in it. That way, when we encounter similar issues in the future, we have the ability to not just survive them, but to thrive in them.
Our very own body has adopted a similar method to help keep us safe. We may observe this in the way that our immune system functions. When a pathogen enters the human body, and the immune system recognises it as a foreign object, it begins to attack it and attempt to remove it from our bodies. During and as a result of this small war between the germs and our immune system, we experience various symptoms such as a fever or runny nose, depending on the type of pathogen that is trying to harm us. When the battle is over and we have completely recovered, our body does not return to the way it was before. Instead, it memorises the pathogen so that it is immediately recognisable when it attempts to enter our body again. So, when the same pathogen attacks a second time, it is exterminated by our immune system without even causing the same symptoms that it did the previous time.
No matter how much we try, we will always encounter situations in life that are uncomfortable or distressing. Apart from adopting this method of both surviving and learning from these situations at the same time, we must also teach ourselves to avoid letting temporary external situations change our perspective or personality. If we allow negative moments or sudden surprises to affect us, then life itself can become exhausting as we progress through it.
For instance, a slender stalk will bend and move in the wind. It may appear feeble, but it can survive a hurricane. On the other hand, a large tree will not move an inch as a result of the wind, but in a hurricane or storm, it will likely break in half. This is because even though the stalk may appear to bend or change to accommodate the wind, it never changes in structure. When the battle is over, it regains its original shape and position. A tree stands up against winds so that the only way it can survive is through sheer force. This means that after prolonged struggle, it will be weakened or completely destroyed.
As young people, it becomes easy to pick up a habit of fighting life and attempting to resist every struggle. In the long run, however, it is healthier for us to become a gentle stalk and accept life as a stormy cloud with its own great silver linings.
