Thank you Gary of Fiction is Food, for nominating me for 3- Day Quote Challenge. As I mentioned during the first day, I will be quoting few favorite lines from Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist.

How many times have we grumbled about things going wrong in our lives, while doing nothing about them? Though it doesn’t require any effort to lament and blame the circumstances when something goes wrong, complaining hardly makes us feel better. In fact, it makes our state worse. The reason for screwed up lives may not be us always. Yet, there are certain ways to make our lives better irrespective of the pain caused by us or others, or the situations. One such way is self-improvement.

Consider disruptions in relationships between individuals due to differences in attitudes or misunderstandings. During this phase, people either stop communicating due to the sudden eruption of their egos, or slowly turn a victim of emotional breakdown due to the distance from their loved one. Making efforts to amend the situation is the best way to handle a stir in relationships. What if nothing works? You’ve tried to make the situation better, but in vain. The problem might sometimes be beyond the capability of both the individuals involved. What can you do then? Will you keep pondering over the ruined relationship and curse your fate? Will you drench yourself in agony and pain since you are helpless? Thinking of any of the above stated options will not only deteriorate yourself, but also make you weak and vulnerable.

The right way to handle crisis, when situation gets out of hand or when you feel nothing else would make it any better, focusing on improving oneself is the most effective option! Each of us have ample scope for improvement in one way or the other. If you can’t think of any ways to become a better person, then you might have to re- evaluate your perception about yourself! You may get apprehensive as to how can improving oneself make everything better, when the problem isn’t about the individual but external factors? Yes, the dark phase of your life is not an outcome of your actions. It might be because of someone else- Someone’s attitudinal  deficiency, their health issues or circumstances. Irrespective of the reasons for happenstance, improving thyself makes everything better!

How? Focus on improving yourself. You may be good at many things, but may be lacking certain traits or habits. Try to spend time on developing such habits, especially during hard times. It may be exploring a hobby that you always wished to learn, improving public speaking skills that might help you become a better communicator, inculcating discipline in your life to get rid of laziness or focusing on your health by initiating a fitness regime which you never had. The list can go endless on proper analysis! These may sound lame and ineffective at the time of crisis, but the impact of improving ourselves can make a huge difference on our outlook and our lives. After a good number of days of being involved with making yourself better, you will notice that your life will magically turn better! The circumstances that resulted in your pain, will slowly start vanishing for whatever reasons. This is no wizardry! You were so involved in making yourself better, that the time invested in self- improvement has never made you realize the time that has gone by! Which otherwise would have appeared ‘forever’, if spent lamenting, worrying and depressed!

Time heals everything. Every pain, every obstacle, every fear, every failure that you are going through now is as temporary as the season. Meanwhile, strive to make yourself better and everything will fall in place eventually, magically!

“Strength doesn’t come from what you can do. It comes from overcoming the things you once thought you couldn’t.” – Rikki Rogers