So, I have been in a “funk” for the last few days. There isn’t any one particular reason for my funk, just a bunch of petty grievances, nostalgic feelings regarding my kids growing up, aggravations with the renovation process that we have going on in our house, letting myself be brought down by sad news stories and a busy schedule, etc. etc. Yesterday, my funk reached its crescendo point. At that point, I had let all of my molehills turn into mountains and I was feeling very lowly. Now two things have happened that have jarred me out of my funk and I can feel that my switch has been flipped (luckily, I don’t have clinical funk and my heart goes out to you who do have to deal with that very real pain). The first thing that happened to help me get back to my happy place, is that, while I was spiraling with what many people now call “first world problems”, my friend texted our group chat requesting prayers for a family who she works with. Let’s just say that this family has real problems, severe problems, life or death problems,” just getting by” problems, severely ill child problems, overwhelming problems. Let’s just say that my perspective changed really quickly. Of course, I let the perspective change then spiral me into a guilt funk, where another friend reminded me of my own words, “Just because someone is having a heart attack, doesn’t mean that your broken toe doesn’t hurt.” Still, I was letting my broken toe turn into a gangrenous, oozing wound that I wasn’t working on healing.
So the number one thing that helped me flip my switch was a perspective change that caused me to count my very many blessings. The second thing that helped me, is that I really don’t like feeling bad. It’s not my natural state. I started getting really sick of feeling down. So, I started looking for healthy ways to get “out of my head.” If you are a regular reader, you know that I love animals. So, as I was perusing the amazing Twitter site Nature’s Lovers (talk about a “healthy upper” – you MUST check this website out!), I saw a video of a full grown cheetah kneading on a full grown tiger. Both big cats seemed to be enjoying the process. I honestly couldn’t believe my eyes. I didn’t think that it was safe to house two different animal species in the same enclosure (particularly large predators), so I decided to do some research. The truth is, that animals in the wild rarely choose to live and bond with other wild animals species (although there have been isolated cases), but apparently in captivity this practice is much more common, particularly if the animals bonded when they were still babies. The most interesting case of this phenomenon is the “BLT” case in an animal sanctuary in Georgia, called Noah’s Ark. There, for many years, until the sad recent natural deaths of two members of the “BLT” crew, a full grown male lion, a full grown male tiger and a full grown male brown bear lived together, peacefully and happily, as brothers. In fact, when the sanctuary tried to separate them for fears that they would start fighting, they all cried incessantly for each other. You see, they were held captive in a drug dealer’s basement when they were young and they bonded fiercely to each other. When the police raided the drug den, they found the animals, malnourished, mistreated and ill, but they since blossomed after getting good care, and became a favorite attraction at the sanctuary. Right now, Baloo the Bear, is the only living member of BLT, but they say that he is thriving. (on an offside, if you were wondering like I did, the reason why Leo, the lion didn’t have a mane, is that he was neutered at a very young age) It’s feel-good stories like this, that I like to fill my head and my heart with, when my mind keeps trying to stay in a negative spin cycle.
Changing my perspective, remembering that my blessings far outweigh any of my grievances and looking for the good, miraculous stories out there (and there are A LOT of them), made my funk fade away.
“What consumes your mind, controls your life.” -Bryce Lewis
“I refuse to entertain negativity. Life is too big and too short to get caught up in empty drama.” – Bryce Lewis
