I had a bad day yesterday. Oh, nothing horrible happened to cause my bad day. I was just not in a good way. I was over-tired, and reeling from a super-busy and stressful week. Physically, I was in pain, because my shoulder is acting up again. And yesterday, it all kind of compounded, leaving me just a little “off”.

By 5pm, I was exhausted and grumpy. I shut off the computer, put on my pyjamas and spent the rest of the evening motionless on the sofa. I went to bed at 9 and fell asleep at 9:30.

I’m thankful for my bad days. Here’s why:

Crash and Burn
I have a weak sense of when I’m overdoing it. I always have. I go go go go go until I crash. My “bad days” are my crash. It’s my body, mind and spirit’s way of telling me to take a break. When I was in my early twenties, I didn’t recognize my “crash”. So I just barrelled through it, kept working and playing and stressing. Until I got sick. Had mono that kept me in bed and off work for weeks. Then I got sick again. Had to have an operation. Only at that point, did I realize that not listening to my “crash” had become the “crash and burn”, which takes much longer to recover from. I’ve learned to recognize my crash point. I respect it by taking a break, resting my body and mind and focusing on myself.

Moving Forward
Everytime I have one of these bad days, my mind overtakes me. My thoughts become irrational and I get highly emotional. I am extra sensitive to everything. My buttons push more easily. But once I’ve had the opportunity to rest, and I’m on the other side of it, I almost always learn something new about myself. I think about the combination of things that have put me in that state of mind in the first place. And I gain a new sense of self-awareness that helps me to avoid letting those same things overtake me in the future.

Life is a balancing act. We all need to make sure that we are able to create balance in our lives. But balance is just that. The pendulum swings back and forth – to the extreme of contentment and wellness, and to the extreme of stress and confusion. In each of those spaces resides an opportunity to learn and to move forward.

So don’t let the bad days get you down. Accept them for what they are, respect what your body and mind is telling you, and wake up the next day with a new perspective.