A Letter to Yourself on a Good Day

I’m having a bad day.

Maybe you are, too. Or maybe you're having a good day. Either way...there's something I'd like to say.

Bad days have several sources: situational, hormonal, depression-related, or just a day when things aren’t going well for you and your mood adjusts to the circumstances and snowballs into a Bad Day. You can’t avoid them, like you can’t avoid the rain falling on you in an open field, but you also don't have to drown within them.

Bad Days can descend on you like an itchy, acrylic black sweater that doesn’t breathe and feels more and more annoying as the day wears on, but it’s too tight that you feel like you can’t actually take it off.

I have good days, too—I’ve been lucky enough to have more good days than bad—and I’ll have them again. I love those good days. I love being alive on those good days. The acrylic sweater is gone and is replaced with a more breathable option, like cotton, and things feel light, airy, easy.

The difference between your mood and emotions, your way of reacting, your overall perspective on a good day vs. a bad day is striking. I sometimes have a hard time reconciling the vast difference. Bad days are like bad dreams that you can’t see outside of…the dreams during which you don’t realize you’re dreaming. When you wake up—once it’s over—the Bad Day can often seem inconsequential and insignificant—as though everything was a huge deal in the dream but then seems so silly when you look back it. Sometimes it doesn’t even make sense.

If you can take the time to focus on the reality that this is just a phase, whether it’s just a Bad Day or a Bad Month or a Bad Season, you can reach down into your heart and find the Good Day feeling. That’s you, and it’s always there. Believe me when I say it’s always there. It’s just being pushed down in favour of the dominant, wretched Bad Day feelings.

So how do you reconcile the differences? How do you reach out and link arms with the happiness and joy and the real you that is buried under the sadness?

Well, counselling or talking to someone is a great option—but you could start with this: when you’re having a good day, when you feel like you’re living out your life with purpose, when the stars seem to align and the birds are singing a sweet chorus and you feel the warmth of God’s love everywhere, when you recognize your value and when you feel happy and just want to help others out of that surplus, write yourself a letter.

Tell yourself how you really feel about yourself. Tell the truth. Remind yourself of how lucky you are and of all the things you have. Make a list of what you know you are truly thankful for. Tell yourself all the things you like about yourself. Tell yourself all the things you don’t love about yourself but you’ve accepted. Crack a joke. Dish out some wisdom. Reassure yourself that “the heart of life is good,” as John Mayer says, and that you’re going to be OK. You can become drenched in a rainstorm, but it’s just water; it will dry.

Within feelings of hopelessness, waves of crushing sadness, indecision, and scattered thoughts, it can be really hard to remember these things, yet it’s extremely crucial that you do. You know yourself better than anyone else does, so it stands to reason that you will know what you need to hear when you’re going through a rough time.

I did this for myself this year, and I’ve already gone back to that letter more than once. It has really helped.

We can struggle with reaching out to others and saying that we need help, and I would definitely recommend finding the courage to do it, but at the very least, as a small but meaningful start, you can have something written in your own hand, for your own self, reminding yourself of your value and your purpose. Remind yourself of the truth that exists underneath the storm clouds that threaten rain.

Friends, family, mentors and counsellors are all really important and can make a huge difference in helping you through bad days. Just don’t forget the strength you have within yourself, to help yourself gain perspective and emotional balance.

Write a letter to yourself on a good day, and read it on a bad day.