I have learned that no matter how bad things are...

I have learned that no matter how bad things are, you can always make things worse. 

If pain is inevitable, then misery is optional. Pain like suffering comes unbidden. 

But they often do not stay for long. Once the bad news is announced, or the bad event comes, they - like messengers - take their leave. 

They bid you farewell. They have done their part. Their work is complete. The rest is up to you. In their departure, what is often left behind is either misery or hope, helplessness or resilience, resignation or resolution. 

I believe a time is given for mourning. A time for reflection. A time for grieve. After that, it's time for recovery. You can either make it better or make it worse. 

You can ruminate until it hurts. You can sleep all day and refuse to move a muscle. You can mope and sulk to attract pity. You can play the victim and soak up the attention. You can make it worse by refusing to make it better. 

Your choice counts. Your response is invaluable. Your resolve matters.

When you have hit rock bottom, it is often said that the only way to go is up. But many are forgetting that rock bottom is a breeding ground for false comforts too. 

Many will seek solace in staying down instead of drawing hope in standing up. 

To many, wallowing in "rock bottom" is a form of negative rejuvenation where hopelessness and helplessness take turn to demoralize the victim down a vicious spiral of restless desolation. 

So, if the mother of invention is necessity, then the mother of overcoming is proactivity. We take control of the messiness in our life and set things right once again. 

It is a tough undertaking no doubt but every step forward is nevertheless a step that deeply empowers. Falling flat or falling forward is still our choice. 

What makes the crucial difference is a choice that is invested to change our life for the better. The changes may be small, seemingly insignificant, but the circumstantial forces rallied around that one act of proactivity contain the power to break down many walls that conspire to cage us in. 

Never underestimate the power of positive chain reaction. 

Viktor Frankl, a survivor of the Nazi occupation, in his bestseller "Man's Search for Meaning" made this observation:- 

"We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in numbers, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances - to choose one's own way." 

So, yes, times can indeed be bad, no sweat. You are there to make it better. 

Let me end with this reminder. 

There is a crack in everything that God has made. The crack is to allow His light to enter; or else, we would be in a very dark place. 

This light seeks to lead us to the rock that is "higher than I" where we can stand above the trouble waters. It is a place of hope, a place of faith, a place of blessed assurance. 

But the journey to the rock starts with a crack. It starts with our surrender. It starts with letting go and not holding on. It starts when we return to the innocence of a child and not become entrenched in the arrogance of a religious scribe.

As T.S Eliot puts it in "East Coker":-

"In order to arrive at what you do not know

You must go by a way which is the way of ignorance.

In order to possess what you do not possess

You must go by the way of dispossession.

In order to arrive at what you are not

You must go through the way in which you are not.

And what you do not know is the only thing you know

And what you own is what you do not own

And where you are is where you are not."

To me, that is faith. Not arrived faith, but journey faith. Not righteousness declaring, but imperfection overcoming. And not riches in appearance, but riches in the eternal hope of His reappearance. Amen. Cheerz.