Every next second is a new chance to be your better self. Even if you sucked in the last second. That’s how short and forgiving life can be.
Speaking from experience, it is really hard to break any kind of cycle that has been constant for a lengthy time period. For example, for the beginning of the fall semester, my daily schedule consisted of getting up right before class, eating carelessly, and watching time go by so fast while my anxiety and stress increased with every passing minute. It was so easy to fall into this trance of toxic actions, but it didn’t even cross my mind that I could change my ways so easily. Did I blame myself for not thinking about this and doing something earlier? No, of course not. There is so much going on in this world that needs to be changed on a large scale, that it’s hard to know what to prioritize to change first. It’s easy to forget about yourself and feel powerless when so many other things feel bigger, but your power is never gone. If anything, your power is an innate quality that can never be truly taken from you.
I found myself thinking that I could so easily put time into eating healthier meals and go to sleep earlier and do this and that better. I remembered that I totally could be doing the right thing over the wrong, and this served to remind me that I am oh so capable. I am so capable of creating the life I want and removing what I know isn’t good for me. Owning this fact and allowing myself to really believe in my capabilities and power was a source of hope and happiness for me–hope and happiness that I am 100% responsible for. This doesn’t mean that I whipped up my day schedule into perfect shape right away. But whenever I misstepped and let myself go back into my trance, I just remembered that in the next second, I could so easily let go of my mistake and decide to change my day or my hour or my minute for the better. I could go from laying in my bed mindlessly scrolling through Tik Tok, to go on a walk. If I found myself guilty and shameful for my lengthy screen time, I forgave myself immediately and did something else in the next second. The change from negativity to positivity happened just like that, in a mere second, and it had a giant impact on the rest of my day and ultimately, how I perceived myself.
Just knowing that I had the ability to be better enabled me to look forward to my days and look forward to making my own self proud. There is an infinite amount of changes I could make in my life and every day and every second is an opportunity to implement one. Remembering that I had power over myself in the first place was all that it took to actually use it. In an extraordinary time where we can feel so helpless and so dependent on others to do the right thing, it is easy for our own capabilities and power to slip our mind. But once we trust and remember the fact that change begins with ourselves, we realize that the opportunity to change for the better is available to us every second.