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There exists a fine line between pleasure and pain. When you indulge in anything pleasurable, you reach a point where it can negatively impact you.

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When the stress of life gets to you, it’s important to recognize when you just need a personal day to relieve stress and center yourself.

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Are your fantasies fulfilling your desires? Are your dreams and hopes being fulfilled by thinking about them? These are real questions that we need to ask ourselves honestly. Many of us fantasize about a better life or better version of ourselves. We have been told for years to visualize success and you can achieve it. The problem is we often change the phrase to visualize success and you will achieve it.

Visualization is the first step. It lets us know where we want to be. It is the starting point that tells us we are not happy where we are and want to be somewhere different. However, unless we take action by planning and moving down the road, we will just be in bed dreaming about a possible future and never get there outside of our dreams. Thought and visualization with no action is fantasy and as fleeting as a dream.

If you have been on social media and seen videos and posts about recipes that sound and look good and said to yourself “I can make that,” but never did anything about it, what does that say about your visualization. You saw it, said it looked good, and said “I can do it.” Why haven’t you then? Don’t allow your comfort zone to keep you from trying to reach higher and try new things.

I got a Ninja Foodi last year and said to myself, “I am going to cook all my meals in this thing and work through the entire recipe book before I try something else.” I tried one recipe. The food came out exactly how I expected, but for some reason, I never did another meal in that kitchen device. I went right back to the fastest meal prep patterns I have gotten used to. 

We need to get to a point where we are exciting ourselves about taking actions towards our goals. Force yourself to do something, anything that you have wanted to do but never gotten around to doing. If nothing comes to mind, try forcing yourself to smile for 20 seconds. This simple action will cause endorphins to flow and make you feel more positive. Your simple action just improved your mood for a few moments. Your actions determine your outcome. Your visions help you determine a goal and find the road to your destination. However, without action your vision and thoughts are wasted.

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Why is it that we complain about our work life to people at home, but we complain about our home life to people at work? Isn’t that backwards? The people at home can’t really help us with our work and our work acquaintances can’t help us with our home issues.

Sometimes, our complaining could be just a way to vent our frustrations. It is common to go to someone we know will support us and empathize with our struggles. We will seek out the ones that are willing to help us and are willing to listen. The problem with this is that we are likely pushing our stresses onto other people who do not deserve them. Our wives/husbands will listen to our problems because they love us. They will offer the usual words of comfort or advice to make us feel comforted. What we need to make sure is that we are not dumping on our listener. Instead, try to make it a conversation and be open and honest about our negative feelings and experiences. Make it a discussion and remove the emotion from the issue so that you can work through the emotions and properly deal with the issues.

In other situations, you have people who bottle their feelings up. They are often the people who try their hardest to not bring people down. They are quick to offer the advice that they themselves may need to follow, but never seek out the advice because they feel like they might bring someone else down or be viewed as a hypocrite. It isn’t healthy to dump on someone else. However, it is just as unhealthy to bottle your emotions up. Share your feelings openly and honestly in a safe environment. Don’t dump on someone. Try to recognize the listener so that you know who you can trust and who will be able to help you recognize the path forward. Each person is different.

Don’t be like the cook who cooks for everyone else while eating fast food yourself. Be the kind of person that takes care of yourself the way you try to take care of others. If you are listening to others, make sure you take the time to find someone who can listen to you. If you share with others, make sure you listen to them. Venting is ok as long as you are not bringing others into a bad emotional state.

In anger management, I learned to find a healthy outlet for my venting. It was in video games and reading. Those activities gave me a chance to calm my emotional state and allow me to open rationally to others about my feelings. The next step is to make sure that you are addressing your complaints in a positive manner. If you have complaints about something at work, find a way to improve the situation at work. Seek advice from others, by all means, but instead of sitting back and complaining about it, work positively on it to find a solution so that is no longer something you need to complain about. Same thing for family issues. Seek counseling from others who have been down that road and found a positive solution, or look to professional help with the ability to help you get there.

Complaining can be a healthy form of venting if done properly, but all to often, it turns negative and dangerous. For those with a “Victim Mentality” you will always complain without trying to find a solution. For those with a “Victor Mentality” you look for positive solutions to the issues you are dealing with.