They say only 2 things in life are certain - death and taxes. I think we need to add Bad Days to that list as well. No matter how committed we are to personal development, the occasional bad day is inevitable. I know that I am very susceptible to discouragement and apathy after a bad day. I used to look at bad days, not as a normal part of life, but as an example of personal failure and proof that I was never going to make it. Fortunately, a Bad Day isn’t the end of the world. What really counts is how we handle them when they show up.

Here are five tips that have helped me better manage those days.

1. Reduce Expectations: When circumstances are going well, it is easy to expect that they will continue to go well. It is easy to forget the struggles of the past, and expect that the future won’t have those same struggles. By building these expectations, I only set myself up for failure. When I begin to eliminate expectations, and become willing to accept each day on its own terms, the number of bad days goes down. In reality, a day is only bad because I am struggling against the reality of that day expecting it to be different. There is no day that is “bad” in and of itself.
2. Accept Myself: My wife used to have a poster in her room when we were dating. It was a little Precious Moments figure with the caption “Please be patient, God isn’t finished with me yet”. I am a work in progress, with weaknesses, insecurities, and areas of ignorance. I can either accept that, or struggle against who I am and the path I am walking. The struggle leads to pain, anger, and suffering. Acceptance and focus lead to peace.
3. Stop Negative Thought Patterns: When frustration and anger dominate my mind, I revert to self-pity and begin to play the old tapes. Those stories I used to tell myself about how bad life is, and how worthless I am start to play out again in my mind. This type of thinking only amplifies the negativity, and lengthens the time of recovery. I need to accept response-ability for my thoughts, and change my response. I have a whole toolbox of methods for dealing with negative thoughts now. I don’t have to let them dominate me anymore.
4. Affirmation Meditation: One of my favorite tools for dealing with negative thought patterns is what I call affirmation meditation. I don’t know if there is a formal term for it, but it is a powerful method for refocusing the mind away from negative thoughts. I noticed that negative thoughts tended to repeat over and over again in a pattern I call the pessimists mantra. As I began to try and change my thoughts, I found that using the same technique in a positive way created new patterns in my mind and made it much easier to overcome the negative patterns.
5. Find the Lesson: I have come to accept my responsibility in creating bad days. Usually, the bad day comes because I need to learn something, and I can’t learn it any other way. It may be a reminder of point number one, that I need to stop expecting and start accepting. It may be patience with myself and others. It may even be that I have pushed myself to the limit, and need rest. Whatever the lesson, or lessons, of this time may be, I want to find them so I don’t have to learn them again.
6. Rest: I usually find myself emotionally and physically exhausted after a bad day. The struggle, the stress, and the negativity all sap energy. One of the best things I can do after a bad day is get a solid night of sleep so I have the energy I need for tomorrow. If I don’t do this, I often find another bad day waiting for me.

It takes practice and commitment to learn to face a bad day with new habits. We have gotten so accustomed to accepting negative emotions as a normal part of having a bad day that we often don’t even try to make a change. By creating a plan, and sticking to it, we can develop new tools and new strengths so that bad days don’t end up derailing our personal growth. We can turn bad days into proving grounds for the changes we have made, and use them as building blocks to grow further and faster.

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