Why Is Life So Hard? A Modern View On Living

 Why is life so hard? This is a question we’ve all asked at some point. Things happen in our lives, normally without warning. If you’ve read any of my articles you’ll know I’ve suffered from anxiety and depression in the past – It’s because of these feelings I’m a deep thinker and always I like to be totally open about how I’m feeling and how I want to keep getting healthier as my life goes on.

Asking this question about life, I believe is important. It’s important because we’ve all had hardships at some stage in our lives and question why it’s so damn hard. Depending on what stage you’re at in your life or how you feel right now, I’ve probably felt it. You see, I like to ask the hard questions and face them straight on and hopefully, you can relate to what I’m going to say here.

No matter what you’re going through, I believe life is hard because we set expectations for our lives from an early stage. If you’ve read my story, you’ll know that I’ve always felt like I’ve had no direction in my life. I’ve always felt uneasy about the future and how I should be spending my time to make things worthwhile.

Life is hard but we make it harder on ourselves

Even though I felt like I had no clear vision for myself and had a lack of goals – I had expectations. These expectations are the things that cause us the most heartache when they don’t materialise.

Example:

When I was a child I imagined I’d have a house by 25, have a high-paying job, have a family of my own and not be anxious anymore.

I have my own family but that’s all that has come from my expectations, although I am of course grateful for my family and proud of them. You may argue that if I really wanted the other things too then I might have made them priorities, but the bottom line is, I set my expectations too high when I was a lot younger and I didn’t give myself a road map.. If the things you dream about never come around, you can start feeling a bit lost.

Another good example of this is my anxiety I used to feel a lot (and sometimes still do).

I always thought I’d grow out of it as if it was an immature feeling that would eventually go away. Instead, it stuck around and I had to face it head-on if I was ever going to get it under control. I also thought that I’d grow up and snap out of the bad moods I always got into as a kid. Truth is – I still have to work hard at not getting down and into a mood.

I chose the blog image for this article on purpose. The idea of life being like pushing a rock up a mountain sums it up for me. I’ve come to realise that life is hard because it is a constant barrage of obstacles which need to be overcome and dealt with. It was never meant to be easy in the first place…

I don’t look at this fact as a bad thing anymore though. You see – when I learnt that life is like this way, I began to appreciate things more. I began to understand that life isn’t about reaching a final destination of happiness. It’s not a goal you can set, reach and then be eternally happy.

This idea that I’ve been thinking of has recently been summed up by the late Chester Bennington of Linkin Park. Before Chester’s death, he explained in an interview that people think that when you’re famous and ‘successful’ you automatically get an unlimited pass to happiness but in reality, it doesn’t work like that. Instead, he explained that he’d always felt the way he felt, the only difference was he was then in Linkin Park.

Chester had a lot of demons, maybe more than a lot of us will ever experience, but I think we can all take that away and learn from what he said in that interview.

So, if your goal is to be rich and famous or to have a nice house or maybe even have a new car, it doesn’t mean that you’re going to be satisfied long term. I think that reaching the goal you’ve set to try and reach your ultimate happiness is great for motivation but it’s not what you should be focusing on. Without sounding like a big cliche, life is the journey, not the destination we think we need to reach.

If we try and enjoy the journey, we’ll be satisfied for the long term.

Why is life so hard? – shit happens!

Without sounding depressing, I’ve come to learn that shit does really just happen. It really doesn’t matter where you are in life of or what level of success you’re at, if you’re human, you’re not immune to shit happening to you.

So, aside from setting expectations that you find hard to, or never achieve, bad things just occur naturally and usually when you least expect it. When I was a kid I heard the expression ‘ ‘shit happens’ and didn’t used to think much of it.

I guess when you’re a kid you think everything is great and fun until you reach a certain age. For, me it was difficult learning that really, the world is a harsh place and full of real obstacles.

Some of the fucked up things that can occur are;

• a relative dying
• a partner leaving
• losing a home
• natural disaster

So, how do you get over shit happening in your day-to-day? For me, I’m learning that things happen and there’s a lot you can’t control. Maybe I’m a control freak or maybe I don’t like the idea of not having a say over every aspect of my life.

However I’m starting to accept that these things just occur without my control over them, and it’s easier to process. You have to learn to have a clear vision of the bigger picture. When you understand, no matter how badly these things suck, that these things are just a long string of events over a period of time over your life, things make more sense. When you’re stuck in one bad situation to the next, it can seem like everything always goes wrong for you.

Having a view of the bigger picture over your life allows you to see patterns over the years, it allows you to not only see the bad that happens to you but also allows you to take more notice of the good things. Yes, ‘shit happens’, but, so does good.

I’m the first to admit that I usually gravitate towards the bad stuff easier than the good because that’s the way I’m put together, however, as I get older I understand taking hold of the good stuff when it happens. I’m more able to see situations as what they are, not get so caught up in them and realise that they are just a blip in time that’s not going to last forever.

Why is life so hard? is it the media?

I personally feel like the media has a huge role in how we feel about our lives. After all, the media reports the news that you see on your TV and computer. With celebrity stories, new diet fads and reality shows, it’s easy to start questioning our own lives. If we’re not doing the things we see others doing, are we doing life wrong?

The problem I have with the media is, it’s really dangerous for impressionable people. People who take things too seriously find themselves very influenced by what they see on the news and on TV shows.

This is also very apparent with social media. How many times do you see your Facebook ‘friends’ posting images about how great their lives are (when secretly they are staging these images)?

To an impressionable teenager, to see everyone else living wonderful lives can be very damaging to your self-confidence and self-esteem. When it looks like everyone else is having a great time and not you, it can make your life seem different and really hard in comparison.

One of the problems with this situation, whether it’s the perfect life Facebook friends seem to have or reality TV stars, is that we start doubting ourselves. I’ve doubted my abilities for most of my life but I learned that comparing myself to others does not help me in any way at all.

All this does is make you look at what you don’t have compared to someone else rather than looking at your own qualities. The truth of the matter is the person that you’re comparing yourself to likely also compares themselves to someone else. We’re all so guilty of it, but you can learn to look inside of yourself to focus on your own strengths and qualities.

When you start to forget what others are doing and look at yourself more, you can start to build on yourself. When I was a teenager I was always looking at other people my age asking things like –  ‘how does he have those shoes? I want them too!’

Of course, when you’re a teenager your life is so hard! Or at least you think it is. You see – it’s to be expected when you’re that age, after all, you’re at a difficult age where you’re unsure of yourself and you do look for guidance from those around you.

However, once you reach your 20’s I really feel like you should start to focus on yourself and ignore any apparent successes of your friends and family. What works for someone’s life might not work for yours and vice versa.

It’s time to stop comparing yourself to others and start to try new things yourself.

So how can we make life easier on ourselves?

I think to make life easier, we have to appreciate the good things in life more. I’m talking about the small things. We’re here because let’s face it, our parents wanted us here, we had no manual to read that would give us a purpose. We really have to give ourselves a purpose. Even if you feel down and don’t feel like doing anything, I’m sure that there is something that makes you feel alive. If you’re saying no, I think that you’re not being honest with yourself, or, you just haven’t discovered it yet.

I think that we have to learn to notice when something good is happening. For example, your child’s smile or laughter. When I allowed myself to see my life’s bigger picture, I understood that my child is not going to be that age again and so I should take in what is happening in that minute, or even that second, and experience it to the full with no distractions.

For me, I’ve always found it hard to live ‘in the moment.’ It frustrates me when I know other people can easily and it makes me feel like I’m never quite satisfied. Because I’ve always lived with anxiety and a depressive side, whenever I’m happy or experiencing something good, I still have anxious thoughts in the back of my head. However, after becoming a dad something shifted in me.

Here’s what I’ve learned about children after having my own – they just want to experience things, but maybe more importantly, they genuinely live in the moment. They haven’t yet experienced any of life’s pains and anxieties so they don’t find life hard. They find it exciting – they want to learn and understand. You might say, “One day they will though”. This is true indeed, one day they might, however, I think if we can learn to live completely in a good moment and just enjoy it for what it is, we can start to appreciate that actually life isn’t so hard, it’s how we choose to experience it that makes it easy or hard.

So, I urge you to embrace the good when it happens and not just focus on the struggles you may face.

Here’s to your success – Sean