Stop wasting time feeling sorry for yourself

By Engr. Carlos V. Cornejo

One of the challenges we had to face during the two-year lock down (year 2020 to 2022) of the covid-19 pandemic was making good use of our time and battle boredom.  Many were taken by surprise with the sudden shift of lifestyle being confined at home most of the time for two years and could not adjust to it.  If the same situation could happen again for one reason or another perhaps due to a prolong serious sickness that makes you stay at home to rest and recover, instead of lamenting on the prison-like situation, you should take the bull by its horn and subdue it.

Take control of your life.  Make a plan of learning something such as a musical instrument, books to read, skill to learn, etc.  Much like life in general if you don’t have a sense of goal or let’s use a more sublime word, sense of purpose in life, life would be aimless, bland, boring, etc.  Difficulties tend to get exaggerated when you complain more about life in general, whereas if you look at life with a sense of adventure, you look at obstacles as part of the challenge and excitement.

Will you play a computer game if there were no challenges or no goals to achieve?  Why do we enjoy playing computer games?  Because it is a challenge and an adventure.  Many virtues go along with games that we should apply in life.  We tolerate defeats, we would be persistent, we are determined to win and reach a goal, and lastly, we are enjoying it.  Why don’t we approach life like that?

Why are prisoners able to adjust to their lives in jails?  Because they know why they are there.  Victor Frankl said, “If you know the why in life, you will be able to know the how.”  The irony is prisoners have more sense of purpose than us.  Whereas, those who got confined to their homes during pandemic, spend their days, lamenting and complaining.  I don’t deserve this.  Why is this happening to me?

We all have to learn to play the cards we are dealt with by living the motto of the U.S. Marines, “Improvise, adapt and overcome.”  Life will always be full of challenges whether you decide to live a life facing them or just cower yourself at home and binge on useless things of watching movies, TV, playing computer games, etc.  For those who decide to live as a couch potato they will still be confronted with boredom eventually when they have worn out themselves playing computer games and watching movies.  In the end, those who decide to confront challenges in life the right way will be rewarded with more wisdom, more experience, more skills, and a deep sense of satisfaction and purpose having accomplished goals they have set.  This is living a dream that everyone is invited to do and is very much within our reach, if we decide to confront our challenges.