We all have those days. The ones where nothing seems to go right and we fantasize about how much better our lives would be if we quit our jobs, dropped out of school, or broke up with a longtime partner, starting all over, falling for the promises of a fresh start.

While it may sound appealing to quit, say if you failed a class or are beginning to feel a little unsatisfied in a relationship, these times of frustration are not the moments in which you should seriously consider moving on – not even on the worst of days.

I learned this after recently attending a lecture given by McCree O'Kelley, an Assistant Professor of Dance at Kennesaw State University and a former professional dancer and Broadway performer. Amongst his discussion about the path of his personal career and various stories about his life, Mr. O'Kelley also revealed the secret he used when deciding it was time to move to a different dance company, end his performance career, and finally, when to become a professor.

Instead of giving up on a bad day, as Mr. O' Kelley explained, the only time you should consider quitting is when you experience the same desire to quit on a good day.

I not only found his advice to be easily applicable to essentially any decision in life, but I also found it to be incredibly liberating in two senses.

An integral part of human nature is rationalization. We rationalize every decision, from why we need to buy expensive clothing, to why we skipped going to the gym today. Admittedly we find it easier to rationalize our indulgences on a bad day as a form of self pity, explaining why quitting on a bad day seems so much more reasonable. However, on the good days, even when that desire still exists, we beat ourselves up for even thinking about quitting. Immediately, we are overwhelmed with all the rational reasons to remain in our current situations, whether its the feeling of needing the steady income or the fear that we would be throwing away a relationship we put a lot of work into. We feel it would be wasteful to quit, even if we aren't happy when everything is seeming going right.

However, in light of Mr. O'Kelley's advice, the responsibility of being constantly rational seems silly and depressing, in comparison to the happiness we can experience when listening to our hearts. Leaving something as important as a job or relationship behind can be scary, especially if we are unsure about our decision, however, by recognizing our desires to move on during the good days, we can find peace within our choices, prepared to find fulfillment elsewhere.

Not only can his advice reassure us we've made the correct decision, but it can also motivate us to work through the worst days, with the knowledge that we want to pursue the current path that we are on. Knowing that we don't truly want to quit on the good days allows us to use the discouraging times as opportunities to grow, leading us to the most rewarding feeling – the awareness of a newfound strength and ability to pursue through even the most challenging of days .

So, let us treat the bad days as practice and proof of our endurance, and the good days as guidance for our futures, knowing it's okay to give up -- but only when it's coming from our hearts, not the evils of a few bad days.

Mercyhurst University

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