When you're going through a hard time or having a bad day it's really easy to let yourself take a face-forward dive into an ocean of self pity. You start asking yourself questions like, "Why is this happening to me?" or "Why do I always get handed the short end of the stick?" It's normal to feel that way regardless of how blessed you are in your life, but sometimes it's hard for people to realize all of the blessings they truly have.
Recently I viewed a video online which displayed a split screen to the viewers. On the left side it showed a wealthy individual and on the right side it showed a poor individual. For many of us, when we think of a "wealthy" person we're going to think of celebrities or royalty. However, in this video it showed someone as regular as us as the "rich" person. College students, myself included, are constantly complaining about how poor we are, but the fact that we get to sleep in a comfortable room all to ourselves, have a couple bucks in our wallet and have access to clean food and water, we are already wealthier then a significant portion of the world's population.
The small child who was by nothing more then bad luck born to be displayed on the right side of the screen opened her eyes to a room shared by her siblings on her makeshift bed with dirt beneath her feet. She walked barefoot on the dirt road that led to her school. Along the way, while the rich teenage male stopped and grabbed a fresh water bottle from his fridge, she got on her hands and knees at a polluted lake to fill hers up.
Despite the fact that we all have our own stories, and within those stories our own sets of horrible pain, loss, and hurt, we also have to realize that some people would trade in all of theirs for yours, and be happy. That young girl had a smile on her face despite the circumstances she was born in. Despite having to walk barefoot to school, she is making the effort necessary to give herself the chance of a better life through education.
It's easy to forget about all the reasons that girl gets up to smile every day when we know nothing of her struggle. It's easy to not understand her pain because we were born with so much more than she and others like her were. It's harder to pull yourself out of your self-made pity party and realize that you have many blessings, and therefore many reasons to be happy, but it's the same effort that young girl makes and the same one that's worth it for us to make -- and that is to not count your blessings but to make your blessings count.
