I am not entirely sure when it started, the endless negativity that consumed my life. I did not have a rough childhood that enables my outlook on life to be dark and gloomy; I have always had an exceptional family that lifts me up, and I have never had any tragic incident in my life that would give me the right to feel grim. And yet, despite all the wonderful things in my life, I continue to find myself dealing with the constant nagging pressure of negativity built up in my mind.

College opened my eyes and made me fully aware of the my problem with pessimism. Every day, I would allow self-doubt to creep into my head and find a way to convince myself that my life was going nowhere, letting the question of whether all of the hours spent on my college education would amount to anything (for example). This caused me to wake up every morning and just "go through the motions" rather than fully embracing, appreciating, and praising life. The worst part of it all was I found just about anything and everything to blame my self-inflicted sadness on. Whether it was school, volleyball, or the people in my life, I spent months making myself even more angry by searching for scapegoats and playing the victim card, when in reality, I was the culprit.

It took me months to finally come to the realization that all of the negativity in my life was done at the hand of no one but myself. I know this may not seem like the making for an intense "Criminal Minds" episode, but I know I am not the only person who can relate to being victimized by themselves. Whether it be about your body, your grades, your current successes, or your romantic life, there is almost always something that is happening in our personal lives that we allow to take over our happiness for that day, week, month, or year.

Well, I was fortunate enough to have someone in my life who grabbed me by the shoulders and shook the life back in to me. He reminded me that I was not the same person when I was bringing myself down and I had the power to fix it. However, some of us are not as fortunate and feel that we are alone in this life and cannot be brought to the surface by ourselves. So, I am here to tell you to stop drowning yourself because you are not alone and there are plenty of us that understand. Let yourself live and choose, every single day, to be the best you that there is and to see the best in every situation, no matter how hard it is. We hear the cliché all the time about not living in the moment. Well, they are right. Do not waste your life by giving yourself permission to dwell on things that bring you down.

While I am no where the near the optimist I truly want and hope to be; I have found it in myself to see the good. When I wake up in the morning, I make the conscious decision to say that it is going to be a good day and that nothing can bring me down, not even me.

So, what is stopping you? Go make your glass as full as you want it to be! Overfill it with happiness and, most of all, positivity.