I do not consider myself a pessimist. However, I don't exactly consider myself an optimist either. I try to see both sides of situations. After all, good and bad blend together, don't they? At the very least, it is extremely rare to have one side without even the tiniest hint of the other somewhere in the background. Lately, life has been kicking me down further and further until I can no longer see what's going on realistically. Even though seeing the good in the world gives people like me a certain perspective, no one should deny themselves time to feel the downside of tough times.

Now when I say people should allow themselves time to feel their sadness, I am not endorsing wallowing in gloom and self-pity by any means. I just think people need to see the truth in the matter. Life is tough sometimes, despite the fact that it feels like situations are tough more often than just sometimes, but treating the dark, tough part of life as something to be glossed over and basically ignored is not the answer. While shoving the cruel difficulties of life into a deep secluded corner of a person's mind sounds like a good idea, I promise you that it is never worth the ongoing repetition of leaving something difficult in life alone and away to fester like disease.

Of course, there are people (including me) that need to figure out how to see the more positive side of troublesome situations in a better way. Personally, I try to think to myself when life gets difficult beyond imagination and say that 'Nothing good lasts forever, so that means nothing bad lasts forever too.' Like I said, I do my best to see things in a multilayered way as best as I possibly can, even though I have not been doing a great job of that lately.

Although cheesy slogans like 'Fake it till you make it' and 'Chin up, buttercup' tend to get lost on a person like me, I still want to believe that there is more than the tough times in life. I sincerely want to find and point to the obvious good in the world, but I know there's more to it than that as I get older. So if you're struggling mentally, which is perfectly fine whether you are or are not, I encourage you to not only acknowledge the negatives of what you're feeling, but to further understand that there is both good, bad, and everything else in between.