(originally published November 11th, 2005)

Well, today was a tough day. It started out okay, but then I had a series of setbacks that started to bring me down, and depress me for a long part of the day. I do't want to get into major details, but let's just say that they all seemed to involve money in some fashion, and I didn't see any of it coming as the day began.

Now, there have been times in my life when I'd suffer a setback and be depressed for days, sometimes weeks. Some things have been less than this, some have been bigger. The truth of the matter is that there's nothing wrong with being upset or depressed because something has happened that you may not have been expecting. And we all deal with these stressors in different ways, in different degrees. To some people, having a pet pass away is a traumatic experience, whereas someone else might just see it as the way nature works and move on.

We all should be allowed our time period of grief or depression, no matter what it is. We also should figure out own own ways of getting out of these periods of funk, even if it seems odd to others. For me, I first had to sit and just think through all the things that occurred. Second, I needed time to myself. Third, I went to lay down for a bit, closed my eyes, and just relaxed some. And finally, I got back to some normalcy in my day. After all, once I started working my mind through everything, I realized that these few setbacks were no big deal, that every single one of them was just a temporary setback and that things were still fine, I started feeling better, and ready to get on with my day.

That's a hard thing to do for anyone. We tend to want to relive the bad times over and over; I certainly do. Some of today's events, I'll probably be recounting to people for days, weeks, possibly years. Some I may never talk about again after today, because they won't mean that much anymore. But right now, hours later, I'm doing well, I'm fine, and I'm happy. I know that setbacks are a part of life; how we deal with them tells us how we're progressing in our lives. Tonight, I'm glad to say I'm fairly proud of myself.