What makes a day bad?

What makes a day a day bad? Is it a series of events not going as planned? Is it a tragedy taking place? Is it just one bad moment that proves to be irritating or upsetting?

The truth is, people profess to have a bad day quite often.

I listened to my son tell me how he was having a terrible day. He described the problem in detail and through tears, and the problem - as he stated it - pointed to a moment of his day not being as fun as he had hoped. I listened to him (and tried to keep my patience), and when he was finished I tried to help him understand that he was just using the wrong words for his situation. It wasn’t a bad day; instead, it was a bad moment.

Two things occurred to me during this conversation:

• How many times do I do the same thing (which may have resulted in my five-year-old copying my response)?
• How often do bad days really happen?

Lois Lowry wrote an incredible book entitled The Giver. It was set in a dystopian society, where rules ruled the day. One of the focal points of the community within the book was vocabulary: people were to be specific with their words.

Specific words. Something that is becoming extinct today.

• “That was the worst.”
• “It definitely was not worth anyone’s time.”
• “That food was atrocious.”
• “I had the worst day ever.”

These phrases - and so many more - lack specificity, and in doing so create a bad habit (and potentially paint an inaccurate picture).

[Note: I understand what hyperbole is, but I also understand that most people do not view their lack of specificity as hyperbole. And because of that, the words and phrases become true in the mind of the user (and unfortunately the listeners, too).]

How would our life change if we were specific with our description of it? Would we really have bad days or would we just have bad moments?

Please understand me: I understand that there are terrible things that happen to people; and if you are living in the middle of one of things, I hope that you have someone (or a few someones) who can walk through that with you.

However, in so many situations, it is not the worst, it could always be worse, and on the balance scale of life, the good moments far outweigh the bad ones.

When we choose to be specific with our words, our perspective changes.

Yes, we will have things that we want (or need), but our perspective through those moments make all the difference in our life. Our words are like a ships rudder, guiding our perspective with every syllable.

The smiling picture of my son (attached to this post) was after our conversation. Two things happened before that picture was taken:

• He chose to say, “it wasn’t a bad day, it just wasn’t as good as I expected it to be.” (I’m not exaggerating his words.)
• Later on, he looked at me and said, “Daddy, I’m really not doing great, but when you hug me it makes me feel better.”

Being specific with our words affects our thoughts and connection with the right people (in the right way) affects our heart.

As we begin to view our situations with a different perspective, we will begin to realize that bad days happen less often than we once believed.

[I would love to hear your comments and thoughts about this post. Use the comment section below or click here to tell your story.]