What Keeps You Going?

[F1fan]

Setting goals (both short term and long term) that can be accomplished. It could be as small as getting laundry caught up on, or cleaning out a closet. Set a goal, and get it done. Even small accomplisments will boost hormones in the brain, and also boost mood.

Viktor Frankl wrote about this in Man's Search For Meaning, where his observtions of those in Jewish concentration camps had a higher survival rate IF they set goals and accomplished them. Long term meaning in life comes about through setting goals worthy of the self. It doesn't necessarily mean winning, but it is the process of life that is given meaning through the committment to the self.

 

[Revoltingest]

To keep going is what I'm compelled to do.
It's effortless.
Life's tribulations are just things to cope with.

 

[PoetPhilosopher]

I ponder how common that is. For example, it seems that at funerals there's always this one person who steps up to the the plate and becomes the rock in which everyone else leans on for a couple of weeks. (In my experience and observation)

Yeah, I don't know. Everyone in my family has strong determination. The only time that's ever a bad thing is when we disagree on something - then it's like two titans clashing.

By the way, there's a song about people like this:

 

[Debater Slayer]

Metamucil.

Sorry, jokes are part of the answer. Humor keeps me going, often by pointing out how inconsequential my current worries are.

Otherwise "This too shall pass".

Humor helps me cope with a lot of things, too. I like what I've seen of your sense of humor on the forum!

 

[VoidCat]

Ooo live animals(not stuffed ones) in general especially cats. I love animals and seeing one brings me such joy.

 

[JustGeorge]

We all have good, bad, and neutral experiences. The most common factor in all of them is that they eventually pass.

When the going gets toughest, though, what keeps you going? What are the reasons you push through even when life seems to be at its most difficult?

I really struggled with this through late summer and fall... there just seemed no end in site to some of the bovine feces and nonsense I was facing. I started breaking a bit, and started asking people I knew and trusted "what do I do? How do I keep from losing my bearings?" Worry was keeping me awake, weariness affecting my ability to function, hopeless and helplessness was shutting my brain off. It didn't help that those who I thought might have insight or answers just shook their heads and said "I don't know".

So I started looking into what people did who had it real bad. Worse than me. Prisoners, war survivors... tried to find common themes. I thought back to the Buddhist group I used to attend, and thought what the guys might have told me. Came up with my own survival plan, because no one else could do it for me.

Purpose, detachment, humor, low expectations, gratitude, connection with something greater than myself, acknowledgement of cycles, taking joy where I can find it, allowing imperfection in myself and others.

Sometimes repeating the 5 remembrances in my head helps:

1. I am of the nature to grow old. There is no way to escape growing old.
2. I am of the nature to have ill health. There is no way to escape having ill health.
3. I am of the nature to die. There is no way to escape death.
4. All that is dear to me and everyone I love are of the nature to change. There is no way to escape being separated from them.
5. My actions are my only true belongings. I cannot escape the consequences of my actions. My actions are the ground upon which I stand.

Its all going according to plan, it seems. Nothing's amiss.

 

[The Hammer]

When the going gets toughest, though, what keeps you going? What are the reasons you push through even when life seems to be at its most difficult?

A desire to see things to their end. No matter what the outcome.

 

[The Sum of Awe]

I would say the uncertainty of the future does. I don't know what might happen in the future, but there's almost certainly more good things to come.

 

[Debater Slayer]

I would say the uncertainty of the future does. I don't know what might happen in the future, but there's almost certainly more good things to come.

I hope so, for both of us!

 

[PoetPhilosopher]

Humor helps me cope with a lot of things, too.

I'd say, same. Although I can be pretty deadpan.

 

[Debater Slayer]

Ooo live animals(not stuffed ones) in general especially cats. I love animals and seeing one brings me such joy.

I love cats so much that I made an Instagram account just to follow cat accounts there. Seeing one on the street also tends to give me a mixture of happiness from seeing one and sadness from knowing it's a stray and probably struggling.

I'd definitely get a cat if I weren't allergic to them.

 

[Exaltist Ethan]

I exist to exalt, that is why my name is Exaltist Ethan. I am here to spread the idea of natural divinity, syntheism and Earthseed. While I know God would be created even if I didn't exist, I know people are starting to learn the idea that divinity can be a natural concept and I hope that by existing I can tell people the good news that we are creating God, the Synverse, and that I can be a small fraction of that Synverse myself.

 

[wandering peacefully]

We all have good, bad, and neutral experiences. The most common factor in all of them is that they eventually pass.

When the going gets toughest, though, what keeps you going? What are the reasons you push through even when life seems to be at its most difficult?

Knowing I have family I love and who love me. And knowing bad times will pass eventually. Also, there are only two options which are still living and not ever living again. I force myself to take the first option even though it is the most difficult at times.

 

[VoidCat]

I love cats so much that I made an Instagram account just to follow cat accounts there. Seeing one on the street also tends to give me a mixture of happiness from seeing one and sadness from knowing it's a stray and probably struggling.

I'd definitely get a cat if I weren't allergic to them.

My main deity i worship is a cat. Bastet.

 

[RestlessSoul]

Tea is a literal taste of normality that brings with it strong emotional senses of wellbeing. It keeps one going.

5 little words that have seen countless families of Brits through untold crises; “Put the kettle on mum.”

 

[Trailblazer]

When the going gets toughest, though, what keeps you going? What are the reasons you push through even when life seems to be at its most difficult?

Two things: My faith in God and my love for the cats.
The cats are a reason to keep living when things seem hopeless. God does not need me so God is a reason to keep living.

 

[Trailblazer]

God. My boyfriend. Tea (no, it does).

God. My 'might be' new boyfriend. Coffee.

 

[Rival]

God. My 'might be' new boyfriend. Coffee.

He's certainly a lover.

 

[Trailblazer]

Many folks don't know how they'll cope for lack of experience.

I certainly don't have that problem.

 

[sun rise]

On a very personal level, a good night's sleep. On a spiritual level my effort to become more loving.