I’m reminded by a quote I came across from way back when I would frequent Reddit every day: “Was it a bad day or just a bad 5 minutes that you milked all day?” Yesterday I definitely struggled with the latter. And sometimes it can be hard. For as much as I talk about collectively changing the world together, there are times when I’m just not happy or just plain don’t feel well. There are 2 things I’ve found that have helped the most—exercise, and a return to gratitude.

Sweating, and getting as close as you can to your physical limit, just helps get it out. Science has been clamoring to figure it out over the past few decades—we release endorphins, our hormones change, we actually sweat out any toxins in our body, the movement gets our heart pumping and blood flowing. All I know is movement works.

The second one, a return to gratitude—now that sounds a lot like hippie nonsense doesn’t it? But I mean ‘return’ in the sense that when we’re upset or agitated, it almost feels like our mind is in a different place. If we inch towards a place of gratitude, where we can truly feel grateful for the current conditions and circumstances of our life, we move away from that tormenting place. It requires you sit with it, and that can often be painful. But as you sit with it, you realize you can’t deny how much there is to be grateful for. You can’t deny how amazing the simple fact that you’re alive is, alive in this wondrous thing we call the universe, on this amazing planet with all its narwhals and wildflowers. And suddenly, those agitations and feelings of torment feel very small and insignificant, compared to the grand source that is physical reality.

As Alan Watts said, we are under no obligation to be who we were five minutes ago. With exercise and gratitude, we return to our basic freedom of being human and contributing to the universe. Let’s change the world.