Give yourself time. Go home, even if nobody’s waiting for you there. Leave a great party without a farewell drink. Leave behind the relationships you don’t need, the bad habits you want to get rid of, the depression, the wrong people, the person who doesn’t love you, or the person who you don’t love anymore.

Give your (ex-)significant other a chance to find a person to feel better with, a soulmate, who will make their life more comfortable (or not; there are different kinds of happiness, as you probably know). If you aren’t able to make each other happy, step back and give yourselves a chance to find love in another person, or in yourself.

Don’t be greedy. Don’t take away someone else’s chance to be happy, and don’t steal chances for happiness away from yourself. Everybody lives their own life differently. Your experiences are your own, and they won’t fit anyone else’s.

If your rhythms match, that means you found your soul mate. If they don’t, just consider these relationships to be a useful experience, thank them, and leave. Give yourself time.

Don’t wait until it gets worse. If you feel uneasy now, it won’t get better without effort. Don’t be waiting for a moment when you’re forced to decide under pressure. Don’t wait until you’re squashed by the pressure.

Give yourself time; don’t make deep scars on the road of your life, don’t infect your soul with the virus of guilt. The feeling can not only ruin your soul, but also your mind and body. Give yourself time, and don’t spoil the painting of your life.

Appreciate your life more than others do. Give yourself time. If someone devalues your life, or if the person places his/her life above yours, leave. Leave, because above all you’re responsible for your own destiny, and not somebody else’s. Life is the greatest gift, so don’t sacrifice it. Don’t give your love to those who can’t see its beauty and true value.

It isn’t hard to lose yourself, to get lost in somebody else’s life, somebody’s world and reality. It’s even easy to ask for it and desire it.

To find yourself is a hard thing to do. Only you can define yourself, and to what extent the other person can use you. Sacrificing yourself in vain, trying to help someone who didn’t ask for your help, you automatically lose the energy you could have used for yourself or for a person who really needed it. And maybe sometime later, you’ll need this small piece of vital power that you lost.

The relationships are fruitful when there’s an exchange, a cooperation, a return. It’s like dancing. If you start to step on each other’s toes, if your dance becomes painful, you should turn off the music and step back, healing your wounds. Then, start a new dance — beautiful and graceful. Maybe with a new partner. That works for all kinds of relationships: love, family, and work.

To find a way out of a difficult situation is good, but to avoid the situation itself is much better. You always know the right moment to leave: trust yourself, don’t try to convince yourself you were wrong. Try to be honest with yourself and with the people around you.

As much as you want to believe in the opposite, there are no bad people. There are those different from you. You can’t know why these people come into your life, nobody can. But the thing is, they do. There’s no other responsibility than to yourself and to each other, but the first one is much more important.

Everything that happens in our life happens with our permission. We made our life the way it is, we let it happen, we started these changes and built this very moment, even if we don’t realize it. It’s our fault, our merit. We painted our life in grey, we chose to be afraid of everything, we chose to be the outsiders in our own life.

Look around you. Is it time for a change? Time to leave all this mess behind? It’s unbelievably hard to leave all that has outlived its usefulness, no matter what anyone says. Leaving is hard, but leaving is necessary. Take your time, think it over, but don’t miss the chance to leave.

Stop listening to someone else’s advice, and stop repeating someone else’s thoughts. Look inside of yourself. Where’s your anchor? That’s the way you can change the world. Stop looking for it in others. The anchor’s inside of you. The same with happiness: if you can’t find it in yourself, you won’t find it in others.

Leave behind the obtrusive illusions and imposed fears, but keep on dreaming and trying. Never stop aiming to achieve more. Don’t be afraid of mistakes. Mistakes mean you tried, and that’s great. Don’t be afraid of other people’s reaction. You can’t predict it until you do what you wanted to do; even if you could, why be afraid of it? You’ll have a chance to leave in time and move on.

The truth is, everything comes in time. Even miracles. So give yourself time, and don’t delay. If you linger, everything changes. Seize the moment.

Adapted from: Tatyana Varuha
photo credit: Abigail L. Dela Cruz