“Always Look on the Bright Side of Life”

I’m sure many of you saw the news last week about the cruise ship Carnival Splendor.  An engine fire left the ship dead in the water and without electricity off the coast of Mexico.  Passengers were without basic services such as hot food, air conditioning and working toilets for several days.  The ship was towed to San Diego and all passengers were given refunds, compensation for travel costs, and a free ticket for another cruise.

Most of the people who were interviewed after finally setting food on land talked about how miserable they had been.  The heat, the smell, the Pop-Tart dinners, ugh!  I saw images of the Navy lowering SPAM onto the ship, but the cruise line promises that none of the passengers were fed SPAM.

Speaking of SPAM, there were some passengers who reminded me of a song from Monty Python’s musical Spamalot, “Always look on the bright side of life”.  Despite the less than perfect cruise, they focused on the positive.  A man mentioned how fortunate it was that nobody was hurt in the fire.  One woman was laughing saying she and her husband have the best honeymoon story ever!  Another couple was high-fiving because they get a free cruise.

This is an excellent example of how happiness is a choice.  The way you think about an event determines whether or not you see that event as positive or negative.  My refrigerator broke last week and I had to throw out a lot of food.  When I told my friend Mary about it she immediately said, “Boy were you lucky!  It could have happened when you were out-of-town!”  Now that is looking on the bright side!  I was feeling sorry for myself and all of a sudden I felt so fortunate!

The next time something “bad” happens to you, stop for a second and try to reframe what happened so that you see it in a more positive light.