The Difference Between a Bad Day and an Adventure

Something I feel the need to tell myself, and others around me, on a regular basis, is the difference between a bad day and an adventure.

Think of an adventure story you love, think of a few of them if you can. How many adventure stories can you think of that could not also be described as a very bad day for the central characters. It may be a bad day that ends well, but it is almost always a bad day for most of the duration. They are being chased, they are going to lose their job, their ship has wrecked, they are on the run for their lives, they are being threatened, they are falling from cliffs, and people are often dying all around them. If you need to reflect on this more, take some of your favorite adventure stories, and describe them the way you describe a bad day you’ve had to someone. It isn’t nearly as fun of a story that way, is it?

Now, think of a few bad days you’ve had recently. (Let’s stay away from genuinely traumatic events right now, better to process those with a real-life therapist who can interact with you. This post is not likely to be anywhere near in depth enough to get you through the loss of a loved one, huge life changes, or a sudden loss of innocence. This is not medical advice or clinical therapy. I’m not saying it couldn’t help, but I’m saying not to just rely on a blog if you need serious help. Please, if you feel it is too much to handle on your own, get help. It is there, and professionals really can help you if you let them.) Not life changing bad days right now, but just a stressful day that everything seemed to be going wrong, or at least kept looking like it was going to go wrong.

Take this bad day, or days, and try describing it to someone the way you would tell an adventure story. If you can, tell it to someone out loud, or at least read it to yourself out loud. Get excited. Take the big crescendo of failure or final success and give it the energy it deserves in the telling. Build suspense, weave through every twist and turn that day took. Let yourself feel a little bit silly, because the spirit of adventure is a silly thing at its heart.

At this point, give or take a little based on storytelling skill, you will probably have noticed that there is no quantitative difference between a bad day or an adventure. The only real difference between the two is how the story is told.

The only difference between a bad day and an adventure is how you choose to tell the story.
An adventure is a bad day told well.

You don’t even ever need to tell the story out loud to make that huge difference. Just change the tone when going over what is happening in your mind. If you can, try to have your internal monologue be in an awesome movie trailer voice, or the suave descriptions of a noir film detective. You will be able to face worse challenges with more energy and zeal, because, really, the worse life throws at you, the more epic this story becomes.

Don’t call it a bad day either, actually call it an adventure. Even if you are sarcastic, that sets the mental tone for you being the plucky hero (or antihero) instead of the browbeaten background character. Everyone is the hero (or heroine) of their own life story. Remember that every day. There are only so many things you can do to keep bad things from happening and to keep good things happening, and sometimes the only thing you can do is to decide that if bad things are going to happen, you are not going to give them the power to make you have a bad day.

This helps even if you never say any of these stories out loud, but really shines when you feel the need to unload your day to others. Bad days are usually no fun to listen to, adventures can be. Supporting and seeking support from your friends and relatives through hard times is a necessary thing. Seeking social support is healthy for a long list reasons. Telling the story as an adventure can help make the experience less draining on everyone involved; sometimes it could even be invigorating. I’m not saying you will be able to stay energetic and happy about your misfortunes all of the time. That would actually be a problem, because you need to stay motivated to make things better. Addiction to bad experiences can be a real thing; let’s not go there.

You will still need to cry sometimes; you may still need someone to hold you while you cry. From personal experience, even if you couldn’t feel the energy before the cry, sometimes that self-conscious time towards the end of a cry can be the easiest point from which to see the bad day for the adventure it is.

Take the power back over your life. Stop having as many bad days. Start having more adventures.