Your cat gets sick, your phone battery dies, you pour cereal into your bowl before realizing you don’t have any milk … and all of this happens before 9 a.m. It’s been a bad day. They happen to every single one of us. And when those “off” days inevitably come around, you have two options:  

1. Let that one day lead into a negative week, month, or year.
2. Remember that one bad day doesn’t define you and strive to improve for the future. (In case you couldn’t tell by the bold letters, this is the correct!)

You’ve got dreams and goals you want to reach. Don’t let a few hours of negativity tear your focus away from where you’re headed. Consider this post your guide to beating your bad days and improving your mindset for tomorrow.

Find the good.

The funny thing about a bad day is that it’s rarely all bad. Most of the time, there are just a few bad moments that we use to chalk the whole day up to a fail. Example: Spilling milk on the counter takes 2 seconds, but we let that small moment affect us for the next 3 hours.  

We’re willing to bet that even in the midst of a day full of struggles, there were also some good moments in there, too. You got out the door by 7 a.m. for the first time in months? Celebrate that! Your coffee tasted better than normal? Awesome, do a little happy dance! We tend to let small, negative parts of our days affect us far more than the positive moments do. Choose to focus on the good! 

Talk (or write) it out. 

Sometimes, what we need most is to get our feelings out of our heads. At the end of a rough day, maybe you vent to a good friend, a family member, or your dog (the best listener). Or maybe you pull out a notebook and write down exactly what you’re feeling. Rather than bottling up your emotions and letting them eat at you over time, get them out! (Need a few other ideas for getting rid of all that negative energy? Read this article!) 

Do something for someone else. 

Don’t let a bad day make you so inwardly focused on what’s not going right in your life, that you forget about other people. Take the focus off of you for a second and do something kind for someone else! Try out one (or all!) of these ideas: 

• Buy a coffee for the person behind you in line. 
• Give kudos to someone on your team who’s been working exceptionally hard lately. 
• Text a friend to let them know you’re thinking about them, and you hope they have a great day. 
• Leave a nice comment on someone’s social media post. 

And if that wasn’t enough, here are 100 other ways to spread a little kindness. We gain so much by giving—and it might be just what you need to turn your bad day around. 

The sun will come up.

A day is just a day … and tomorrow, there will be another one just like it. Whether your days are positive or negative is totally up to you and your mindset. So, no worries if today wasn’t the best, most amazing, perfect, out-of-this-world day of your life. The sun will come up tomorrow, and you’ll get another chance to try again. 

If you do have a bad day, check out these reminders that will convince you to hold back from lashing out! We hope they help. are some reminders that to help you not to lash out. Learn how to hold back, here.