Hopelessness is the conviction that we can’t do anything and never will. The future seems gloomy, unpromising, there is nothing good and there never will be. How does the vicious circle of hopelessness work? The higher the level of hopelessness - the greater the feeling of despair - the more destructive the actions towards ourselves (we isolate ourselves, give up, imagine the worst scenarios of our life, become more depressed) - the higher the level of hopelessness. What to do? 1. Hopelessness scale At this moment in time, it may seem that things will definitely never get better, nothing in life will change, that you won’t have a job you love, you won’t find mutual love and friends, you won’t be able to overcome financial difficulties. This is a very difficult and painful condition. Try measuring your hopelessness on a scale of 0 to 10 every hour of the day for the next week, for example. Thanks to this simple technique, even the most “hopeless” will find that their condition changes depending on the time of day; from the one with whom they communicate; what they are thinking about; what they do. Noticing that sometimes we still feel better is the first step towards our changes. 2. Search for hope and control Hopelessness is like a black hole that increasingly absorbs, crushes and takes away all your strength. It seems like this condition will never go away. But even such a feeling can be specified. Nowadays, all the attention is focused on the dark, negative and unsuccessful moments/areas of life. - What exactly makes you feel hopeless? - What exactly are the reasons for the gloomy forecasts? You can take a pen and paper and write down the points. Look at what areas of your life you don't feel hopeless. And focus on them. What is in your area of ​​influence? What can you influence right now? Maybe it's communicating with loved ones, playing sports or reading books. Do this right now and do it every day, week, month. If you pay attention to the things that you can actually control, where you are effective, then the hopelessness will gradually begin to dissipate. 3. Finding a resource in past experience Everyone has difficult times in life. Someone gets fired from their job, someone breaks up with their loved ones, someone gets sick. And all this makes us feel hopeless. Try to look back at your life and ask yourself, have you ever thought that nothing good awaits you? That you will never be happy? Then relate these predictions to reality. Have you really never smiled since then? Have all your gloomy predictions really come true? If you have experience overcoming such conditions in the past, then you can do it again now! The main thing is to give yourself time to overcome. 4. Reconnaissance of the situation You can ask yourself a simple question: - Why did I decide that everything was so hopeless? - Write down and sort all the arguments into pieces. For example: You broke up with a friend and you are visited by thoughts that you will never be happy and you will never meet such a friend again. Such thoughts and feelings are absolutely normal in such situations. - What is the reason that you will never be happy again? - Will you never feel better again in your life? Of course, now you are thinking: “I am the most unhappy person. And I can’t imagine that I’ll feel good.” Such reasoning is based on the fact that you imagine the future under your current emotional state. So-so picture, right? But we cannot predict how we will feel in the future. Here you can ask yourself: - Before meeting this person, did you feel happy? - Why is this particular person a beacon of your happiness? 5. Act Hopelessness paralyzes you, makes you passive - you do not take any action, save your energy and time so as not to disappoint yourself - the gloomy outcome of the future that you predicted for yourself comes true. But imagine a time when you didn't feel so hopeless. What do you.