One Good Thing
When hope feels too heavy, one small honest thing can be enough to keep you standing.
Some days don’t arrive with hope. They arrive heavy—already asking more than you feel able to give.
On those days, optimism feels like a demand. Gratitude feels performative. And “looking on the bright side” feels like another way of saying try harder when you’re already tired.
This practice isn’t about that.
One Good Thing is not a mindset shift. It’s a pause.
It’s the permission to stop scanning the horizon for silver linings and instead look at what is already here—small, unpolished, quietly holding you.
The good thing might not be impressive. It might be the way the water tasted colder than expected. A text that didn’t require a response. The fact that you got out of bed, even slowly. The light on the wall that stayed longer than you thought it would.
Some days, the good thing is simply this: Nothing got worse.
That counts.
You don’t have to make meaning out of it. You don’t have to build a lesson around it. You don’t even have to feel thankful.
You just have to notice.
Because on the days you can’t carry optimism, one honest, good thing is enough to keep you standing.
And sometimes, standing is the bravest thing you do all day.