In life, it is inevitable to ‘escape’ from difficulties and hard times. Marriage broke down, a loved one dies, you lose a job, you may be facing financial challenges, or depression hits you.
What do we do when our world hit rock bottom ?
The times when things are falling apart are exactly the best times to transform and reinvent your life.
A friend recently sent me a video of an 88 years old body builder, Ernestine Shepherd. Her story inspired many. I am sharing this video with hope that it will encourage and inspire you as much as it did for me.
Personally, I believe that it is how you respond to the setback that really defines the type of person you are.
When you can use your gifts to navigate the difficult times, you not only live a fulfilled life, but it also strengthen your personal growth.
So how do you transform your life through setback ?
Here are four ways
1) Change your mindset
It times of difficulties, we need to have a resilience mindset.
In our struggles, we learn about ourselves and the people around us. We start to reflect on what we want from life, and what it takes get us there. Most of us know that we need to stay positive but it’s easy to lose that drive when life disappoints us. We have to commit to focus on getting better one day at a time.
2) Find strength beyond self
Different people respond to life’s challenges differently. For me, when things get to their most difficult, there is only one place for me to turn—and that is to God. Sometimes life is filled with challenges that stretch us so far that we begin to doubt ourselves. You may find yourself struggling to make sense of your thoughts, your emotions, your feelings. Times like these require more than human strength. In bleak moments, I encourage you, bring your struggle to God. He will guide you and bring you comfort through the pain. You will discover new strengths and a better life. And if you reach out to Him, He will show you blessings exceedingly, above and beyond what you can think of.
3) Focus on what you can control
Some situations are beyond our control and no matter what we do, we cannot change a thing. We must avoid setting ourselves up for frustration if we were to focus our time and energy on things we cannot control. By focusing on the negatives, we are making the situation seem even more bleak.
Instead focus on the things that are within our control because that is the only way we can make a change that is actually going to help. For example, make a list of everything we can control about the situation and direct all of your energy towards those things.
4) Find the lessons in the hard times
I believe that when you start looking for the lessons, you set yourself on a path for personal growth.
When I find myself caught in a bad situation, I like to reflect and see what went wrong and what I could have done differently. I will always find some lessons that helped in my growth and often I get some sense of clarity of what I need to do to improve the situation. Or if I do find myself in a similar situation, I know what to do to minimize the difficulty of the situation.
There will be difficulties in life, but the good news is that no matter how difficult things may get, you can bounce back. We need to have resilience and grit. No matter how many setbacks you’ve faced in your life, it’s never too late to cultivate resilience and grit. Be like a rubber ball, each time you hit rock bottom you have the ability to bounce back and the harder you hit the ground the higher you will bounce back.
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