No matter how much you plan or prepare, there will always be moments when life sucks.
Setbacks and times when you feel like your plans have been so derailed that you can’t see a way to get back on the track are an inevitable part of life.
Since there’s really no avoiding these situations, the best thing you can do is learn how to handle them so they’re less disruptive when they do happen.
In today’s episode of The Live Diet-Free Podcast, I’m discussing Dr. Neeta Bhushan’s book That Sucked, Now What? to help you learn how to develop the resilience to bounce back in the face of challenges by self-regulating your emotions, developing compassionate ownership, and turning your rock bottom moments into the catalyst for change.
You can listen to the episode here…
Or keep reading the post below:
Self-Regulation
Many people are lacking self-regulation skills simply because it’s not something you’ve ever been taught. So when life sucks, it’s easy to fall into the “woe is me” trap instead of trying to better understand why you’re feeling (and reacting) the way that you are.
Dr. Bhushan offers three self-regulation skills that you can start working on today that will make a difference in your life the next time you’re thrown a curveball.
1 – Understanding emotions serve a purpose:
The purpose of emotions is to motivate us to take quick and decisive action. You are feeling emotions so you can react more quickly and instinctively to the situation, but it is also important to work on building in a pause and recognizing the feeling and question whether or not your response is warranted.
2 – Having healthy reflexes:
This means that when life sucks, you are able to hit the brakes, stop the actions you are taking that aren’t serving you, and focus on your immediate needs. Developing these reflexes in situations where you start to feel yourself getting worked up and you know something like getting sleep, taking a walk, etc. will allow you to react without much thought.
3 – Shifting perspective:
Shifting perspective gives you an opportunity to reframe whatever is happening to you and finding the magic in the moment of suck. You do this by stepping just enough outside the story or just beneath the surface enough to take inventory of it, pausing, being curious, and choosing what you want to make this mean.
Compassionate Ownership
It’s very easy to get stuck in a cycle of continuing to trying the same things over and over again hoping for a different outcome than you’ve gotten in the past.
Maybe your friends (or even you in the past) have had success with a specific diet or workout plan and you want those same results, but each time you try, you find yourself frustrated, overwhelmed, and with nothing to show for it.
Learning how to take compassionate ownership gives you the opportunity to view the situation more objectively if you’re not getting the expected outcome. You’re able to see that the actions you’re taking aren’t serving you or helping you reach your goal no matter how badly you want them to and you can make necessary changes that will support your goals.
Compassionate ownership allows you to acknowledge that in the past you have done the best you could with the resources and knowledge you had, but now that you know more, the things in the past do not need to define your future.
When you approach yourself and your actions with kindness and reflection, you will learn what you need to address moving forward and take ownership of the responsibility to do the work.
Rock Bottom
When things are going well, most people tend to start ignoring a lot of the practices that got them to that point.
Unfortunately, when you reach the top of the mountain and things are looking good and your guard is down, that’s when you’re going to encounter a setback.
You’ll quickly find yourself back at the bottom of the mountain and trying to pick up the pieces and remember how you handle these situations when life sucks.
That rock bottom feeling can cause you to do one of two things – you can either choose to live in that feeling and adopt a victim mentality or (and the better option) is use it as a catalyst for positive change in your life.
It is likely that there are multifacets to the changes you need to make and you can’t make them all at once, but just starting with something you know you can commit to can create the momentum you need to continue.
Even after you make these changes, setbacks and sucky moments will still be inevitable, but instead of allowing yourself to be knocked down to rock bottom again, you’ll have developed the skills and habits necessary to stop yourself and start the climb back to the top.
Our team at EA Coaching is passionate about taking women from feeling like they’re at rock bottom to making the changes they need to become their healthiest, happiest, and most confident. Check out estheravant.com/coaching for more information about how this is possible for you!
