Act Now: Crucial Tips for Surviving Tough Times
My heart is heavy. I feel crushed when I think of our recent anniversary of September 11th, realizing that the war on terror is still far from over. I feel crushed by the recent anniversary of October 7 and all deaths in the Middle East that have occurred since then. And I feel crushed by the devastation caused by the hurricanes across America in the last few weeks, some of which destroyed everything some of my family members had.
I am crushed but not defeated.
What about you? If those events have not stressed you out, I would guess there are plenty of other things stressing you out. It could be the upcoming election, knowing that certain issues could go one way or the other, depending on who is elected. It could be the loss of a marriage, the estrangement of a child, the loss of a job, a significant health problem, or a thousand other things.
And if you’re one of the fortunate few who doesn’t have anything stressing you out, all you have to do is watch one or two evening news programs and you’ll have plenty of things to worry about.
The point is, stressful events and tough times will always be a part of our lives. But we don’t have to be defeated by those events because we can all do some things to lessen the pain, ease the stress, and move on.
Here are a few tips that I’ve found helpful when the stresses are piling up.
► 1. Recognize your loss.
Every change and every stress comes with a loss. On September 11th we lost some of our peace, comfort, and trust. We lost some of our innocence, thinking that we could never be attacked on our soil.
When you lose a relationship, you may lose some of your confidence and begin to doubt your ability to build and maintain a healthy relationship.
When you lose a job, you may lose some of your own sense of professional competence and self-reliance.
Initially, a loss can numb you. You may even ask yourself, “Did it really happen?”
So the first step is recognizing your loss. Take a realistic inventory of what you lost. You don’t want to catastrophize or exaggerate the loss, making it worse than it really was. And you don’t want to minimize the loss, because your lack of reality will come back to bite you at the time you least expect it.
► 2. Experience the pain. Go through the emotions.
Sometimes, when you’re dealing with a loss or a great deal of stress, your feelings may be so intense that you try to avoid them. Minimizing your pain, or trying to suppress it with alcohol or drugs, only postpone the day you must face it. So allow yourself to feel the pain.
But tears, sadness, and other expressions of grief do not mean you’re “breaking down.” You’re actually “breaking through.”
Your emotions are a lot like ocean waves. Like the waves, the grieving process follows a natural course that builds and recedes. It can’t be rushed, and it can’t be turned back. And like the waves, the waves of grief, with their intense emotional, physical, and mental undercurrents, can wash over you for some time. You may want to resist, but “flowing” with these waves helps you accept your loss and focus on a hopeful future.
In terms of emotions, you will go through five distinct emotions when you’re faced with a loss. You will start with DENIAL. You simply don’t want to believe the loss occurred.
Then you experience ANGER. You feel “robbed.” Whatever stress or tragedy came upon you doesn’t feel fair. You think this shouldn’t be happening to you.
Then GUILT washes over you. You may think you’re somehow responsible for the stress or loss. You think you could have done more to prevent the loss. You could or should have put up those hurricane shelters before the hurricane came. You should have spent more time with your partner before he or she left you. And so on and so on.
That can turn to DESPAIR. You feel varying degrees of sadness and loneliness as you yearn for the past.
Finally, if you’re moving through the grief process in a healthy way, going through the emotions rather than getting stuck in one of the emotions, you will feel HOPE. You gradually accept your loss and adjust to the changes it brings. You start to have hope for the future.
Just remember. You will probably go through these emotions more than once. Waves of grief can wash over you whenever something reminds you of your loss. Just when you think you should be over your loss, special dates, pictures, even songs or smells can kick off another wave of emotion that you must again work through. As time passes, however, these waves will grow smaller, less frequent, and easier to deal with.
► 3. Use the positive “but.”
In any situation, in any loss or stress, there is always some good. If you can balance each painful loss with a corresponding good, you will arrive at hope a lot more quickly.
To get specific, if you’re dealing with a stressful loss, take a piece of paper and draw a line down the middle. On the top left-hand side, write the word “Losses,” and list all your losses, big and small.
On the top right-hand side, write the word “Blessings,” and list all your blessings that counteract or offset your losses. I call it the “positive but.”
For example, I had an 85-year-old lady in one of my programs a while ago. She was a delightful individual, still investing in her personal development, although she had her losses. When we did the above exercise, she wrote on the left side, “I lost my husband.” Then she wrote on the right side “BUT I still have my children.”
She continued, “I lost a lot of money when my stocks dropped drastically, BUT I still have my house which is paid for. My hearing has gotten rather poor, BUT I can still see very well to read. My son moved out of town, BUT he still calls me on the phone every week.”
Do you see the point? She could have focused all her energy on the stressful left side, on the fact she lost a husband, lost some money, lost some hearing, and had her son move.
She could have focused on all her losses and been fairly depressed. But she chose to offset her losses with blessings, to focus on the right side, and coped quite well.
Follow these three tips and you will handle your stresses so much better.
Final Thought: Do not let what pierced your heart crush your hope.
Dr. Zimmerman’s Tuesday Tip, Issue 1266- Act Now: Crucial Tips for Surviving Tough Times
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