How To Cope With Difficult Situations and Emerge Better
Hello Friends,
Today I am so excited to share how to cope with difficult situations and emerge better because of them! I am so passionate about this topic because I believe that over the past few decades we have really embraced a victim mentality and vilified trials of any kind. This is doing us such a disservice because we have lost the art of embracing our suffering as a challenge to overcome. It is by accepting this challenge to overcome that we will ultimately emerge stronger. Working through our difficuties is a great opportunity to develop grit and resilience! I do not love suffering and I am not advocating you seek it out by putting yourself in vulnerable situations. Rather, I am saying instead of immediately getting overly emotional and thinking woe is me, try to see, if possible, how you can turn the situation into something you could potentially benefit from. This is not going to happen immediately. Obviously you are going to feel emotional when something in your life goes awry, don’t just ignore how you feel and shove your emotions down immediately. You are human not a robot, and it is normal to experience feelings. Just don’t dwell on those feelings for too long.
First, it is important to process your feelings a little bit. Sometimes processing particularly difficult situations can require a little bit of effort. Try talking with someone, it does not need to be a psychologist or professional, it can be a friend or family member. If you do not want or need to talk to someone else about it write about it in a journal or pray about it. Just taking the time to recognize what you’re feeling; anger, sadness, or pain etc, can be enough to help you process it. Another benefit to identifying the emotions you are feeling is, it will help you identify your coping mechanisms. Here is your opportunity to start emerging from this difficult time better.
Start with identifying the type of coping mechanisms you use. Do you cope or deal with hard times, by doing things that are healthy or unhealthy? These are relatively easy habits to identify. Do you overeat when you’re upset or drink a lot of alcohol? These are not good coping mechanisms for obvious reasons because they have negatively impact our health. Now think about what are some better options?
A great healthy coping mechanism is physical exercise. Try using this in two ways, the first would be immediately as soon as something bad happens, the second is to make it into an ongoing routine. In the immediate aftermath of something difficult happening try taking a walk. This can be a walk outside alone or with your family or pets. You will get some natural endorphins from this which will help you to feel better and if the sun is shining then you can get some vitamin D as well, which is also a mood booster. If you are going through a difficult time that is not going to be short lived consider starting an exercise routine to help regulate your emotions and cope with the stress of the situation. It could be as simple as a daily walk in the sunshine, or as regimented as committing to an hour of exercise 5-6 days a week that includes strength and cardiovascular training. I think everyone has a form of exercise that they love they just need to find it. It seems like when you find that type of exercise when you finish a workout, it will leave you wanting more and excited for your next one. You will absolutely have times where you will not want to exercise but knowing you will enjoy the workout helps motivate you to do it.
Some other physical coping mechanisms that you can try are; taking a warm bath or enjoying other types of water like going to a beach to look at the ocean, or going to a pond or lake, even looking at a beautiful aquarium. Water has a wonderful calming effect, that is why there are so often aquariums in medical and dental offices. Enjoying water in these ways is a great way to help you feel instantly more at ease when hard things happen. You can of course add these into your routine to help regulate your mood as well by carving out time to go to a beach or lake regularly if that suits you, or setting up an aquarium in your home or pond in your yard. I happen to know a lot about aquariums and ponds because my husband has owned an aquarium and pond company for nearly 20 years so if setting one up interests you; check out our website www.lotsafishies.com and you can contact my wonderful husband if you need help. In my personal opinion there really is just something about aquariums that is soothing, I can’t pinpoint it, it could be the sound or the interesting sight of having a tiny piece of an underwater world that you can see into any time you want.
Another great way to cope with difficulty is by journaling. Obviously when something bad happens puling out a journal and writing down what is going on and how you feel is basically a way to vent without having to talk to someone if that is what you prefer. If you try journaling as a coping mechanism keep in mind that you then have a written record of how you are handling difficult situations and you can then see how your reactions evolve as you work on improving yourself. One way to improve yourself by journaling is by keeping a gratitude journal. I suggest keeping it short and sweet. At the end of every day write down three positive events that you are grateful for. Studies have shown that if you do this for two weeks the effects it has on you will last for months. It causes you to be more positive because you are making an effort to commit positive things to long term memory where they would normally go through a filter in your brain and might get forgotten. This causes you to look for the good rather than the negative, ie making you more optimistic.
The last thing I would suggest to cope with difficult times is community. Find a group of friends that make you want to be the best version of yourself. Consider trying to find a mentor, someone further along in their spiritual, financial, or marital life than you that can help guide you when you have questions. Praying together is very intimate and can be very intimidating but being vulnerable and praying for each other is a great idea. Finding a community can be so beneficial because it is a positive way to always be motivated to improve yourself. You don’t need to strive for perfection, but we are always growing and it is better to be growing in a positive direction developing good habits the growing in a negative direction picking up bad habits along the way.
Here is a list of the 9 ways above to cope with difficulty and emerge better. Try physical exercise like taking a walk. Incorporate an exercise routine into your life. Take a warm bath. Look out on some water like a lake or the ocean. Consider investing in an aquarium or pond so you can enjoy the underwater world whenever you would like. Try journaling. Keep a daily gratitude journal. Find a beneficial community. Consider finding a mentor.
I hope you found this post encouraging and I hope it inspires you to face the next difficult situation in your life as a challenge that you can and will overcome. When you do you will emerge stronger than before you faced it!
Your Friend,
Amanda
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