With so many people being laid off and so much business at a standstill, lots of people are feeling terrible. A friend recently joked, “Break even is the new profit!” Sounds like we are all in trouble and just at the mercy of the market! While we can’t control the market, we can control how we react. When our lives get tough, we have a few ways of reacting…
1 - We can be optimistic, which is the best, but VERY hard when things are so bad. Hence, this is the least common. The lack of consumer confidence is a great statistic to validate this. Some people will actually be annoyed if we are optimistic, because they would rather us wallow in misery with them. How can we become optimistic?
The first thing to do is gain control of WHATEVER you can in your life. As author Robert Greene says, “When we feel helpless we feel miserable.” So, do not feel helpless…control your eating habits, your dressing habits, your social circle, control anything!
The second thing to do is plan. ANY plan is better than no plan. In fact, a terrible plan is better than no plan when it comes to feeling in control. Just sit down and make plans. Of course, try to make good ones. Get help only from positive people who either already have plans or are itching to make some.
The third thing to do is gain understanding of realistic outcomes, even if they are bad. You will feel more in control if you can see bankruptcy and plan your way through the mess instead of just thinking the world going to end and believing that nothing you do will allay the damages. Your imagined damage will usually be far worse.
Even though becoming optimistic is obviously the best option, there are problems with this: It’s hard to follow through with the above steps, it’s hard to face reality, we may have to find fault in ourselves, and many people around us are not supportive. Therefore, most people will go for option two: Self-pity.
2 – We can pity ourselves. Self pity is really EASY. We can shift blame onto some one or some thing else. Great! We have no responsibility. Most people will go along with our throwing of blame around, because it’s easy for them too. We can have large “pity parties” and “commiserate”. Awesome!
The problem here of course is you will avoid responsibility and eventually your world will come crashing down around you: financially, physically and mentally. As silly as this option sounds, many people will simply let this happen. The huge amounts of foreclosures without any attempts to reconcile or negotiate are great stats to validate this. They just closed their eyes to reality because it was so hard to view.
Most people think these are the only options. Nope! There is a third. If you have trouble staying optimistic, if you can’t seem to gain control, if your plans seem to be erratic, if you have so many around you who are not positive, GET ANGRY!
3 - Yes, we can get angry. As Emperor Palpatine, from the Star Wars movies said, “Give in to your anger; it gives you focus.” It sure does! You can still shift blame onto someone or something, but now be pissed. Instead of poor me, now it’s damn that… (economy, boss, client, prospect, company, government, etc...)
Now you can focus on getting back at whichever enemy you’ve blamed. You can focus on getting an even better job, finding another client, surviving this downturn and starting a stronger company. You’ll show that son of a #$%@ who you really are. This yearning for validation and/or revenge can actually focus you enough to start planning. That means you may even set goals and picture positive outcomes (the showing up of your enemies). Hence you can gain control and actually shift into optimism. Or at a minimum, you have a much better chance of getting out of your negative circumstances, when compared to self pity.
Is the moral here, to get angry? NO. It’s that ANYTHING, even anger, is better than self pity. Self pity is the killer and must be avoided at all costs. Dreaming of punishing imaginary enemies is better than wallowing in a delusional world of “if only things were better.”
Not only must you not fall into self pity, you must stay away from others who are in self pity mode. Again, it’s best to be around optimistic people, but if you can’t, it’s better to be around angry people. You can all plot your revenge together!
Everyone knows that we are supposed to be optimistic. Duh! Every cheesy new book, self righteous talk show host and new age self-help guru tells us this. But we are all imperfect human beings full of emotions. So, often it’s just not that easy. How many of us can remain optimistic when our livelihood, our life style and/or even our families are in peril? If you can, great! Most of us have a really hard time. Even so, it is still critical to stay far away from self pity. And as crazy as it may sound, anger is a good temporary refuge.
Good luck!
Larry
