Read one of the best articles about conquering crisis in Prevention magazine. Oh to have had this article a couple years ago when I felt like everything was a crisis!
Jeffrey Rossman, PhD, offers six suggestions for conquering stress. I stumbled upon the same six ideas but it took me a long time to reach my own conclusions! He believes using his tips creates emotional flexibility that helps us flex in the wind of adversity like a tree in the wind. How I love PhDs who are poetic!
First acknowledge your feelings. Yes! It IS sometimes okay to feel a little crazy and scared and freaked-the-hell-out! If it's a feeling, it's real. If we try to hide from our feelings, they haunt us anyways. Go a step further and air your feelings - confide your feelings - start a journal or blog. Maybe don't make my mistake of airing them to anyone who will listen. In fact, had I the ability to do it all over again, I'd run out in the middle of the deserted golf course in my back yard and tell the trees.
Next, erase ALL blame. That's right. Do it. While it's a normal human response to try to assess blame - because blaming is an attempt to make someone pay for your pain, it's not very productive. I've written about this in the past. Who cares whose fault it (whatever IT is) is? There's no changing past events no matter who was to blame. Forgive! Don't feel like a dormat! Decide to let go of anger! But don't stop there. Do your emotional homework and recognize the changes you've made to prevent a recurrence. AND forgive yourself.
Find a circle of support by finding your tribe and letting people help. Yeah, you have to be a little careful. I trusted the wrong person; the wrong person will use your personal tragedy to create additional wounds. So, find or create the right group, but be cautious. Not everyone is worthy of trust.
Look for ways to find meaning. I believe we learn something every time we suffer. Sometimes it takes a long time to be able to clearly see what we've learned, but it's there. Endure the crisis but use it to further a cause. There was nothing I wanted more than to understand why our 1997 bus accident happened, but I will never, ever have a REASON. I have found ways to grow personally and professionally, and attribute that growth of knowledge with learning to deal with that crisis in the long term. Finding meaning might mean we reorder our priorities. It's difficult to be truly introspective and seek truth without sometimes thinking: What would happen if I only had a year to live? Who would I want to be? How can I be that person?
Convince yourself you can bounce back. Do things to create opportunity for personal growth: exercise, step out of your comfort zone, clear the weeds choking your optimism.
Most important, connect with your spiritual side. Maybe it's finding the spiritual in nature or creating a sacred space in your home or joining a prayer or study group. Whatever it means for you, immerse yourself in spirituality. Because, says Mark Schultz, when all hope is gone and we've been wounded in the shadows, He is all the strength that we will ever need.
Jeffrey Rossman, our poetic PhD, has a book, The Mind-Body Mood Solution that might be worth a read. The article I read appeared in the January 2011 issue of Prevention.
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