We all get disappointed sometimes. And mostly we follow a pretty simple process of feeling tremendously upset, thinking about it way too much, then finding some way to comfort ourselves and then moving on. With the help of some friends, some carb-heavy comfort food (or herb tea or martinis or double-chocolate
fudge crunch ice cream or whatever your narcotic of choice may be…) and perhaps a period of true unbridled wallowing, we get over it.
Mostly.
But some disappointments linger. Some become a permanent part of our internal landscape. Some even feel as though they have become part of our identity, and we almost can’t imagine letting them go, even though they cause us so much pain.
Here’s the good news: you’re reading this.
That tells me that you:
- Actually WANT to get over it
- Can at least sort of imagine that you COULD get over it
Welcome to Bouncing Back from Disappointment: Three Strategies to Really Get Over It.
I hope we’re going to make some good progress
here – I can’t guarantee anything, but I have seen people make some miraculous shifts in very brief amounts of time, so I
wouldn’t rule anything out. Now, it’s not possible to “unthink” something, and you can’t not feel the way you feel
about something. There’s no magic pill.
But you can
unscrew the bolts a little bit on the ideas that are keeping the experience both fixed and
painful.
(One possible exception: Grief. My
experience is that other kinds of pain and disappointment can shift and move
but grief – even old grief – just sweeps up on you and feels for all the world like it just happened this morning. So I want you to be working on a specific
frustration or disappointment or failure here, and I want you to pick one, but
if it’s a Grief, then maybe, just for the purposes of today, pick another, less
knotty one.)
Everybody have one particular disappointment in mind? Good.
Maybe it’s just a little one: I over salted the
turkey meatloaf the other night and I’m a little disappointed in myself.
Or a medium one: I’m still so bummed I
never finished college, or that we got outbid on that house.
Or a big one: I got fired.
Or a really big one: I still can’t
believe he or she had that affair.
Now, let’s get a
reading here:
On a scale of 1-5, how disappointed are you about your
thing?
1 = Actually, I’m mostly
over it
2 = Still stings a bit
3 = This causes me some pain when I think about it
4 = Ouch! Ouch! Ouch!!!!!!!
5 = I almost can’t imagine EVER being over this
Are you at a 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5? Whatever it is, just guesstimate and write
down the number.
It’s important that you be honest with yourself about your level of disappointment.
Sometimes we can get caught up in Enforced Optimism (“Oh, it’s all good…”) or Depressive Diminishment (“It’s no big deal”) and I don’t want that. I want you to haul the monsters out from under the bed and look them in the eye. Be straight with yourself. There’s no sense pretending that you feel all yippee-skippy when you don’t, and there’s no sense hanging on to a disappointment from which, you discover, you are really mostly already recovered.
STEP ONE: We Are Not Amused (but maybe we could be…)
So the first thing I want you
to do is give this event a new, more disastrous name. Really exaggerate. Unleash your Inner Drama Queen. Go for it. Write it down.
“I blew the presentation,” could be
re-named “I’m Headed For The Poorhouse For Sure!!!”
“I fell off my diet,” becomes “I Am
The Walrus, Koo Koo Ka Choo”
“I didn’t finish my novel,” becomes “I Will Never Be A Real Writer Ever Ever Ever Ever Ever”
Got it?
Be melodramatic. Make yourself laugh.
(It’s great if you can do this with a trusted friend who can laugh with you.)
How does it feel to give it this extreme name? What do you notice? What shifts?
Next, I want you to write down a really minimizing name for your event. Brush it off. Spin it like a crooked politician. Or imagine you have an eccentric great-aunt who hears about your disappointment and just waves it away with a word. What does she call it?
“Nobody’s buying my product,” becomes “Well, This Has Been Some Fascinating Market Research…”
“I’ll never get another date,” becomes “Oh, Pish Posh, Silly Old Dating, Who Cares?”
“I’m chronically disorganized,” becomes “I Am So Creative With Where I Put Things!”
Again, write them down and notice how each one feels. (Don’t worry – you can always go back to the same way you’ve always felt. No pressure.)
We’re
just experimenting with perspectives here, so you don’t need to actually believe your new names for this event, but you do need to acknowledge that there may be some alternatives to the lonely, empty feeling you’ve allowed the memory of this event to trigger in you.
If you like this Step, then keep going:
– What would your dearest, best friend call this event?
– What would your Guardian Angel call it?
– What would a poet call it?
– What would a late-night infomercial spokesperson call it?
– What would a gypsy fortune-teller call it?
Experimenting with different names can remind you that when it comes to your own life, you are in a position of choice.
You get to decide what you think about it.
And that can move you from feeling like a disappointed victim to feeling like the confident, empowered, creative genius that you truly are.
NOTE: I’m curious – what names did you come up with? Please comment because I’d love to hear them!
Coming soon: Step Two!
The Solitude Cure
There is no real cure for loneliness.
Except to transform it into solitude.
Solitude is remembering that there has never, ever been a single (solitary) person like you.
You arrived alone
You’ll die alone.
And in between those two things, you will be having a discreet, one-of-a-kind experience of the world.
Everyone has that “among them but not of them” feeling, at least sometimes. And creative people feel it more often, I think, than most.
Everyone yearns for connection, comfort, fusion, total immersion. We read books where people fall in love and “become as one” and we think we should have that feeling ourselves.
But that only happens in fiction.
So.
The cure is to embrace the separation. Enjoy the space. Hold yourself slightly apart. After all, you already feel apart, so go ahead and exaggerate that feeling a little bit. Observe the world around you. Retreat into your own skin and observe you having your very own point of view on the world.
That isolated, personal point of view is where your art comes from. So go ahead and create something inspired by this particular vantage point. It doesn’t have to be any good, and you don’t ever have to show it to anyone. Just go ahead and let something flow.
And now you have the real cure for solitude: art.
I Can’t Go On. I Can’t Go On. I’ll Go On., ww… by samanthabennett222
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When you find yourself all bummed out and thinking dire my-life-is-a-failure-type thoughts, my advice is to wallow in the feelings and ignore the thoughts.
HOW TO WALLOW
Cry.
Beat the mattress with a whiffle bat.
Run around the block as fast as you can.
Re-read a book you find comforting and transportive (Sci-fi? Romance? This is not the time to be an intellectual, here, people – we’re looking for comfort.)
Watch a movie, and not one of those “good for you” movies, either.
Work out.
Paint.
Scribble.
Write poetry (you know you want to…and you can call it “song lyrics” if you want)
Clean out your closet – be merciless.
Sleep, baby.
Write letters to the universe, pouring your heart out.
Go to a 12-step meeting.
Get down on your knees and pray.
Weed the garden.
Fingerpaint.
Listen to Fiona Apple or your personal equivalent.
Comfort food!
Re-read books you’ve read before.
Watch home improvement/animal/decorating shows on TV – shows where nothing bad ever happens.
The idea is to burn off the fog of feelings with the sunshine of energy.
You wouldn’t let an over-tired child make an important decision, would you?
Of course not – you would distract that child with something soothing and fun until they were calm enough to move forward.
So, when you’re in the grip of strong feelings, be your own good parent.
How do you like to wallow?
Don’t go grocery shopping when you’re hungry.
Don’t call ex-lovers when you’ve been drinking.
Don’t think when you’re feeling.
Let’s say you have a disappointing day. Everything is going wrong. Bills, parking, people, money, friends, the very streets seem to be out to get you. You feel alone, sad, furious, frustrated, exhausted and forgotten. You think, “That’s it. I’ve had it.” And you decide to turn your back on your life and start over.
The thought of which depresses you even further.
Or maybe you’re ill, or in physical pain. My friend Chris gets a cold and suddenly his whole life feels like a pathetic joke in which nothing good can ever happen. When his body is weak, his thinking gets weak, and it’s hard to ignore the dark thoughts that are one of his “symptoms.”
Or maybe your illness is actually a hangover; post-alcoholic depression is no joke. Even if you are not suffering from the physical effects of drinking too much, your brain may be. And in it’s weakened condition, your brain is liable to throw out an awful lot of negative thoughts. It’s perilously easy to believe negative thoughts when you’re hung over.
Or perhaps you are in the middle of a truly awful situation. When you have lost something or someone you love, be it a person, an animal, a place, a job, a relationship, or even just your idea of the person you thought you were, you will grieve. According to the Greeks and Sam Christensen “Grief is the Daughter of Anger and Sadness” and “Revenge is the Son of Anger and Sadness,” – an evocative conceptualization, huh? When we are caught in the strong tides of circumstance and emotion, our cognition is affected. And not, as you’ve probably noticed, for the better.
Has this happened to you? When we’re in the extremes of an emotion, it’s all too easy to tie those emotions to thoughts, and those thoughts certainly feel real. But they are not. The thoughts you have when you are operating at a low vibration are a fraud. They are the devil, sneaking in when you’ve left the doorway of despair open even a little bit.
People who make decisions when they’re upset are called Drama Queens. They live in a turbulent, tumultuous world in which nothing can be relied upon, because they allow their ever-shifting feelings to make their decisions for them.
In the same way that alcoholics and addicts constantly “change the rules,” Drama Queens also create an environment in which no one ever knows how they will be received. Will there be hugs and kisses and a face wreathed with smiles? Or glowering? Or mean-spirited remarks? When people come to understand that they cannot rely on you, then will begin to avoid you. Maybe not right away, but eventually they will decide that your erratic, unpredictable behavior is just more trouble than it’s worth. You have become a person without integrity.
So, you know…Don’t be that way.
If you’re feeling low, you have a few choices: you can just lay low, you can can wallow in it (see “How To Wallow”) or you can try to keep your chin up and soldier on. But really, don’t make any big decisions or rash moves until you’re done feeling your feelings, OK?
NOTE: If you’re feeling low for more than two weeks, go see your doctor and don’t leave that doctor’s office until you’ve gotten some help.
So, what lessons have you learned about “not thinking while you’re feeling”?
