How we handle disappointment reveals what we really believe about life. Everyone experiences some level of disappointment in life, but not everyone moves forward from the imprint of disappointment. Moving forward in a positive way is challenging.
In this episode, I tell a story about a disappointment I experienced in 2014. I trained to race an IRONMAN triathlon in Lake Tahoe, CA. Unfortunately, it was canceled two minutes prior to the event start due to a raging forest fire nearby.
Disappointments can cause us to make conclusions and agreements that last a lifetime. Maybe you can relate to these
“Next time I’m not going to get my hopes up”.
“Why dream”.
“I’m not going to try again”.
“Why try so hard”.
The problem is that we get stuck. We stay in that same emotionally frozen state and are unable to fully move forward with our life, our relationships, our dreams. The way to go forward is to allow disappointment and loss to have a place for a time. It is good to be sad and experience the grief associated with the loss. We obviously don’t want to stay there in loss and grief forever either.
The goal is to move through the loss and then move forward. Try having a conversation with Disappointment.
“Hey Disappointment, I know you’d like for me to believe that I should play it safe and not try-cause look what happened last time. Well, umm, I know it could happen again. I know the relationship could implode or my boss could say No again. But, I’m going to try again anyway. I believe the greater risk is staying stuck and doing nothing.”
