Let me ask you a question: Would you like to learn how to make difficult situations into opportunities and to turn setbacks into setups? If so, read on…
What is it about meaning that is so important to us? What’s the meaning of life? Is there a meaning to life? Are there several? While we do not have the space here to take the deep dive of life’s absolute meaning, for today I want to share some thoughts on individual day to day relative meaning and how it can impact our lives.
How we experience life as individuals is very subjective. To explain this let us use the following metaphor. Think about your favourite TV show. Now think about how satellite information floats through the air to your TV. Unless you have a satellite receiver to decode the information you are not going to be watching that show, right? In fact all of our experiences depend not only on the transmission but also the receiver. This is true of our thinking also. Whether your life is good or bad or just so-so, your happiness depends, not so much on the circumstances of your life, but the meaning that you give them. The meaning that you give to a situation, not only affects how you feel about that situation, it also impacts on what you notice and what you experience.
For another illustration of subjectivity, think of a time when you were going to buy a new car and you had a particular model in mind. I’m sure you noticed how they seemed to be everywhere. Well you certainly saw more of them than before you were going to buy one. That is because of your RAS (Reticular Activating System), which acts like broadband from your senses to your brain. Because there is so much information available to your senses, you will get overloaded if you do not filter it. In order for this to happen you can only be aware of between five and nine pieces of information at a time. So as you are usually seeking either an opportunity to feel good or to avoid a threat, your brain is on the lookout, through your senses and RAS, for that information.
What makes this interesting is that if you believe something to be true, you will notice and experience only that which backs up your belief or the meaning that you give to the situation. Imagine you said something to your friend and afterwards thought that they may have been offended. Then you rang them and they didn’t answer. You messaged them on Facebook and there is no response, even though they’ve seen the message. Now your idea has grown legs and you may become certain that something is wrong. All this stress can end when your friend calls you, saying that they were super busy, then it all makes sense and everything is okay. So you see, you didn’t feel stressed because of your friend or what you did, but because of the meaning that you had given to the situation.
Opportunities everywhere
Let’s take this up a gear to a distressing situation in your past and look at how you can change the meaning to empower you. The most common response to a difficult situation or being treated badly is either a fight or flight approach. We usually want to attack or cower. Both are fearful responses and neither of them serve us. Clearly one should make every attempt to reconcile with others, but if that is beyond your reach, you still can give a new meaning to your experience after the event.
“It is never too late to have a happy childhood”– Tom Robbins
First of all you must recognise what is good for you and what is not. If you accept that hanging on to the past or being bitter is wasted energy or even harmful, then you know you must change. I believe that you cannot neutralise a negative experience, you must invert it. This means that instead of saying ‘Oh it’s OK’, yet still allowing the negative memory to fester in your mind, you can use that memory to drive you to become even better. Try to see the negative experience as a catalyst that finally makes you take a step forward towards a future that you deserve. In all of this relax and allow yourself to ease into the new habit of placing attention on your opportunities to grow. Here are a few questions to help you turn the meaning around:
- How much better will my life be if I find a better meaning for this situation?
- What else could this mean?
- How can I use this situation to become more determined, wiser or more flexible.
- What are the lessons from this situation that can make me a nicer person?
- How can I find a way to be thankful that I experienced this?
With the right attitude, there is an upside to everything. This isn’t being Pollyanna, this is being wise. After all, you create the meaning to your situations anyway, so you might as well give them a useful one, and empowering one, a nourishing one.
’In life, things will either work out or you will get a workout’– Paddy Honan 😉
Tune in to a brighter future…
Where there is growth, there will be new life but also pain. Everything in nature from the shoot breaking through the bud to the chicken breaking out of the shell, shows us the way. Because you have free will you can choose to keep your attention on the pain of the situation or to switch focus to the opportunity for growth. With your focus on a compelling vision, the pain will become lessened considerably, because the meaning that you have given to the situation will not be debilitating, but inspiring, not arresting, but compelling.
Your mind is like a radio, you can tune it to a station that plays miserable music, or you can change the frequency to something more useful and positive. Don’t you think it’s wiser to place your attention on where you want to go and not the pain it takes to get there. So tune in to a meaning that inspires and energises you.
So my challenge to you is to think of a situation that bothers you and then create a new meaning for it. Ask yourself the earlier questions and take new action from the answers that they give you. Please add any questions of your own or thoughts you may have in the comments below.
Live your life on purpose.
awesome article Paddy, thanks!
Thank you Alina. 🙂 Stay tuned to uptitude for more 🙂