There is such excitement in imagining opportunities manifest themselves. When opportunities arise and we truly believe we deserve them and our ability to create them, we can even start to see and feel ourselves experiencing them. We have the ability to imagine the things we want to unfold. We may even start to communicate to our friends that it is “happening!” Often, this approach works. However, sometimes things don't turn out exactly or even close to how we wanted them to.
It feels disappointing.
To deal with disappointment without allowing an undesired circumstance to cause us low self esteem or despair is challenging. How did this happen when we believed in what we wanted to happen. When we were already planning our future around this! WTF?! How to overcome disappointment is possible, even when it's challenging.
With a focused perspective we can accept whatever challenges life throws at us, as important, and valuable in the long run. Challenge teaches us our capacity, our boundaries, our resilience, our passion. There are many possible disappointments life can provide us; job loss, feeling rejected in a relationship, failing a test, losing our ground, death, participating in an unhealthy behavior, etc. Overcoming disappointment, such as these examples, becomes a measure of endurance to keep striving for what we are hoping to accomplish and a potential opportunity to teach us how strong, resilient, and tough we are.
Allowing ourselves to feel disappointed briefly is important and healthy to an extent, to keep momentum toward what we are desiring and creating. Showing up to disappointment, feeling it, and then letting it go is vital for health. Most of us avoid what is uncomfortable at any cost. Feelings if buried alive, will never die, and may dim the light in our enthusiasm towards life itself.
When we feel disappointed it signifies that we are passionate with what we are seeking. That passion is good!
It means there is more energy to give, to achieve our goal. The human heart is resilient if the perspective is right. If we experience failure and we try, and try, and try again, we create movement and eventual breakthroughs. Don’t shrivel up and stop trusting. That will stop opportunity. Strive forward with a patient endurance. This is how to deal with disappointment in a healthy way! It is all about keeping things moving and not letting disappointment stop us.
Disappointment stems from possibility. It’s funny how imagination can create anticipation to the point where the mind starts visualizing and sensing a possible future outcome that doesn’t even exist. It is possible, but it is also not possible.
What is possibility? Possibility is something that may happen or may be the case. It is not a guarantee. If it is a possibility, it means that there are alternative outcomes. When we presence ourselves in mindfulness, we realize that there is never a guaranteed outcome. There are multiple possibilities in every thing at every moment. It is always helpful to keep this perspective, when deciding what it is that we want. Even if it's something we really want, always remember that even if it doesn't work out exactly as hoped, it simply means that experience was not meant for us, and there's a better one waiting!
Life is going to have many unanswered whys. How we show up to the unanswered whys is the lesson. When we hit the wall, what do we reach for? When we fall down, how long do we wallow there? What is it that motivates us to stand back up, to pull ourselves up over the wall? Why do we take a disappointment, or a series of disappointments personally thinking of our self as the failure, or not good enough. We create all sorts of dangerous assumptions to try to explain to our minds why.
As yogis we search for the lessons that keep us in bondage. We challenge disappointments to be exposed so we can bring the process of freeing ourselves from their influence. Keep pushing back the limitations placed around yourself and invoke a greater relationship with your self that is not jaded by circumstance. You can overcome disappointments and setbacks.
You deserve the best in life and you owe that to yourself. No one else is going to do this for you. You do it. Disappointments will show up, but those of us that stay persistent and unwavering and see disappointments as lessons instead of failures, are the ones who create the lives they love to live. So, remember, disappointments are temporary, and merely a stepping stone along the way to what it is you desire and are worth.
Be strong. Move on. Live a life you love.
By Shannon Connell
Shannon is a certified Jivamukti, Power, Hot Yoga, and Mindfulness Meditation Instructor, Usui and Karuna Reiki Master Teacher, and Registered Psychotherapist. She honors the interconnectedness between All-beings and All-things and is passionate about participating and supporting her community in physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health. Visit her at her website www.shannonconnellhealth.com.
Overcome disappointment and envision what you want now with Christen's meditation!
Living the Dream: A Vision Meditation with Christen Bakken