When you use the word “adversity,” most people think of a negative life event, such as death, divorce or bankruptcy. People know that you have to “deal with it,” and overcome adversity. But unless you’re permanently wearing pajamas and starting happy hour at noon, they assume you’re handling it okay. Other than that, the details of how to deal are pretty fuzzy.
Capital “A” Adversity and lowercase “a” adversity
The big adverse life events are:
- Death of loved one
- Injury or illness
- Change in relationship status
- Change in financial status
Yet a lot of adversity comes from our everyday life … I call this systemic stress, because it sneaks up on you. There are four kinds of systemic stress:
- Environmental – things in our physical surroundings that cause stress, such as an unsafe neighborhood
- Relationships – conflict, neglect or avoidance of issues with friends, family and partners
- Work – dissatisfaction, overworking, insufficient pay, conflicts with boss/coworkers
- Social – discrimination, harassment, and isolation
It always surprises me how people don’t understand why they have trouble moving forward in other areas of their lives when they are dealing with either kind of adversity. Why shouldn’t I be able to train effectively for a marathon after the death of my father? Why can’t I find a new relationship as I foreclose on my home?
Overcoming Adversity Is A Cellular Process
Every time we experience a deviation from how we expected our lives to progress, it’s like experiencing a mini death. Elizabeth Kübler-Ross gave us the 5 Stages of Grief model, which helps us identify how we might be feeling at any given point when we experience an upsetting event:
- Denial
- Anger
- Bargaining
- Depression
- Acceptance
The issue is, it’s messy. These stages are not meant to be complete or chronological, and they say nothing of the physical toll that PROCESSING these emotions can take.
Your Body’s Own Wisdom and Timing
You can’t feel emotions without a physical reaction, and the more intense emotions associated with adversity are going to take additional energy to process. Even when you don’t think you have any emotions to process in any given moment, YOU ARE STILL PROCESSING. Even if you think you’re fine and “done” dealing with the bad thing that happened, that’s just your brain talking. Your emotions and body might still need to weigh in.
When my mother died this year, I accepted it pretty easily. In fact, I was glad she died, so she wouldn’t suffer from her brain tumor. I have no regrets and we had a great relationship.
Mentally, I feel fine. And yet, my body is doing all kinds of things to slow me down, so I could process the things that my oh-so-intelligent brain hadn’t caught onto yet. My busy, scheduling, rational brain has no control over this process, so I had to leave it to my body and irrational, emotional brain to figure out what I need at any given moment.
Your Adversity Awareness Plan
Here are the actions I and many other people have taken to help them move through a major adverse event or even a low-level adversity they experience in their lives:
Let Go Of Resistance. When someone is in the middle of a financial crisis, it’s hard for them to stop trying to fix it and let go. Or it’s hard to accept that divorce is on the horizon when you’re having trouble in your marriage. But if you can simply accept that what will be will be—that there never needs to be a logical reason for things to play out a certain way—processing the adversity becomes much, MUCH easier.
Understand The Ways The Adversity Helps You Grow. How did my mother’s death help me grow? It brought me closer to my father. I realized all of the little things that I struggled with this year are inconsequential. I realized that I had stopped taking top-notch care of myself. I hate the cliche of silver linings in clouds, but I do believe that every spot of darkness in your life holds an opportunity to learn.
Resolve To Look Forward Instead of Backward. This might sound like a “keep your chin up” kind of platitude, but really, it’s about processing AND possibility. Looking forward and imagining the new reality helps you process remaining grief. When I remember my mom, I don’t get sad, but when I imagine life without mom in a future scenario, like birthdays or holidays, I find that there is still grief to process. That is an essential step to getting better. The same can be said about processing a divorce or bankruptcy . . . you have to grieve over that lost imagined future before you can move into the new reality.
Notice How Your Values Change. You can’t go through losing a loved one, a job, your home or your health without your values and principles coming into question. But you don’t need to decide anything, just noticed what is of value to you now that you lost X. What do you cling to? Where do you make poor choices or good ones? And what does this tell you about yourself? How does this change your life choices?
Treat Yourself Gently. Sleep more, eat healthy foods, but don’t leave out treats. Cut back your normal routine so you’re not running around as much. Make it about you. And, check in with yourself several times every day to see where your head is at. Just because you’re functional doesn’t mean you’re over it. But that’s your business, no one else’s.
Get Comfortable in Pre Contemplation. The energy that you planned on using to start a new venture, habit or behavior is currently being used by your body to work out all of your emotions and angst. You might wonder why you can’t “pull it together” to make something happen . . . no, you’re not lazy or unfocused; you’re simply processing adversity. It sucks that you can’t just let it happen and at the same time move onto the next thing. The good news is that your limited energy is temporary. The more you let your body dictate your tempo, the faster you’ll recover your normal Type A personality.
Actions To Take
- Perform an adversity assessment. Even if there have been no major life events, you might need to consciously acknowledge the systemic stress. Go through the different areas and identify dissatisfactions.
- If you have gone through a major adverse event, take stock of your current status. Did you try to rush the recovery process? What can you do to help your body’s wisdom?
- Do you feel stuck in an area of your life? You might not be able to move forward in one area of your life if you’re processing stress from another area. Forgive yourself for not moving forward on your “ideal” schedule.
P.S. If you’re going through adversity, you might enjoy reading more about how to align your energy to feel better and for better money results. That’s in my free ebook Money Chakra, and you can download that here.