We’re all aware of the fight or flight complex that is part of our survival instincts. However, as we evolve into a more conscious individual and learn to rise above our lizard brain instincts, perhaps we need to look at the embrace or escape choice that we are often faced with during challenging times in our life.
Our lives are filled with opportunities to escape reality- social media, television, drugs, alcohol, gambling, food, sex. Are you guilty of using any of those to run away from your problems? Some of us have been using those distractions for years and years and have still not overcome a challenge or trauma from the past. Watch more than 2 episodes of Intervention and you quickly realize that many drug addictions come from escaping a tragic event in the past. Sometimes the pain is just to much to deal with, so finding an escape helps us get through one day at at time. But what happens when those daily escapes turn into habits? Before long they become part of your routine, and you may not even be conscious of what you are trying to escape.
I’m not a therapist or trying to say that you can overcome a past trauma with a few self help steps, but recognizing that you might be using an escape instead of addressing emotion is the first step towards recovery. My goal is to help you approach future challenges from the point of a new perspective. There are going to be stressful situations, and sometimes bad things happen even to good people. We will all suffer losses. We will all interact with jerks from time to time. So how do we better prepare ourselves to approach these challenges from more of a fight or “embrace” perspective than a flight or “escape” type of response?
When times get tough, first acknowledge the situation as what it is. This situation sucks- check. Then allow youself to get through the initial emotions, without taking any action – saddness, anger, fear, overwhelm, stress. If you jump to action before you have time to think through a situation, you might make it worse. It’s ok to feel emotion- cry, yell, shake, mope, but don’t stay there for an extended period of time. Get the initial reaction out, then stop and embrace the situation. Think it through. Acknowledge that getting through it migh not be pleasant. Then take the time to create a plan and embrace what needs to be done. Boss is being a jerk? OK, you can choose to move past it, find a new job, report it to HR if extreme, or address it directly with him/her. If you don’t take action to resolve it, you just build upon the resentment or anxiety of the situation. The glass of wine to unwind at the end of the day only distracts you from the situation for a few hours. The next day you go back to work and that same situation is there and hasn’t been resolved. So now you’ve only drawn out the situation and you are even more likely to have another drink after work the next day. Escaping a situation often just makes the situation worse or creates new challenges.
Any type of negative coping method is going to catch up with you eventually. We don’t move on from our problems by avoiding them. If the situation is really bad, you might need to seek professional help from a therapist or medical professional. If it’s a minor challenge, taking the time to address it head on and determine your options will then start to create a plan of action. If nothing else, sometimes just acknowledging it helps you start to move on. Time continues to move on, it doesn’t wait for you to be ready. Accept what you can change about the situation- sometimes it’s only your attitude towards it. Sometimes you have to rise up and make choices that are hard. And sometimes you just have to let shit go. Try not see yourself as a victim. Try not to push blame around. Only you control your thoughts. Only you control your perspective. Choose to think as positively as you can in the present moment. You might not jump from depression to joy, but you can move from depression to saddness, or anger to frustration. Any click of the vibration dial to a higher frequency is going to start moving you in the right direction. Numbing the situation with a distraction isn’t moving the dial, it’s just delaying changing the station.
Not all change is bad. This too shall pass. Those are words to live by. Take control of your life, your thoughts, and embrace challenges as they arise. You are stronger than you know. Much like a mess in your house, you can ignore it for awhile, but eventually you are going to have to clean it up. Don’t become a hoarder with your house or your emotions. Once you start cleaning up the messes as they are created, it becomes easier and easier to keep you house and your mind clear. You always have the choice to think postively about the future, even when the present might be less than awesome.
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