What will you do if I ask you to punch me?
Obviously, you will hesitate and in case if you go ahead and punch me, will that punch be hard enough to knock me down?
I don’t think so.
And, what if I punch you hard first and then I ask you to punch me back?
Am so damn sure, without wasting even a second you will give your hardest punch in return.
Likewise, most of us don’t give our best unless life hits us back and knocks us down. We don’t take any action unless we have any strong reason to do so. Isn’t it?
I say it lot of times, and I will repeat it again too. Smooth roads never make good drivers. It completely depends on you how you see yourself when life knocks you down. You can go ahead and cry about the things that happened to you and dwell on the victim mode, or you have a choice to bounce back and win. It’s nearly impossible to control the flow of life. However, it’s easy to control your actions and yourself.
It’s easy to blame life, god, relative, family, circumstances and your luck for all the adversities you are facing. Our mind is programmed this way that we always choose easy options. But, it’s hard to take the responsibilities and be the master of your life. The option you choose is the one that will separate you from rest of the crowd.
So what you didn’t score the marks you expected? So what you didn’t get the promotion you hoped for? So what your love didn’t love you back the way you expected? So what things didn’t turn out the way you wanted them to be?
Will you go on crying your heart out about all the things that didn’t happen and be a looser or are you going to take it as a challenge and give your best when life knocks you down?
The choice is yours.
How to bounce back and win when life knocks you down
1. Stop and think
At times we all need a break. Break to think, a break to slip into a good state of mind. There’s no use to go on and on and on forever. Giving yourself a break will not only give you little peace of mind, but will also clear up your thought process and bring down your stress.
Life is not a sprint race, it’s a long marathon. You need to slow down when it’s required and to refuel yourself. Give your mind a break from over-thinking and over stressing and channel your energy into something positive and good. Do what makes you feel good. Give your mind a space to think rather than overcrowd it with worthless thoughts and worries.
2. Don’t let it affect your self-esteem and self-image
You need to stop treating yourself as a victim when life knocks you down. If things didn’t turn out the way you wanted, that doesn’t mean that you can’t do it or you aren’t capable of doing it. You always have a choice to make your next move with more energy and determination.
Don’t go into the lone corner of negative self- image and poor self-esteem. Take your failures merely as experiences, not more than that. When we say “Oh, I am always unlucky”, “Why I have such a bad luck”, or anything negative, our subconscious starts attracting the same. What you think and believe about yourself has the power to change your life and fate for both good and bad.
3. Surround yourself with positive people
Our vibe attracts our tribe. Don’t surround yourself with the people who make you feel more bad about the situation and yourself. Leave the people who make you feel negative. Choose your tribe carefully, just keep the ones who make you feel good, help you reach towards your goal and carve you into a better version of yourself.
It’s always good to have positive people around, who are more than happy to guide us and support us when we need them the most. When life knocks you down, rely on the people who can support you to make you stand back on your feet again and give you confidence that you can hit back even more harder.
4. Rework on your perceptive
For everything, we have two perceptions; Good or bad. We see what we want to see. Either we can count our blessing and be happy or we can count our problems and be sad. It’s always about the way we see and perceive things.
Rather than seeing it as a dead end, see it as an opportunity to walk on the new roads. See it as an opportunity to start afresh rather than seeing it as an end of life and hope. I repeat; it’s all in our mind. I strongly believe in the statement that everything happens for a reason. All you need is to find out and explore that reason and don’t settle until you find it. That’s what makes all the difference.
5. Cut things that make you negative
Simply chop off all the things that halt your performance as an individual. Be it social media, your smartphone, negative news, negative people, or anything else. As I said life is a marathon, and you are required to run light.
Remove all the unnecessary stress and people who can affect your performance negatively. Whoever said there is no gain without pain, is just partially right. The fact is whenever you feel pain, just stop, treat it and then start your journey again. You are not required to carry your pains as a badge of honour. Just simply cure it.
6. Learn positive self-talk and affirmations
Do you practice self-talk? Ohh, you don’t? Then, start doing it.
What we talk about ourselves carries the most weightage. What people talk and think about us has the least significance, trust me. The thing that really matters is what we talk and think about ourselves and what we are reminding ourselves when life hit us hard. Make it a habit, start your day with positive affirmations and end the day with the same.
Out of all the powerful words that can make the difference, the one that rules out all are “I am”. These are the most powerful words of the universe, and the suffix you add to it has the power to decide your destiny in a minute. “I am a winner” or “I am a loser”, choose your suffix wisely.
7. Change your strategy
Someone rightly said, if you do what you always do, you will get what you have always got. You can’t expect different results when you are taking the same actions. Its okay things didn’t turn out the way you wanted, try another way to do it.
If your kiss didn’t turn a frog into a prince, you might be kissing the wrong frog. A single key won’t open every door. Likewise, a single solution won’t work for all problems. If some strategy didn’t prove fruitful to you, simply change the strategy rather than quitting and accepting it as your fate. Explore the things that would work rather than mourning for the ones which didn’t.
8. Count your blessings, not the complaints
Shift your focus to the blessings you have in your life and you will see a positive change happening. Be grateful even for the little things that worked in your favor. When we shift our focus to the things that turned out well our mind automatically starts seeing the good side of the life.
I know it’s so damn hard to see the good side when life hits hard and you are seeing no way to deal with it. But, trust me, there’s always a way. You are just blinded by your own thinking. And, the first step to clear the clouds of doubts, worries, and fear is to be grateful for the things that you have.
Make a list of the things you feel grateful for. Include even the smallest things in it. Read it aloud daily and I can assure, you will see yourself and your life changing for better.
9. Share it without shame
It happened with me. I often found myself in a state of loneliness, when I used to get hit by the circumstances and situations which were beyond my control. I guess that happens with most of us. And, when it happens, we often find ourselves chained with the negativities and stress. We corner ourselves from everyone and everything.
And, then we wonder why we always left alone in the end. It’s something we chose for ourselves. Rather than speaking up and sharing our problems with the ones who can understand, we prefer to be left alone. Many of us feel good pitying ourselves, as it may bring some sympathy and lots of “awww poor lad”.
It’s of no use. Start sharing things with the people who love you and the ones who can understand you. That can help you to overcome this phase and heal you faster. There should be no shame in accepting your need to have someone to talk.
10. Never leave the rope of hope
If you ask me what’s the one thing that’s driving us and has the power to take us to the heights. I would say “Hope”. The hope that things will never be the same, a hope that things will turn out for good soon and a hope to give us confidence to say; YES! i can do it.
Never leave the hope. Time never stays the same. You didn’t win this time, don’t worry you will win next time. Always have some good amount of hope and belief in yourself that sun will rise one day for you. However, just hoping is not enough to land on the brighter side of life. Hope should be accompanied by the actions. Hope for the good and take actions towards your goal.
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10 quotes to make you feel strong when life knocks you down
1 . “Many think that the mark of a great champion is the nature and margin of their victories and the peaks they scale and reach. That’s only part of it. The mark of the greatest of champions is how they react and respond to defeat. That is when they become enshrined in our hearts and minds – as they rise again and into the immortal pages of history.” Rasheed Ogunlaru
2. “Shit happens everyday. How you deal with it makes all the difference.” Laarni Venus Marie Giango
3. “One thing about championship teams is that they’re resilient. No matter what is thrown at them, no matter how deep the hole, they find a way to bounce back and overcome adversity.” Nick Saban
4. “Success is how high you bounce when you hit bottom.” George S. Patton
5. “No matter how far life pushes you down, no matter how much you hurt, you can always bounce back.” Sheryl Swoopes
6. “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” Winston Churchill
7. “Your personal life, your professional life, and your creative life are all intertwined. I went through a few very difficult years where I felt like a failure. But it was actually really important for me to go through that. Struggle, for me, is the most inspirational thing in the world at the end of the day – as long as you treat it that way.” Skylar Grey
8. “We don’t develop courage by being happy every day. We develop it by surviving difficult times and challenging adversity.” Barbara De Angelis
9. “You should never view your challenges as a disadvantage. Instead, it’s important for you to understand that your experience facing and overcoming adversity is actually one of your biggest advantages.” Michelle Obama
10. “Brave men rejoice in adversity, just as brave soldiers triumph in war. Lucius Annaeus Seneca
A great piece of writing , with essence of thoughtfulness.