It doesn’t matter how many times you fall down; what matters is how many times you get up.
Today I’d like to share a simple lesson I’ve learned on how to shake off that feeling brought on by problems, challenges and experiences in life that are really unpleasant. Those kinds of things where you find yourself immersed in a quandary when you wake up, and you’re just feeling shitty.
If life is a party, a hangover is something that we create and are responsible for.
Gosh! what side of the bed did I wake up on? Why is the entire world conspiring against me and I haven’t even gotten out of bed yet?!?
If you’re an entrepreneur, or partially human, you will know what I’m talking about here. Despite doing our best, giving it our all, not everything works out the way we intend it to. It seems there is a disconnect, a gap, between how one thinks things should turn out to how they actually manifest or materialize.
At times in life we find ourselves in that really awful place; I’m talking about when you wake up one day and you look around you, at your life, your circumstances, you look at everything you have and you just want to puke all over yourself.
How the hell did I get here? How could this possibly be happening to me?
It seems, in life, in every story there’s always a victim and a villain.
To blame it on the rain, your friends, the economy, your business partners, to blame it on somebody else, just so “I can be right” or “so I don’t have to take responsibility for my half of the equation”, it’s kinda like taking an Advil for headache pain; a way to rationalize what’s happened, but is it really fixing or solving the problem?
“Take that little Advil”… the feeling dissipates temporarily. You can feel self-righteous. You get to feel sore. You get to feel the victim; you get to blame the villain a little more; maybe find some people that will follow you; people that will listen to your sob story. …“Misery loves company”.
Yet, at the end of the day you still have to deal with yourself, the man or the woman in the mirror.
When what we put out, be it good, bad or indifferent, comes back to us, in the end there’s no one to blame.
It’s really about the intention that you had, either consciously or subconsciously, that got you into the place you’re in, if you really care about why you’re there and that’s not even relevant, but more importantly, it’s about what you’re going to do with that.
If you knee jerk and revert to blame you are quashing any opportunity to grow.
That’s what waking up is all about. It’s realizing that where we are right now is a direct result by no one else’s agenda other than our own; an absolute direct result of the choices that we’ve made up to this point.
I have never successfully found a way to growth, to a solution, to making my life better, by feeling bad about myself.
The only thing worse than the action you took, is feeling bad about it.
I’m not saying you shouldn’t take responsibility for your actions, you absolutely should! But feeling sorry for yourself, and licking your wounds and expecting other people to do the same isn’t going to change anything.
You see, guilt, or remorse, is only a helpful emotion to be used as an indicator to point out “Hey I did something that I shouldn’t have done”, but in my opinion, to stay in that space, and to continue to beat yourself up is worse than whatever you did to have caused that feeling.
Feeling bad robs you of the opportunity of using the experience to your advantage, to actually taking that very lesson and turning it into a strength…
Whatever it is that you’re feeling hung over or sad about today, whatever the source of blame, just let it go! Life is too short and the only thing worse about about what you did is feeling bad about it. Take responsibility – don’t shy away from the responsibility of the decision, correct it to the best of your ability, and let it go!
All my best,
Jay Kubassek
P.S. This article is based on the June 4th, 2013 podcast: WAKE UP: I’m Hung Over.
