SMALL BUSINESS | An Olympic-Sized Lesson on Dealing with Disappointment
an olympic sized lesson on dealing with disappointment by Todd Patkin
I don’t know about you, but I was practically glued to my TV in the evenings during the two weeks of the Olympic games in London. I am fascinated by how skilled these athletes from all around the world have become through their hard work, focus and determination. Of course, it’s easy to have a good attitude when you’re happy with your performance. But what about the athletes who didn’t perform as well as they had hoped to? While you’ll probably never compete for a gold medal on the international stage, you will find yourself facing failure, dissatisfaction, and regret at various points in your life. And how you choose to respond to those negative circumstances will set the tone for the way others see you, and most importantly, for your overall quality of life. Here are my thoughts on how you can learn to be easier on yourself when you’re facing one of life’s failures. *Get some perspective. The next time you mess up, try to harness the power of perspective and force yourself to put your misstep into context. Often, you’ll realize that what you’re upset about is a mere drop in the bucket, and that you have a lot more to take pride in. *Put someone else in your shoes. If you’re like many people, you berate yourself for being so inept when something goes wrong – which is surely can do - you tell yourself that you were worthless, and become convinced that everything would go downhill from here. Take a moment and think about how you’d react to a friend in the same situation. Then try to extend the same grace to yourself. The voice and opinion you hear most often is your own, and what you tell yourself can make or break the quality of your life. *Make a list of your successes. Most of us do at least one hundred things right for every one thing we do wrong. But because we tend to focus on these failures, we magnify them in our own minds and reinforce to ourselves just how “subpar” we think we are. When you start to dwell on a mistake, force yourself to name at least five things you did today that were good. *Surround yourself with cheerleaders. The words you tell yourself are important, but what you hear from other people can also make or break your attempts to handle failures in a positive manner. That’s why it’s so important to surround yourself with a team of personal “cheerleaders” who build you up and encourage you. *Remind yourself that you’re normal. In the midst of a culture obsessed with perfection, it may come as a shock to realize that failure, at least some of the time, is normal and
46
RISBJ | rhode island small business journal