“In life, many things will challenge us. It is not about whether or not we rise to them, but rather that we simply rise above.” – Hannah McPherson
I think of obstacles in life as optional. This is because I am an escape artist of reality, most of the time. The simplest solution to every problem is to pretend it doesn’t exist. This is not great advice, as it comes with consequences and complications.
So, don’t follow in my footsteps on that one.
However, there is a perspective shift in there. You can always rise above a challenge. If you zoom out to the bigger picture that we are on a floating rock hurtling through space, then things seem a lot less grave in times of weakness.
When I say weakness, what I mean is that in moments of weakness I try to remember there is no problem we cannot solve with time, patience, and effort, or at least be able to give ourselves the illusion that it has been solved until the next problem arises.
We may not always get the outcomes we desire.
Life has a way of bringing what is meant for you to you, but the alternative must also be true, that things not meant for you will also leave you.
I’ve been dealing with loss, lately. As friends get older, they grow apart. I’ve been dealing with loss of my sense of self, my sense of comfort. It has been far from easy.
This is not an abject judgement on solving problems or true pain, but it is a commentary on how we can respond to these things.
It is easy to get bogged down in the harsh reality of our world sometimes, and the “rising above” concept talks about how we may relieve ourselves of the temporary pains we experience from not being able to process these experiences.
Step 1. Remind yourself that everything is temporary.
Step 2. Remind yourself that things that are forever, we have no real knowledge of, so use your most positive imagination to fill in a story that inspires you.
Step 3. Sit with the feelings caused by challenges long enough to observe and understand what it means to you, don’t just skim the surface or keep digging when you’ve done the work.
Step 4. Zoom out, get back to the basics, trudge through the mundane while keeping the grander scale of things in mind.
Step 5. Allow time, patience, and effort to transform the challenge into something you can work with. Trust the process.
Now, these are not 5 easy steps, nor are they a simple band-aid fix all for responding to problems, but they are a great start to the methodology of rising above.
Today, I am trying to take my own advice, which is difficult. I won’t say this process has always worked for me, but when it has, it was exactly what I needed.
Today, I am trusting the process and I hope you can too.