Midlife Mastery Journal » reaction

After the Fall: Recovering Your Initiative

Les Brown — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 13:00:00 +0000

What happens when you run headlong into one of life’s ‘ten terrible transitions’? You probably know what they are — I’ve written about them before: 1) Death of a loved one, 2) Making a life commitment, 3) Breaking a life commitment, 4) Changing careers, 5) Going into business, 6) Retirement, 7) Bankruptcy, 8) Serious illness or accident, 9) Spiritual awakening (including addiction recovery), and 10) Embracing sexual identity (as Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual or Transgendered). All of them (even the ‘good’ ones) have the same effect on your experience of day-to-day living: it stops! Everything comes to a screeching halt until the transition is completed. You’ve fallen. So, what happens then?

Everyone goes through the same four sets of experiences, according to his or her temperament and the nature of the transition. I call them “the four ‘R’s”: realization, reaction, reflection and result. At each experience, you encounter a different set of emotions, all of which have to be dealt with before you can get on with the life you’ve chosen for yourself. Let’s look at each one.

First, you realize what is happening, and that causes you to feel as if your life has been disrupted. In point of fact, it has. Circumstances have conspired to distract you from your life goals to such a degree that you can no longer ignore it. It demands your attention, and won’t be put off until later. It must be addressed now before you’re free to do anything else. To the extent that you resent this intrusion into your plans, you may even feel defeated or victimized. “Why,” you may ask yourself, “is this happening to me, and why now?”

Next, you have an emotional reaction to the realization that your will has been thwarted. You will probably feel frustrated and disappointed. To the extent that you fought to avoid having to face the transition that confronts you, you may feel exhausted from your struggle and/or overwhelmed by an experience that you simply can’t avoid, no matter how hard you try. Furthermore, to the extent that others are aware of your struggle, you may also feel humiliated. These are the most common reactions to coming to accept that the unthinkable is, in fact, happening.

While the last set of emotions came from your reaction to your realization of your situation, the next set of emotions arise in you when you reflect on your performance in the face of this transition. This is the perfect opportunity for whatever self-doubt you harbor to come forward and to take center stage. In these situations, it’s common to experience your emotions reflecting back to you feelings of inadequacy, incompetence, or deficiency. You may start thinking that maybe you’re defective, because you couldn’t avoid or at least manage the situation better. In extreme cases, you may feel like a ‘nobody,’ a ‘zero.’

As a direct result of this cascade of emotions, from realization to reaction to reflection, you will most likely arrive at a predictable emotional result: you’ll feel a deep sense of helplessness, a sense of being stuck in an impossible situation, and at a loss as to what you need to do next. Depending on whether you’re an extroverted or introverted person, you’ll very likely either strike out randomly at people, places and things in your surroundings (which may or may not have anything to do with the transition situation itself), or you’ll hunker down in frightened inaction. Some others, when faced with this situation, may even take off running in a vain attempt at escape. And, there we have our predictable (but very ineffective) result: the infamous fight, flight, or freeze responses.

Right now, I’m spending much of my spare time building a comprehensive but affordable program that people in transition can use not only to go beyond these debilitating emotions, but also to provide a means by which they can actually use these ‘negative’ experiences as stepping stones to give them a sense of direction, energy, pride, satisfaction, purpose, confidence and accomplishment beyond anything that they’ve experienced before. Sages, spiritual leaders and we coaches aren’t exaggerating when we insist that challenges are only opportunities in disguise. Properly managed, difficult transitions can be the most fertile ground from which incredible growth and progress can develop. I’ve seen it in my own life, and I’ve seen it in hundreds of people whom I have counseled and coached. With the proper guidance, I’ll bet I’ll see it in you, too!

H. Les Brown, MA, CFCC
Copyright © 2009 H. Les Brown

The Mystique of the New

Les Brown — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 15:41:00 +0000

The year has changed . . . how about you? What changes are facing you in 2009? If you're a man in midlife, change has probably caught you like the incoming tide and is carrying you along with its often-understated power. Now, the question remains: what are you going to do about it? Your midlife experience may be causing you to experience your relationships, your career, and your own personality with restlessness, irritability, and discontent. Not surprisingly, you may be reaching the limits of your tolerance for those aspects of your life that are out of focus or discordant. Perhaps you're feeling cheated, as though you've been promised a bill of goods that were never really delivered. You look back at your decisions, and can't figure out where you went wrong . . . exactly where your path turned and headed you off into a direction where you never really wanted to go. Maybe you're thinking (especially now that everyone's talking about a tough new year ahead of us) that it's time to make a change.

Guys: here's were you'll need to be very, very careful. My generation (the 'boomers) are rapidly moving in to take the place of the depression generation as retirees and 'golden agers.' Most of you who will be reading this will be a generation or two behind me. That makes you many decades behind the folks who experienced years of joblessness, scarcity of food, and having to make do with (and for) the necessities of life. Theirs was the generation who learned (from bitter experience) about conserving and reusing whatever little was available to keep them and their families going. They experienced what 'luxury' really means (according to the vast majority of the world's population). They look aghast at our 'disposable planet' mentality. In our 'mentality of abundance' world, the 'poverty mentality' can find few adherents. When in doubt, we proclaim, throw it out and get a new one!

We're also suckers for advertising, and have been for decades: new, improved, better, revolutionary, an amazing breakthrough. Do you enjoy your plasma TV? Are you unhappy because your car is more than four years old? Are you pining to turn in (or give away or throw out) your old stuff and replace it with something more satisfying? A new relationship, perhaps? A new career? A new you? That's really the point, isn't it? Consumed with dissatisfaction, you really want to make a drastic change: turn in the old life for a brand new one. After all, you've now lived half your life, and you've learned a thing or two over these four or five decades, haven't you? You've made some mistakes and now, you think, it's time to put all that practical knowledge to work: out with the old, and in with the new!

Of course, that could work out for you. It's always possible . . . but, seriously, what do honestly think your chances are? You really have three major strikes against you, that I think you ought to consider seriously before making any final decisions. Here they are for your consideration.

First, as the generations ahead of us knew so well, 'new' isn't necessarily 'better': it's just different. The mystique of the new (that tells you it'll solve your problems) doesn't take into consideration that anything new that solves one set of problems always brings along with it a new set of problems to replace the old ones. Often, the new problems turn out to be worse than the old. Nuclear energy is one of those new approaches that promised more than it could deliver. It promised cheap energy (almost free electricity, they told us). Instead it brought risks and not only worse, but potentially permanent problems: even after fifty years, nobody knows what to do with nuclear waste. When you're considering replacing the 'poison that you know' with the 'poison that you don't know', it's wise to take a good long look at the risks you would be buying into.

Second, I think that you ought to consider the consequences that come from making reactive decisions. 'Out of the frying pan and into the fire' happens when you're more concerned with the situation that you want to escape than the risks involved in what lies ahead of you. Granted, if you're in a burning building and the flames are coming at you, climbing out of an upstairs window may be your best bet. However, seldom is a midlife choice a matter of life or death (even when it might feel that way). The proactive (and much better) choice comes from taking a careful inventory of what it is that you really want, and then making a careful plan that will get you from where you are to where you want to go. There's an old saying that's particularly apropos of midlife: 'Sin in haste, repent at leisure.' The better approach suggests that you apply your energies to bettering your situation within your current environment, then making considered decisions with adequate investigation and consultation that will move you forward. Quantum change is an excellent and necessary technique, but only when used wisely (and never in isolation).

Third, and finally, your future success requires that you keep in mind one silly — but essential — truism: 'Wherever you go, there you are!' I'm assuming that you, like all of us, have occasionally found that, at times, the situation that you created became the situation that you left. That happens to people too frequently because they assume that the problem lies outside of themselves. Denial can completely blind you to your own contribution to difficult or objectionable situations. You can make changes in your environment to correct what appears to be an obstacle, only to discover that it keeps reappearing in each new context that you move to. It can take you years (if ever) to face the fact that the obstacles are, in fact, of your own creation, and that you re-create your dysfunction in every new environment. When you find that you're experiencing similar difficulties in different situations, you truly need to ask yourself, what's the common factor in all these similar equations? Before you change persons, places, or things, I recommend that work on changing yourself first.

Like the change from one year to the next, change, and the embrace of the 'new', on its own can do little to improve your situation. As in every decision, you need self-awareness, skill, knowledge, vision and, most importantly, a plan. I never tire of repeating the Cheshire Cat's admonition to Alice: "If you don't know where you're going, any path will take you there." Reaction boils down to ignorant and cowardly instinct. Proaction derives from the essence of your humanity: your conscious awareness, informed judgment, and courageous action. The year is new; the choice is yours; the time is now.

H. Les Brown, MA, CFCC

Copyright © 2009 H. Les Brown

Coping with Financial Catastrophe

Les Brown — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 15:58:37 +0000

In case you’re among the .001% of the population who might not have noticed (who knows? perhaps you’ve been in a coma for the past six months), the world’s financial institutions are in meltdown. Commentators the world over are using the term ‘unprecedented’ to describe what’s happening. That means, of course, that there are no precedents to guide you and me in our attempts to figure out what our options might be. Do you shift what money you have left around to stop the erosion, or do you sit tight and do nothing with the conviction that eventually things will turn around and improve? Do you act, and lock in your current condition, turning a paper financial hemorrhage into a cash loss, or do you do nothing and risk your remaining assets in a world market that seems to be spinning out of control?

For anyone who’s a Douglas Adams fan, I want to share with you the very best advice possible: as it says in big letters on the front of the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, "Don’t Panic!" (and, of course, while you’re at it, always know where your towel is). The sage advice you’ve been offered in regard to panicking — don’t — can very easily be forgotten, especially when you’re a guy going through the midlife transition. Since your inner world tends already to be in turmoil, a global financial crisis is sure to throw fuel on the fire. When your life is in chaos and you feel like you’re hanging by a thread, there’s nothing quite like a suffering a direct hit to both your career and your financial future to send you over the edge.

The collapse of the financial markets represents only one extreme example of the catastrophic events that could (and often do) occur during midlife. What do you do? How do you recover? What’s the best plan? If you’re asking me to provide you with an effective, safe and secure remedy to your woes, you’re asking the wrong guy. Everybody suffers — including me — when a catastrophe effects the global economy. I have to make exactly the same kinds of decisions that you’re faced with right now. Furthermore, I’m neither an economist nor a financial adviser and, as I mentioned earlier, this situation is unprecedented. What I can offer you are suggestions regarding the mentality you need to adopt toward the crises that you’re bound to be facing during midlife.

First, let me remind you about catastrophe theory. I’ve been using the term ‘catastrophe’ liberally because it has a particular meaning apart from the connotations of ‘disaster’ and ‘tragedy’. Technically speaking, a ‘catastrophe’ doesn’t need to be something horrible. ‘Catastrophe’ refers to a watershed point or a point of no return, beyond which events are governed by a certain inevitability. People often call it ‘the straw that broke the camel’s back.’ It’s the one too many that collapses the house of cards, or the drop of water that causes the container to overflow. The financial markets have reached their ‘tipping point,’ and now you have little choice but to ride the catastrophic results back down to their point of equilibrium . . . unfortunately, there’s no telling where that point may be.

You need to understand that, whenever catastrophe hits, you necessarily go into reactive mode. The almost irresistible need to do something proves to be a far greater threat than the catastrophe itself. Chances are very good that a knee-jerk decision in reaction to events outside your control will prove to be a poor choice. I’ll offer you three suggestions about how to react to a crisis: 1) do only whatever’s immediately necessary to preserve the life and limb of yourself and others; 2) stop, breathe, think, gather information, consult experts, assess your risks, plan; 3) only act if and when a) you have contingency plans already in place or b) your proposed course of action carries both a reasonable level of risk and a reasonable chance of success. Keep in mind that reactive decisions have a very strong tendency to make a crisis situation worse. Doing nothing very often proves to be the best course of action.

Most people experience an overloading of crisis experiences (and, consequently, a lot of reactive decision-making) during midlife. The reasons behind this become clearer once you stop and think about what’s going on in your life. On the inside, you’re experiencing a highly emotionally-charged period of reevaluation. It often happens that all of your assumptions and presuppositions come under scrutiny at some time or other during midlife. As a result, your long-standing decision-making processes have come to a grinding halt. New values are intruding into old habits. It takes more time and energy than ever before in your life to make an authentic decision.

Meanwhile, on the outside, your life is in full-gear and highly committed. You face critical challenges (and choices) having to do with your relationships, your family, your social involvements, your career, your finances, your health, and so on, seemingly forever. In point of fact, you’re ‘at the top of your game.’ Also, the stresses and concerns that face you are both broad and deep and carry with them some very serious consequences for your future. At midlife, more than at any other time before or after, your responsibilities are maxed out, your resources stretched to the breaking point.

This is no time to be handed a catastrophe; yet, because of where you are in the course of your lifetime, this is exactly when catastrophes are most likely to occur. This time in your life most requires good contingency planning — exactly the skills that younger men are most reticent to develop. You need to have an emergency evacuation plan, and you need, if possible, to conduct personal ‘fire drills,’ so you won’t have to react blindly when the unthinkable does happen. You don’t have to produce a catastrophic response plan for every possible eventuality: that would be both silly and impractical. But, you do have to have in place such plans for your critical relationships, your financial security, and your health.

Obviously, you can’t put a response plan into place once the catastrophe has occurred. Yet, remember what I’ve said many times before: pain is simply the universe trying to get your attention. There’s a lesson to be learned from every crisis; midlife mastery consists in responding to these crises by doing the possible, learning your lesson (the first time), then moving on with the resources that remain. Since you’re reading this, I can only assume that you’re concerned with your future. That, in itself, proves that you’re on the right track. If the Second World War — and the incredible suffering of millions of innocent people — has anything at all to teach us, it’s that where there’s life, there’s hope. So long as there’s breath in your body, no matter how damaging the catastrophe, you can always do better tomorrow.