Strategies for Dealing with Disappointment

Most of the time, reality falls short of our expectations. We thought we would be further along financially. We thought we would have hit our weight loss goal by now. We thought our 6-year-old would brush his teeth before bed without being asked!  

Frustration is a part of life, and it's how we respond to our challenges that make or break us. I can attest that this year has been a very challenging time for my family and me. We experienced more adversity than we'd care to admit. The negative has been it almost broke me. The positive is that I get to incorporate many stories into my speaking engagements, and 2020 (and Q1 of 2021) has given me tons of crazy material. Though I would never want to live the last year over again, I have learned a ton about disappointment. 

If this article helps just one person, then it was worth writing.

Try these strategies for dealing with disappointment:

Avoid Exaggerating

A good friend of mine, Dan Koval, has seen me at my best and my worst. When I am going through a challenging time, he does an excellent job putting it in perspective for me. If I'm in the middle of a trying time, it’s easy to overdramatize my situation. Though this might get sympathy from some, exaggerating challenges can add unnecessary stress to our life. If we convince ourselves that our lives are terrible, we will start to live out this reality.  

Ideas to avoid seeing your disappointments as more significant than they are:

1. Immediately depersonalize. It’s easy to interpret a significant setback as personal to us and us alone, but that’s not true. Did you lose money in business this year? So did millions of other companies in America. Got laid off from your job this year? So did millions of other Americans. Did you not hit your weight loss goal? Well, you get the point. If we see a setback as just a part of life, it will lessen the blow. Although, if we dwell on a disappointment and think that we’re the only one in the world going through it, we will distance ourselves from reality, and by doing so, we’ll isolate ourselves.  
2. Focus on specifics. Sometimes we lump our bad situations with the good. When we generalize, it could end up leading to depression. For instance, we lose out on a bonus that we worked hard for, but everything else in our life is going well, and we dwell on the lost funds, “telling ourselves that our life sucks.” By telling ourselves that one setback is a single, temporary, isolated event, we can help save our mindset from going into a complete downward spiral. 
3. Welcome the change. If there is one thing that will stay constant in our lives, it’s that we’ll experience lots of change. We could fight it or embrace it. It’s so often that we have our heart set on a specific outcome, but it seldom comes to fruition precisely as we imagine. What seems like a massive setback today could be something that we laugh at a year from now. 

Moving On...

Fear can psychologically paralyze us and can often become so intense that it significantly holds us back from taking risks. By altogether avoiding risks, it chokes out our ability to achieve our fullest potential.  

Actions that will help us move on: 

1. Lean on support. There is nothing wrong with leaning on help from friends and family during challenging times. We all go through times where we will need to be encouraged.
2. Small steps. After a setback, focus on making small, quick steps toward another goal so you can feel accomplished and get instant motivation.
3. Learn from experience. Disappointments can teach us more about ourselves than any book or self-help course ever could. We can use disappointments to help refocus our goals and get stronger. 

If we accept setbacks as a part of life and deal with disappointments constructively, they can make us stronger in the long run!

*Matt Zaun is an award-winning speaker and storyteller who empowers organizations to attract more clients through the art of strategic storytelling. Matt’s past engagements have catalyzed radical sales increases for over 200 organizations that range from financial institutions to the health and wellness industry. 

Matt shares his expertise in persuasion with executives, sales professionals, and entrepreneurs, who he coaches on the art of influence and how to leverage this for profits and impact. 

For more info, check out his video | https://youtu.be/pflQtzgP7X0