TURNING PAIN INTO POWER

Life is uphill and doesn’t come with an instruction book. At some point in our lives, we all face painful experiences and difficult challenges. It’s part of life and no one gets left out. We cannot avoid or ignore these experiences. We just have to respond and react as positively and proactively as possible.

I remember the day I received the call from my doctor about my cancer. It was the toughest moment of my life. After a year of treatment, I was fortunate to be declared cancer-free. But it still changed my life forever. During that year, I became much more intentional about my life. I started thinking more about others and helping people, instead of just myself. I began to change and get rid of some bad habits and replace them with good habits. I started to connect more with people, rather than just being transactional. I focused on being more transformational, taking my life from success to significance. I stopped procrastinating and finally wrote my book, “The No Excuses Mindset”. I started my “Success to Significance” workshops and many other things in order to serve others and to live my purpose. 

We all deal with emotional pain. But how successfully we overcome it, is all about how we ‘react’ to it. Just coping with it, or ignoring it, is not enough. Inevitably, we all pay the price of our pain, for whatever negative things happen. Either we PAY the price NOW and PLAY LATER, or we PLAY NOW and PAY LATER.

Everyone reacts to pain differently:

1.    Some people cope with it.

2.    Some people accept it as a new reality and go through it with no plans.

3.    Some people turn the pain into a new source of power, energy, and fire, to make major changes in their lives.

The truth is, “You can turn your pain into power and start a whole new chapter in your life”.

Pain is like a wake-up call that forces us to look within and find our real inner power. It has many lessons to teach us about ourselves. 90% of overcoming pain has to do with the mindset. You have the ability and the gifts to rise above it. But first, you must own it and decide to fight through it and choose not to be a victim. Then, you need to develop a plan and start taking action to pull yourself out of whatever hole you are in. The fact is, you are bigger and stronger than your pain.

There actually are many benefits to pain in life: 

·      Every painful situation has a lesson

·      Every painful situation has a reason

·      Every painful situation can result in necessary, positive changes in life

·      Every painful situation can become a new start of something bigger and better

·      Every painful situation can reveal and teach you things about yourself, allowing you to understand your true gifts

·      Every painful situation shows you who your true friends really are.

Here are three things you can remind yourself of when you are faced with an overwhelming challenge or emotionally painful situation:

1.    Remind yourself of your WHY, your PURPOSE, and your DREAMS. These are the reasons you ALWAYS GET BACK UP.

2.    If you can look up, you can get up. Harness your faith and trust in God, or whatever Higher Power you believe in, to help you get through this.  Believe that you are strong enough to do whatever it takes to overcome your pain. 

3.    Remind yourself of all the people around you who love and care about you, who want you to fight to overcome whatever obstacles are in your way. 

Much of life is always about 10% of what happens to us and 90% how we react to it.

·      How do you deal with pain?

·      What are your plans to deal with it?

·      Can this pain become the source of power for something new and exciting in your life?

·      What are the hidden lessons this pain is trying to teach you?

·      Can you turn this adversity into an advantage in your life? If so, how?

Once you answer these questions, you will realize you already have whatever it takes to turn your pain into your power.