Resilience in Restless Times

Mentor Speak

This series of short write ups provide pearls of wisdom from Global Leaders and Mentors who are associated with us. They bring in a practitioner’s perspective and serves as an effective combination of advice that has authenticity, experience and most importantly – relevance.

Currents times have created severe personal challenges for people from all walks of lives. Surviving in pandemic times has become one of the most difficult tasks for almost everyone across the world. Psychologically men, women and children are experiencing fear, frustration, and they are grappling with the new world order. Many of them have got displaced from their work, some have encountered a dead end, and a few are going through extreme hardships. How can one come out of this? Is there something we can do to cope up? The answer is simple – become resilient but it is easier said than done.

What can you do to become more resilient in these restless times? Switching television channels, reading negative news or just talking about the scary things are NOT going to help. It will only aggravate the situation and one can seriously go down a spiralling depression cycle.

While there are many things that can keep individuals sensible and composed, I thought of sharing a few ideas that are based on logic, some studies on coping with hardships and finally some universal truth, great seers and saints have presented to the world. Consider this as a remembrance of those age-old nuggets of wisdom:

Get rid of the second Arrow

You cannot change the way the world will appear in your life. This is pure logic and fact. Simple yet bold and hard. Irrespective of good or bad times, every moment in our lives are based on two things. One, the environment presented by people, places or predicaments are absorbed by all our senses and processed in our mind. It is like the first arrow that might hit us in warfare. The second one is the ‘phantom arrow’ that we create with our minds, build scenarios of discomfort, injustice, unsurmountable difficulties, fear, and we start suffering. What if we do not create this psychological second arrow that creates the biggest suffering? Researchers have found that the physical pain, even in case of serious injuries is much less than the ‘pain world’ we create with our mind as a consequence of that physical pain. Therefore, the answer lies in getting rid of this second arrow- a bothering ghost of our mind. The first arrow has happened, take it, live with it in a detached manner, try to forget it and DON’T indulge in dwelling on that. Have you not seen people with disabilities happy, cheerful and full of joy? How are they doing it? The secret is that they haven’t created a second arrow for their consequential difficulties as a result of their initial disability. They just accept life as they have been presented to them. Take inspiration from them and junk the lethal arrow created by our minds. Magically, you will heal your temporary wound. If you are jobless, you will have something else to do, find a job, it may take longer but trust me, you will get one. If you have no money, ask for help. If nothing shows up, find something that you can do. Be in control. Pause, even with apparent pain. Observe, discard, and wait for the next sunrise. It may be a long night, but it will surely appear in the sky.

Don’t Gamble in the game of Chance and Choice

In life’s treadmill of chance and choice, we are all gamblers. Some are proud and successful, and others think they are pathetic losers. What to do now? Do we lookout for new table stakes with better chances or try harder to be more accurate with the ability to choose? This, in a nutshell, characterises what we are going through, in our lives, career and family. Many young people have come to me for advice asking what they should do in order to become more successful. I tell them, do what you enjoy doing. Don’t bother about success. It is relative. I have seen poor billionaires and rich beggars. Success is an outcome, a moment of recall and at best an adjective before your name. Are you willing to sacrifice your joy for just an adjective? This pandemic has now created a climate of heated discussions. “What went right and what went wrong? What has happened and what could happen? What’s the next chance and what should I choose?” Remember one thing. Choose what you love to do. The road ahead may be difficult, initially not rewarding enough materially, but you will find tremendous happiness. The sum total of happiness defines how successful a person is in one’s life’s journey of fewer than 100 years.

Don’t get into the “if-then-else” Jail

I have seen people come in and out of this algorithmic jail. “If I score above this percentage then I will go for studying medicine to become a doctor else I will try becoming a Chartered Accountant and pursue to become a CPA.” This person neither turns out to be a doctor or a good accountant. This kind of software syntax type life decisions are nothing but sophisticated gambling with chance and choice and people miss out on what they initially loved. If studying medicine and surgery, being in a hospital as a caregiver, bringing a smile to a sick patient’s life is what brings joy in someone’s heart, it is important that one follows that through; in their lifetime. Maybe study radiology, nursing, paramedical programs. Medical science is vast indeed and is not just made by doctors. Some of the finest engineers have worked in medicine and so have chemists who brought in amazing insights to pharmacology. The problem comes when one remains vacillating on their purpose and goal. It is important to have a goal. “If-then-else” world creates shifting goalposts, shifting sense of purpose and shifting focus in life. This pandemic has created an even more super cycle of “if-then-else” scenarios. This anxiety elevating time needs pause. While nature as given us one, we have internally become restless. Therefore, this is the best time to find that path of work that gives you joy. Build on it. Prepare for it. Seldom does one get times, when there is hardly any difference between a Saturday and Monday. Get out of the jail in your mind. Write your purpose and love. Follow it through. Suddenly you will feel light, powerful and resilient. Restlessness will be gone leaving behind a wonderful sense of peace and progress.

Finally, it is important to be thoughtless, yet mindful, at least for 5-15 minutes in a day. There are many teachers providing guided meditation. These are practices to dive into that infinite pool inside. That joyful calm will embalm our scars of restlessness. We will come out rejuvenated and resilient.