We live in a world that’s full of uncertainty. We may have planned carefully our life, but circumstances could thwart all our plans in just one second. This could happen with the loss of a loved one, a job, or even a dream.
In an uncertain world, how can you stay mentally strong through challenging circumstances?
The answer to this question could be tricky because no matter how knowledgeable you might be about dealing with certain situations, knowing and doing are two different things.
When someone is in a particular situation, say they lost a loved one, it would be much easier for you to cite how they should feel in order to cope. But it’s a different thing when you’re on the same situation.
When it comes down to our own personal story, everything else looks different.
In her TEDx talk, Amy Morin specified, “When you go through tough times, good habits aren’t enough.”
She continued that the secret to staying mentally strong was to give up your bad mental habits.
These destructive mental habits are what might hold you back from reaching your full potential, and most especially, could drive you to nuts when life challenging circumstances arise.
Check out if you have these bad mental habits and start to break yourself away from them one step at a time.
3 Destructive Mental Habits:
1. Unhealthy beliefs about yourself.
Feeling your pain is okay and even healthy. But when you magnify it, you’re putting yourself in the self pity trap.
Self pity keeps you stuck in life and intensifies your problems.
Instead of seeking for solutions, you put yourself and your life on a dead end by constantly feeling sorry for yourself.
How to overcome it:
Unhealthy beliefs about yourself come up when you’re not comfortable with your thoughts and emotions. You think the best means to avoid that discomfort is to wallow in self pity, feeling you’re a victim of circumstances.
Yet, no matter how much you look at it, self pity could only prolong your pain. The only way to escape from uncomfortable thoughts and emotions is to go through them and feel them.
When you’re able to acknowledge their presence, you’ll gain confidence in dealing with such discomfort.
2. Unhealthy beliefs about others.
If you’re not aware, this destructive mental habit is a subtle one that most of us are guilty of. It comes as a complaint about how others are making our lives difficult and complicated.
Unbeknownst to us, this is a mental habit where we give away our power to others. We allow them to control our lives, thoughts, and feelings.
What’s worse, we’re giving this power away, open-handedly.
How to overcome it:
Your unhealthy belief about others often comes up as a result of a comparison. You believe other people are either above you or below you.
Their actions affect how you feel and behave and you think your actions affect how they feel and behave.
If you allow this belief to go on, you will one day find yourself blaming others for your circumstances in life. You even blame them for holding you back.
The truth is, you are in full control of your thoughts and your life. You hold the power to yourself and you have the right to exercise it.
Stop comparing your life and circumstances with that of other people. Don’t resent their success either.
Moreover, do something not because others want you to do it, but because you want to do it yourself.
3. Unhealthy beliefs about the world.
This unhealthy belief is where most of your ‘whys’ in life stem from. You may ask why isn’t the world giving you what you deserve, why it favors others and not you, and many other questions which answers can only disappoint you.
It’s because you think the world owes you something. This thought process can only disappoint you because a cosmic reward is only given to people who don’t vibrate from a place of lack.
Believing that the world isn’t fair is how the world will likely respond to you.
How to overcome it:
At times, accepting the truth that the world isn’t fair could be liberating.
Let go of the thought that the world isn’t fair. Once you’re freed from that kind of thought, you’ll start to see that the world is how you make it.
You can only change your world by believing that you have the power to change it. Give up the thought that the world will reward you for doing good deeds or going through a lot of tough times.
The world’s response to you is largely dependent on the kind of thoughts that you allow in your mind. Thus, it’s of utmost importance to let go of the destructive thoughts and beliefs before you can allow good mental habits to settle in.
After you’ve identified your destructive mental habits, focus on starting new ones. Start with practicing gratitude because it’s a mental habit that not only strengthens you but opens you to a whole new world of possibilities.
Most of all, good mental habits can carry you through life’s storms with emotions intact, which is also the key to achieving your fullest potential.
