There were many instances in my life when I look back now, that made me realized how adaptable I was to every circumstance that I was in. I might not have liked the way things were or even complained some along the way as I worked through them, but in the end, they worked out just fine or in some cases, even better than I thought. I could think of several key events of my life: for instance, bouts of depression during University time when I felt I could hardly blend in; when I started my life anew in the Netherlands with no prior exposure to its culture, weather and language (zero idea of what I have signed up for); the day I knew I could no longer give my dad a real hug and not even a real goodbye; when I realized I have been passed for promotion again that I felt so deserved for; the time when I almost lost the opportunity to graduate for my MBA which I spent the last years working so hard at; days as I witnessed how my marriage grew cracks and gradually dissolved; the day I moved into a bare home (literally an empty shell) for which I had to establish everything from scratch within a designated timeline; the day I took the plunge to give up my career of more than 15 years that I love, to go for something that I believe in, in the midst of COVID-19 pandemic. As you can imagine, it's all an emotional roller-coaster, to say the least! For some of you who are reading this, you might think that these are nothing compared to what you have gone through, you are probably right. But the point is not about how we compare ourselves to others and certainly not a competition of who had it worst, but how we handle the situations as they come. Regardless of what had happened, here I am alive and kicking, and I am still standing. So are you. Mind you, that is worth a celebration. This is the result of us adapting anyway, and we are making the slightest shift every single day whether we clearly admit it or not. But, I would argue that there are some subtle differences in manners we subject ourselves to them. Let me explain.
We are always given the choices on how we navigate our lives. When we find ourselves in unfavorable or unexpected situations that somehow upended our lives, our work is nothing but to decide in that moment: (1) to stay stuck (i.e. 'I don't know what to do?!') and question everything with a "why me" attitude, (2) to drag our feet with a "whatever" approach (i.e. 'oh well, I am used to this happening'), typically go with the flow with a lackadaisical behavior and settle for less; or, (3) to make it intentional to understand why things happened and the message nestled therein (i.e. what is it that I am supposed to learn here?), and followed by deliberate actions to harvest the bests of them and move forward. Notice how it usually throws us into a place of lack to begin with, then the increasing strength and power that we can give to ourselves in that decision order. I would think that we normally go through this as a process, and as we train our adaptability and resilience muscles over time, it makes it easier and more natural to root for the third decision - which I recommend that you always consider at any turn of events, whether you can go right at it (which is awesome), or show yourself some compassion to slowly come to it. Here is the beauty of this process...once you adeptly adapt, things get rolling and as you stop at some point looking back, you understand how the dots were connected and you probably would not want to have it any other way. You could even be asking why were you so rigid, obstinate or fixated about how things should be in the first place.
Life is what we make of it and it starts with us making smarter decisions. We must be truly responsible of the decisions that we ought to take. There was a line that I picked up one day from the Netflix kids series called 'Hello Ninja", that my 5 year-old loves watching. The kid ninjas were confronted by a formed gigantic blob that easily outsized them emerging from the edge of the cliff, and was anticipated to decimate the entire land if they did not do anything quick enough to stop it. First, they freaked out but soon one of the ninjas had a brilliant idea and immediately scuttered off to request help from their buddy dragon. As the ninja described to the dragon what exactly happened, the dragon's reply was so simple yet significant that I have learned something from it. He praised the ninja for acting responsibly to protect the land and explained the fundamentals of being truly responsible as embracing equanimity, not panicking and being frantic when disaster strikes and knowing to ask for help when needed. This is again such a genuine reminder to all of us that we do not have to face any difficulty doing it all alone. Reaching out for help when we really need it, is not a sign of weakness but courage - and, it is honorable to do that. Sometimes, we are so caught up in our ego selves to give a darn on what others might think and allow others in who could guide us to somewhere better and brighter in a shorter span of time.
I have learned a great deal about how I adapted in life when I started to pay more attention to the two pots of plants near my kitchen windows; one is the mint leaves plant, and the other, the four-leaf clover which was gifted to me by the city council when I moved in. Although there is sufficient sunlight penetrating the window glass, I like to move their pots around from time to time just to ensure every side of them would get a fair share of the abundance. It was a joy to observe how the plants adapt by twisting and turning in every possible way towards the sunny side of the windows again, sometimes in quite perplexing ways and shaped themselves so differently every time. I'd like to think that they can teach us something about adaptability. These plants are merely different life forms, just like us humans. The biggest contrast is human mind that we have been privileged to have (or not) depending on how we leverage it to its highest potential. The bottom line is, we can adapt fast to any situations in our lives if we understand that we just need to get out of our head and know that help is around the corner if we just ask. As I sit there writing, I feel utterly blessed with where I am today, the person I have become and that life is always working out for me.
How about you, how do you adapt to unexpected changes in your life?
Which decision of the aforementioned would you opt for?
Listen to your heart and pay attention to your surroundings.
There might just be some signs all along, trying to show you the way.
No matter how things may seem like to you initially, be assured that life is always working out for you.
Comments