This is an excerpt from the video “Navigating A Crisis” I released on Youtube on April 7, 2020.
I want to be a voice of hope and inspiration to help you turn negativity into positivity. I want to be a voice of courage and vision and assure you that no matter what you’re going through right now, you’re not alone, we’re all coping with uncertainty. But here’s the good news: no matter what you’re going through, you have the potential of coming out of it a better person. Not only the potential, but even a probability that you will come out a better version of you. Adversity often does this to us.
You can navigate a crisis — any crisis, including Covid-19 — and move through it, to not only survive but actually thrive and come out better as a result of it. You will need practices and strategies for coping with stress and the uncertainty of not knowing how it is all going to play out, but there is every possibility that what you’re going through now might, in hindsight, turn out to be a very positive experience, unpleasant as it now seems.
POST TRAUMATIC GROWTH
Post traumatic growth is a psychological term — different people come out of very stressful situations in different ways. Some people come out of it and it breaks them, but for other people it seems like a crisis is actually the best thing that happens to them. Because life demands change. And we forget that. We get too comfortable in our life and we think, “Oh, I don’t want anything to change”, especially when everything’s going well. We never make a change when everything’s going well because we’re comfortable with it. But when a crisis comes, it forces you to make changes because you can’t allow the crisis to overcome you.
Crises are opportunities for personal growth and development.
And very often when you make those changes they are the exact changes you needed to make to grow in your life, to become a better person, a smarter person, a more successful person — to be your best self. And on a microcosm, each one of us needs to make changes in our life. Change only happens by choice, chance, or crisis, and hey, we’ve got a crisis. So don’t let it go to waste. Remember that this is an opportunity for personal growth and development.
From trauma you can build positive qualities
From trauma you can build positive qualities, such as resilience, courage, and creativity. You can develop new insights that actually give you an opportunity to reset and reboot your life, to turn negativity into something positive.
That’s what happens when your computer crashes. You have to reboot it again. So when your life is in a crisis, this is actually a tremendous opportunity for you to reevaluate everything and to eliminate those things that no longer serve you, embrace new practices, new ways of living, and become your best self. And I’m going to share with you some suggestions on how to do that.
Acknowledge that you are in a crisis and take the steps to overcome it.
A crisis is a lot like being in a sailboat during a storm. It’s easy to navigate in good weather but during a storm different approaches are called for. When you’re in a storm, you want to batten the hatches, you want to trim the sails, you want to do whatever is necessary to get through it. What you don’t want to do is panic. And that’s exactly what you do with a crisis: you acknowledge what is happening and you take the necessary steps to overcome it. You never panic.
STEP ONE: Remember That You Have Survived Crisis Before
Remind yourself that you have been here before. No, not this particular crisis, but a different crisis, and you did manage it. I want you to reflect back on those previous crises. It might have been a health crisis, a marriage breakup, a bankruptcy, or any number of crises that you went through. At the time you had no idea how you were going to get through it. In fact, you thought it was hopeless. Be honest, you really did. But did you get through it? Yes, and often the better for it. This is important to remember and to keep reminding ourselves. This way we don’t panic. We ride out the storm and do whatever is necessary.
STEP TWO: Re-evaluate What Is Important In Life
What are the opportunities of a crisis? Well the opportunities are that you get to reexamine your life in a new, more exciting way. You’re not restricted, you get to look and evaluate, what is it that I thought was so important in my life? How was I living my life prior to this crisis in a way that was inappropriate?
Maybe I was spending too much money in different ways. Maybe I was partying too much. Maybe I had not been spending time with my family. Maybe I had neglected my spirituality. What changes can this crisis bring to me in my life?
This is a chance to really reexamine your goals, and ask yourself, “Am I being my best self? and “How can I make myself a better person?” This is what a crisis is, it’s an opportunity to look at your life and reset it, and re-evaluate what’s important to you.
STEP THREE: Focus On The Positives In Life
One of the most powerful practices energetically is the practice of being in gratitude every day. Not thinking of all our problems and difficulties and negative thoughts, but thinking of all the good things that we have to be thankful for. Let’s take on the practice of kindness. Let’s reach out to other people and help them in whatever way we can. Let’s take on the practice of being a better person. Let’s take on the practice of doing our Mind Power practice every day. Let’s take on the practice of being proactive. Let’s become the person that we want ourselves to be, because that’s what a crisis can do.
STEP FOUR: Change The Narrative
A crisis has the opportunity of going one of two ways, of either breaking you or making you a better person. And you are the one that will decide which way that’s going to go.
The mind is a storyteller, and likes to tell us stories. Your mind right now has a story about this crisis. The story might be, “I’m never going to get out of it. I’m in a financial mess. I don’t know how I’m going to pay the mortgage or rent.” And for many of us, this is the story we are telling ourselves.
Use the power of your mind to change the narrative
Let me share with you a Mind Power technique: it’s called “Taking Control of the Narrative.” How we take control of the narrative is by observing what we’re thinking each day and choosing to either continue thinking this same way or to change the way we are viewing the situation. If the narrative is positive, great. If it’s negative, you have the option to turn the narrative into something more positive.
Are you thinking right now, “I don’t know how I’m going to get out of it. I’m never going to rebound from this”? If that’s the narrative, then you notice it. You realize that this is a very negative way of thinking and it is not helping in any way. In fact, this belief is probably stressing you out and holding you back from taking action. You notice this and then you make a decision to either do nothing and let the mind keep thinking these thoughts or you become proactive and change the narrative. You begin a Mind Power practice: you change the narrative.
STEP FIVE: Utilize The Powers Of Your Mind:
Turn negative thoughts into positive thinking
Repeat these thoughts to yourself every day:
The very first thing that you say to yourself when you wake up is, “This crisis will make me a better person. I will not only survive this crisis, I will thrive. I will become a better person. I will become stronger, I will become more resilient. I will become more creative. I will develop new work habits. It will strengthen me in many ways. I will become a better person.” And when you fall off to sleep, you remind yourself once again that, “I am going to come out of this crisis a better person.” You keep telling yourself this story, creating this narrative.
Then something profound happens. Your subconscious mind begins accepting this message, and when it is repeated often enough, this message becomes imprinted into your subconscious and your subconscious starts acting on it. It begins bringing these experiences to you. You set in motion synchronicity in your life so that what you are envisioning begins to actually happen to you.
It’s not really that magical or mysterious, it’s just the way that life works when we choose to harness the powers of our mind.
STEP SIX: A Shift In Perspective
Imagine how your future self will look back at this moment
Five years from now, this crisis will be long over and you will be in a new position altogether.
Let’s project ahead five years from now. I want you to imagine you’re your future self right now, and you’re looking back at yourself and you see how you’re reacting right now. Is your future self proud of how you’re reacting? Is it pleased with how you’re reacting? How could you make your future self say, “Wow, you really got it right, didn’t you? You really reacted appropriately. You did the things, you had the practices, you had the strategies.”
NEVER LET A GOOD CRISIS GO TO WASTE
There’s an old saying, never let a good crisis go to waste. Now you don’t want to look back five years from now and say to yourself, “Oh my God, I wasted that crisis. I let it defeat me. I wasn’t creative, I didn’t make the changes.” You don’t want to say that. You want to look back at this time and say, “Wow, I really stepped up, didn’t I? I really showed up, I really made the changes that I had to do, I really got my creativity working. I took on new skills, I took on new practices.”
This is a chance for humanity to change as well
From a macro view — from a humanity point of view — this crisis is an opportunity, too. It’s an opportunity for us as a species to say, “Are we really living our best selves? How can we as a community — how can we as a population — have different priorities?” And I think the number one priority that any of us can ever have is to be our best selves.
Forget about how much money I can make or how many cars I can have, or whether I live in a mansion, or how successful I can make my business. Now I’m not negating these things. These things can be important to you, but have we focused on what would make me a better person? What would make me kinder, what would make me more compassionate, what would make me more loving? What could I do to give back to my community?”
My Prediction For Your Future
Take these strategies and practices into your life every day. And take it one day at a time. And if you do that, you are going to come out of this crisis in a tremendous, amazing way. You are going to be a better person, and you’re going to be amazed by what opportunities come. In fact, I predict that if you follow these practices, you’re going to look back five years from now and you’re going to say to yourself, “That was the best thing that ever happened to me!”
