Sometimes you won’t get what you want. You won’t get the job you applied for, or the store will be out of stock, or you’ll fail at something you wanted to succeed in. There are all kinds of reasons why you might suffer disappointment in life.
The key is to get over this disappointment as quickly as possible so you can get back to your everyday life. This might sound difficult, but here are some ways you can do it.
Allow Yourself To Feel Bad – For A Time
No matter what the disappointment was, you are likely to feel bad about it. That’s perfectly natural, and it’s not something you should try to avoid; feeling bad gives you a chance to think about what happened and maybe even come up with a solution.
However, the important thing to remember is that your bad feelings should only be for a limited time. Otherwise, you might continue to feel bad well into the future, and eventually, that feeling will become a habit rather than anything you genuinely feel anymore.
The time limit you set will depend somewhat on the disappointment itself. If it was something small, such as not winning the lottery when you had really hoped to, you’ll only need an hour, perhaps less.
If it was something bigger like not getting the bonus you wanted at work, you might need a day or two. However, once you have grieved your loss – which is essentially what disappointment is – you need to move forward again.
Look For The Next Opportunity
You’ll never only have one chance to be successful in life. If you suffer a disappointment in one way, there will be many other opportunities for you to try.
If you’re feeling sorry for yourself because you didn’t get on the team like you had expected to, look for a different opportunity; you could try out for a different team, or even start your own and design your sports kit, so you’re ready for when it takes off.
The more you realize that there are many different opportunities and ideas out there for you, the more of them you’ll see. Rather than feeling bad about the one you missed, look out for others; if you don’t, they’ll pass you by.
Put It Into Perspective
Think of the times you’ve been disappointed about something in the past. It’s probably that, for the majority of those situations, you can barely remember them, even if at the time they seemed huge and life-changing.
A good question to ask yourself about anything that is upsetting you is whether it will mean anything in a year. If you can honestly say that this particular disappointment will still negatively affect your life in 12 months’ time, you are well within your rights to be angry about it.
If, however, when you put everything in perspective, you realize that whatever it was really isn’t even going to be something you remember in a year, or perhaps even a month, then let it go.
The only thing that happens when you hold onto disappointment like this is you get more and more distressed. It’s not usually necessary.
