Tips on Dealing With Setbacks

Setbacks are occurrences that will likely come up again and again during your life. Any time you set a goal and start taking action to make that goal real, you set yourself up for potential disappointments. If this was never the case, most people would easily get all of the things they want in life but we all know this is hardly the case.

So how do you deal with setbacks? How do you find the mental strength and energy to keep pushing towards the things you want in life when it seems like every time you make some progress, life comes along and knocks you down? Here are a few tips that might help.

1. Realize That It Isn’t Just You

Many people fall into the trap of thinking that bad luck, setbacks, disappointments, and failures happens to them way more than most other people. It gets to the point where when a setback occurs, they shake their head and say, “I knew it.”

It’s easy to think other people have way more luck than you especially when all they let you see is the good parts of their life. Realize that we all face setbacks, some bigger than others, but it happens to all of us and it happens constantly. There isn’t some god of bad luck who follows you around casting voodoo magic on you, causing you to fail just for their entertainment.

2. Re-Evaluate Your Plan

If you keep running into the same wall over and over, perhaps it’s time to look for another path. The setbacks you keep facing could be because you’re doing the wrong things. If you’ve been trying to lose fat and running on the treadmill for hours a day isn’t really working, find a different method.

Sometimes, it just comes down to a small change in your daily routine. Other times, you might have to completely dump your plan and either start over fresh or find a new goal to pursue. This can often be a tough, heart breaking decision but remember that just because one goal doesn’t work out as planned, it doesn’t mean your other goals will follow the same fate.

3. Give It Time

For many, setbacks show up for them because they keep quitting too soon. When things get tough, they quit and once the pain has subsided, they try again only to run into the same challenges, only to quit again and repeat the endless cycle. Just think of anyone you know who constantly starts over with their diet and work out routine and you’ll get the picture.

Sometimes, you just have to keep on working despite the setbacks. Adjust your approach when necessary and keep putting in the work. As they say, ‘Rome wasn’t built in a day.’ You might be doing everything right except for being patient enough for the results to show.

4. Get Help

It might be a good idea to find someone to help you out with your plan of action, someone who has already achieved what you want to achieve. They can help show you the right actions to take, saving you time and energy.

You could also find people who will mentally support you by encouraging you during those times when you feel like throwing in the towel. It’s a lot easier to let ourselves down than it is to let the people we love down, the people who believe in us and are behind us 100%.

5. Focus On What You Can Control

Many people let the outcome of things they don’t have any control over decide whether or not they feel like a winner or a loser. Instead of focusing on outcomes, focus on actions. Whether or not you’ll make $1 million or become a best seller or lose 50 pounds comes down to the actions you take or don’t take to make those things come true.

Find success and fulfillment in taking action. If a setback happens that was caused by something you had no control over, don’t stress over it since you couldn’t have done anything about it anyway. Focus instead on what you’re going to do in order to keep moving forward. As long as you do all that you can do… that’s all you can do.

6. Never Give Up

Setbacks will happen so you must learn to deal with them. You’ll have periods where you’ll be making great progress and periods where you’ll have to take 2 steps back just to go 1 step forward. Success isn’t easy, far from it. Success isn’t for those who kind of want to achieve their goals; success is for those who want it so badly, they will not let anything stop them.

It may help to look up stories of highly successful people who had to overcome tremendous setbacks to get to where they are today. Reading about their determination might help inspire you to keep pushing yourself as well as remind you that at any given second, there are countless people going through will breaking setbacks and the few who refuse to give up are the ones who usually end up getting what they were after.

Often times, you will have to attack your dreams as if your life depended on it like this zebra’s will to live:

7. Believe In Yourself

Whatever challenges and setbacks you may be facing right now, work through it. If you believe that things will get better for you, you’ll have the courage to continue on. If you believe your life will never change no matter how hard you work, you simply won’t put in the time and effort required to make that change. The fear of putting in tons of effort for nothing stops many people from giving 100%.

See setbacks are opportunities to become mentally stronger. You just have to believe that you control your own destiny especially during those times you feel like giving up the most. Your unshakeable belief in your ability to create the life you want and your willingness to put in the work and time required will make you unstoppable. This is the sort of mentality that will give you the greatest chance at success.

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