Overcoming Major Life Changes

Achieving success can be difficult sometimes. You’ll encounter setbacks, roadblocks and may even battle discouragement. But when all is well with you emotionally and your ordinary world is humming along rather smoothly, achieving success is something that you see as doable.

With major life changes, it can impact your ability to function much less let you want to continue to seek success. However, there are some things that you can do that help to deal with various emotions during a painful or stressful life event.

Death

The death of someone you care about, whether expected or not, can make your life feel like someone has pulled the rug out from under you. Suddenly, not only are your emotions all over the place, but so is your schedule, your normal. routine

You might experience shock, anger, fear, grief and depression. When it’s time to get back to your work, to get back to your life, there are some things that you should do. Make sure that you allow yourself to feel what you feel.

Keeping emotions squashed or shoved downward is never a good idea. When you experience a loss, one of the best things you can do to help promote healing is to stay busy.

Keeping your mind and body busy is actually more therapeutic than dwelling on the loss. Some people think that if they return to pursuing their goals that it’s not the right way to grieve.

There is no right way. But returning to the structure of your normal life before the death can help you heal. Move forward while grieving. Take moments for a grief retreat if you need to.

Break for half an hour to let the emotions out, to grieve. Talk to a supportive friend or loved one. Speak with someone who understands the psychology of loss. Join a grief support group if you need to.

But keep busy through it all. Turning your focus outward rather than inward on the grief helps you deal with the emotional fallout in a healthier way. Staying busy gives you stability and in a sea of emotion, you need that.

Understand that one of the emotions that you may experience is guilt. You may feel this way if you don’t jump back into work. You may feel this if you do. Guilt is an emotion that many people experience after a death.

It comes from a perspective based in either regret or fear. Regret that you didn’t say or do enough while the person was alive or fear that that resuming your normal routine will make you appear uncaring.

Just remember that returning to your normal routine doesn’t mean that you didn’t care. It doesn’t mean that your grief is somehow not as deep as the next person’s is. It only means that you’re trying to find order in the middle of chaos.

Divorce

Some people compare a divorce to a death. In a way, it is. It’s the death of what was normal for so many years. Many people report that the emotions they feel just before, during and after a divorce are the same as those that are experienced during a death.

Your emotions will be all over the place. Common emotions are the same as found in the five stages of grief. There will be denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.

While you’re going through the first four stages, you may find that it’s difficult to concentrate. You may have knots in your stomach. You might find yourself lacking the motivation to do anything productive.

Your emotions come in waves. You feel like you’re drowning in them. One of the reasons that most people struggle to get through a divorce is because it’s the upheaval of the normal they’ve come to expect.

The unknown is frightening. The questions will peck at you like hundreds of birds. You may not even know the answer yet. But you can move forward even when you’re experiencing a major life change such as a divorce.

Know that others have walked the same journey. There is life, love, and laughter on the other end of this journey. Know that you will be okay. Maybe not today, but you will be. Learn not to focus on your emotions or the circumstances of the divorce.

Instead, put your focus back on creating the career and the life that you want. A divorce may drag out. Or the motions associated with it might. Take steps toward success in the areas of your life that you want to see change.

Take that class. Start that business. Chase your dreams. Go after your goals. Whatever they are. Every time you feel like you’re uncertain or you’re about to fall apart. Stop. Count to five.

Tell yourself that you’ve got this. Work toward your goal in ten-minute increments if you have to. But keep going. Working after your goals will give you a sense of accomplishment. It will bolster your self-worth during a time when a divorce may make you feel unworthy.

Moving

There’s no doubt that moving is both hectic and overwhelming. There are several reasons why the event is traumatic. It’s expensive. Your finances feel the impact when you move.

And it feels like there are always a lot more costs involved than you anticipated. There’s a lot more paperwork to handle to switch to your new place - mortgage paperwork, school paperwork, updating banking information and more.

You may have to close out local accounts if you’re moving out of state. Switch over utilities if you stay in the same area. The demands on your time increase tremendously. That’s a big culprit as to why moving is stressful.

You get shaken out of your comfort zone. Out of your routine. It’s physically and emotionally draining and loads you down with extra tasks in addition to keeping up with your day-to-day ones.

Moving is a change from where you’d invested your life. It’s leaving behind friends and maybe family. It’s letting go and starting over. You can keep your wits about you and keep working on your goals by making your routine as close to what it was as possible.

Do the tasks that you would normally do every day and week. Don’t change that. If, on Mondays, you engaged in networking opportunities, then do that. Keep the forward motion going by sticking to your success to-do list.

Pregnancy

When you discover that you’re expecting a child, it may make you excited and happy. Or, it might make you afraid and worried about the future. Pregnancy is a time of wonder but it can also be physically demanding.

Pregnancy causes many changes in your body as well as adds physical stress. It raises the estrogen level which can cause nausea. You might experience fluid retention and dizziness.

You’ll gain weight. You may experience cravings. Your taste may change. Your skin will stretch and you may experience stretch marks for the first time. Backaches are common in pregnancy and so are muscle aches.

Mood changes are common. It’s also common that pregnancy affects your relationships. You may get more emotional. Your partner or your friends may be jealous or feel left out.

You may experience less intimacy with your partner sometimes, due to the exhaustion the changes may bring. All of this can cause emotional or mental stress in your life.

To achieve success while experiencing a life change like a pregnancy, you need to make some adjustments.

It can be hard to focus on a task or goals when you’re wiped mentality. Rest when you need to. Prioritize your to-do list into what must be done immediately to better your life and career against what you can hold off on for now.

Protect the time that you do have to work on your life and career by delegating tasks or hiring outside help to free up time.

Marriage

Chaotic events can disrupt your life. While planning a wedding and getting married is a happy event, it is a chaotic one. The number of things that you have to plan and set in motion often seem innumerable.

And you’re having to coordinate with dozens of other people. There are food choices, travel to consider, finding a wedding venue, a dress, bridesmaids dresses, the cake, the catering and sometimes it seems like each new day spawns a new set of tasks to handle.

Even a happy event can derail your plans to achieve success if you don’t keep an eye on the goals that you want to accomplish. Sometimes a relationship change can cause a person to temporarily lose sight of what it is they’re striving for.

Keep your focus on what you need to do for you. Getting married is a big deal but you don’t want to push the success that you want aside. It’s easy to keep your focus when you remember the reason that you set the goals you chose in the first place.

It’s true that you may face a time crunch. You may have to make some adjustments. Instead of getting to focus on achieving your goals for two hours at time, you may only have an hour.

Or you may work in bursts of ten minutes at a time. You’d be surprised what you can accomplish in ten minutes with unwavering focus. Getting married means a lot of waiting around at times.

During those times, you can do something that works toward your goal. When you know you may have a short wait, take your to-do list with you and work on one of your short tasks.

You can balance this life change along with your goals by using ways to make the most of both to achieve what you want.