FACING PERSONAL TRAGEDY

When it comes to personal tragedies—there are a thousand different forms. The tragedy could be a crisis in your finances (debt, bankruptcy, unemployment, etc.), in your health (accidents, disease, etc.), in your career (redundancy, getting fired, under-employed, bureaucracy, etc.), in your family relationships or friendships (conflict, disagreements, abuse, etc.), and so on. Nor is there any escape from personal tragedies. There’s no insurance that you can buy to protect you from having to face the many different kinds of personal tragedies that can arise in life. It is inevitable and inescapable. It’s an intimate aspect of life regardless of your wealth, health, friends, intelligence, etc.

In the last week here in the US, we have witnessed many, many people facing personal tragedies as hurricane Florence came on shore destroying homes and businesses with winds, waves, and flooding. As a result there was the loss of life, the anxiety of being stranded, the uncertainty of how to put one’s life back together, etc. At the same time a typhoon did similar destruction first in the Philippines, then in Hong Kong and mainland China.

Now while none of us have any choice about facing personal tragedies, we do have choice about how to think about a tragedy. And of course, how we think determines how we respond. This is precisely where each of us have “personal power” to manage our lives. No one can force us to think about something in a certain way. You and I are free to think about anything in a hundred different ways. Some of those ways of thinking will deepen your misery and pain, will undermine your sense of choice and control, and will put you in a deep pit of depression. Some of those ways of thinking, on the other hand, will build up create an attitude of courage, determination, and resilience within you. The way you think about tragedy is that critical.

This gives you a leverage point for taking charge of your life and your future, or for forfeiting it. In this, your way of thinking is not determined. At any moment you can turn the direction of your emotions and responses and therefore of your life. In terms of facing any and every tragedy, the key is your way of thinking.

Now as we know in NLP, your way of thinking involves a great many sub-variables. Beginning with your representations, we can first of all examine what and how you represent things. As we do, we can then inquire: What is the effect of representing X in this way? Does this bring out your best response? Does this empower you as a person so that you are taking charge of your life? If the answer is ‘no,’ then you are at a critical choice point in your life. You are at a point where you have a leverage point for positive change. The question is whether you will use it or not.

If the answer is ‘no,’ then there are these questions: How could you represent X in a way that will

enable you to think and feel more resourceful? What would be a better thing to represent? What else is there to represent that you have left out?

All of this describes the realm of representational thinking. And it’s powerful. Based on the basic Cognitive-Behavioral Psychology model, it puts a central key to personal power in your hands. Namely, how you think determines how you feel and how you respond.

Some will respond to personal tragedies with self-pity. They will wallow in their misery, deepen their sufferings, try to hook others to rescue them, and live as if a victim of uncontrollable factors. They will become highly skilled in whining, complaining, and making excuses. That will be their way because it is their way of thinking.

Others will respond to a personal tragedy with resilience. They will accept that things often happen that they don’t like and don’t want. Yet when such things happen, they immediately begin looking around to see what they can do to make things better by taking constructive action. They will examine what went wrong to find out how they contributed to it and how to avoid making that mistake again. They will then rise up with courage as they try again. They think of themselves as responsible agents for what they think, feel, say and do. They are learners and live life bravely as victors rather than as victims.

Representational thinking is one sub-variable, there are many more. There is your cognitive filters (meta-programs), your frames (meta-level references, meta-states) which include meta-level phenomena such as beliefs, decisions, identities, permissions, and a hundred other meta-level phenomena. And each one of these provides yet another leverage point for change, transformation, and renewal. With each one you can alter your way of thinking so that you adopt a more empowering way of responding to life in all of its aspects— even tragedies.