8 Ways to Overcome Disappointment

Many things are bound to pass through your mind as you try to make sense of the disappointment you feel but the good news is, you can overcome it.

The emotions you feel when disappointed is not new to any adult. It leaves you with a very unpleasant feeling especially when the disappointment comes from a loved one or significant other.

Many things are bound to pass through your mind as you try to make sense of the disappointment you feel but the good news is, you can overcome your disappointment if you work towards it, step by step.

Therese Borchard of Beliefnet lists several techniques that can help you overcome your disappointment.

1. Throw Away the Evidence: Albert Einstein failed his college entrance exam. Walt Disney was fired from his first media job. Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team. Get it?
2. Stay in the Mud: "The lotus flower blooms most beautifully from the deepest and thickest mud,” says a Buddhist proverb, just in case you thought everything dirty was bad.
3. Make a Pearl: Allow your disappointment to form a life-affirming pearl, just as an oyster does when an irritating grain of sand gets inside its shell. Just be sure to grab the pearl before the sand gets in your eyes.
4. Ignore the Critics: Success is one percent natural talent, 99 percent hard work. Take it from a writer whose eighth-grade paper was read aloud as an example of how NOT to write.
5. Grow Your Roots: Although the bamboo is the fastest-growing plant on Earth, it looks lazy at first because it has no branches…just lots of deep and wide roots. Once its roots take hold, though, bamboo is capable of surging as fast as 48 inches in 24 hours. So are we … if we grow strong roots.
6. Persevere: "The greatest oak was once a little nut who held its ground."--Author Unknown
7. Don't Rush the Process: Only in struggling to emerge from a small hole in the cocoon does a butterfly form wings strong enough to fly. Should you try to help a butterfly by tearing open the cocoon, the poor thing won’t sprout wings, or if it does, its friends will make fun of it. So take your time, and emerge slowly and deliberately.
8. Protect Yourself: Avoid the highly educated relative who might tell you “all things happen for a reason” or that you somehow attracted this disappointment with the wrong thoughts. Build an imaginary bubble of protection and hide inside.