Perspective–Tools for Tough Times

If you stand high on a mountaintop looking down at the valley below, you have a unique perspective. You can see a bigger picture. Sometimes we need to step back and search for a bigger picture in life. The view is different.

We may not have the same perspective when the crisis has passed. If you're anything like me, you can look back on a past crisis and wonder why you got so upset about it at the time. Because things changed, as they always do.

When you're looking at alternatives, you will often find things you wouldn't have seen had you not been forced to look.

For example, a client of mine was laid off from his job.  He found that he had some marketable skills which he could now focus on full time. It turned out that the crisis was actually an opportunity for growth for him. Here are some practical tips for you to take a bigger perspective during challenging times.

• Be flexible in your thinking. Keep your mind open. It will help you to see the diamond in the pile of coal.

• This too shall pass. There's an ebb and flow to life.  Sometimes life is great; sometimes it's not. Knowing that you've survived rough times before should give you some hope that you can do it again.

• Choose optimism. Decide right now that you're going to see the glass half full, not half empty. Look for the positive in every crisis. It's there. But it may take some looking.

• List the tasks that need to be done. For example, if there has been a death in the family, there may be a lot of things to do. As you start listing those things (call relatives and friends, arrange for the funeral, write an obituary, etc.) you can then see what needs to be done, and what is less important. Number the high priority items by importance.

• Let go of what's not important. As you work with your list of tasks, start eliminating the things that aren't high priority. Let them go.

• Let go of what you can't control. There are certain things in every crisis that you just can't control.  The trick is to identify and then let go of those things.

• Ask the experts. If you have a financial crisis, talk to a financial expert. If it's a legal problem, talk to an attorney. People often forget this important tool.

• Ask yourself, "What am I learning through this crisis?" Write it down. The lessons that we learn in life can help us through the next difficulty.

• Tune into your faith. A lot of people smarter than me have said that we can choose fear or we can choose  faith. What if you absolutely knew that you would be able to find some higher purpose in the crisis that you're going through. Would it make a difference? When pressed, most people can identify the higher purpose from previous rough times. If you choose faith that there is, in fact, some higher purpose for your challenge, would you fight against it so much?

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