The 13th Principle of Overcoming Adversity

Last week, I wrote about The 12 Principles of Overcoming Adversity and was overwhelmed by the email responses to it.

While I haven’t gotten through the many emails I have received, a significant percentage of respondents had a question in common that I would paraphrase as follows:

After years of a good, great or successful Life, these things are hard to believe in when Life suddenly seems to get stuck.  Why is this and what should I do about it?

I remember reflecting upon this in my Life when I wondered why things suddenly seemed to stop moving and then I came across something that answered the question for me.

Of the many times I have made presentations, there were a couple of times when the coordinators of the events checked out my background (which is not unusual).

However, what was interesting was that when I arrived they were startled to see that I was perhaps 20+ years younger than they expected.  Each time, the coordinators made comments along the lines of expecting someone much older and how I had obviously compressed a lot of living into my Life.

And so when I became “stuck”, I wondered why someone with so much “success” had suddenly “paused”.

That was when I came across this quote by John O’Donohue which contains a hint to the 13th Principle of Overcoming Adversity:

“Many people who are secretly weary of work have never taken themselves time, or taken time out or away from work, to allow their spirits to catch up”.

<substitute any word for “work”, depending on your own circumstances>

This statement was a punch between the eyes for me.

While my early Life was a whirlwind of success by many people’s standards, I never slowed down to ask questions like:

What does this mean?

What can I do with this ?

Where do I want to take this?

And I never slowed down to express what might have been a better expression of gratitude.

As T.S Eliot wrote in “Four Quartets”:

“We had the experience but missed the meaning”

With that realization, it occurred to me that my “pause” was the Universe / God’s way of saying “You must understand the lessons from your Life up to now in order to proceed”.

And while many of my professional projects have checkpoints to determine how the project should continue, I had missed this principle when it came to my personal Life and how it should continue.

So to those who feel stuck, perhaps the downtime is actually not the negative event that you perceive it to be but is in fact breathing room - a pause to provide your mind and soul with an opportunity to catch up to where you are physically.

This pause can be a double-edged sword.

You can dwell upon the “pause”, increasing your frustration level and tearing yourself apart to figure out why your Life has taken an unwanted detour.

Or you can say thank you for the downtime, take the time to learn the lessons from your past, express gratitude for those lessons and then decide what your next adventure looks like.  While a sense of urgency may tell you that it is insane to roll with this pause, it has been my experience and the experience of many I have spoken to that if you fight the pause, the resistance gets greater.

However, that does not mean that you stop taking action altogether.

I would compare this experience to getting caught in a riptide (which I have personally experienced).  You don’t swim against the riptide since eventually you will become exhausted and drown, fighting against a force much stronger than you are.

And if you stop swimming altogether, you drown also.

However, if you swim parallel to the shore, you eventually swim free of the force that threatens to drag you out to sea and you can make it safely to shore ….. ready to resume the Journey that is your Life.

And so to those who expressed frustration or anxiety over being stuck, I offer this.

The next adventure in your Life might be new success on the existing Path of Life or it might involve embarking upon a whole new Path.

In order to continue on the Journey, the knowledge from one’s past must be understood and appreciated without fighting the process required to accomplish this.  In order to reach this understanding, the desired execution of your Life sometimes needs to take a breather while your soul / mind / sense of understanding catch up to where you are.

Life is calling you to swim parallel to the shore for a little bit instead of swimming against the tide.

Be grateful for that opportunity, embrace it and take advantage of it.

The next step of your Journey requires it and won’t happen or will be delayed until you have learned the lessons required to set out again upon the Path.

And therein lies the secret of the 13th Principle and what you are called to do with it for yourself and others once you discover it. 

In service and servanthood,

Harry

The 12 Principles of Overcoming Adversity

I have been blessed and honored by many people who reach out to me when they are experiencing personal or professional difficulties. 

There is also a running joke amongst some of my friends who know how many times I have been stopped in the streets of New York and elsewhere by complete strangers who, needing help, walked up to me and opened a conversation with a line similar to “Excuse me, Reverend ……”.

The one thing that I prefer to share with people who ask for help are personal stories that I have lived, to help give others context that “I know your pain and this is how I know”.  I’m not merely spouting clichés or repeating something I just read and people are often simultaneously startled and appreciative of my transparency.

A few of those stories came to mind the other day as I was reviewing some items in my journal.  With that in mind, I thought I would share my top twelve favorite principles that I share with others when asked for help.

Here they are, in no particular order and not representing an exhaustive list.

The 12 Principles

1. Be patient with everyone and everything, especially yourself.  Not everything can be directed exactly as we want it and exactly when we want it to be.  There will be moments of weakness.  You are not human if you don’t know what I am referring to.

2. Remember to express gratitude for the small things around you.  If you can’t be grateful for the small stuff, why should you be entrusted with bigger things?

3. Have faith that things will work out, because they always do, often despite our best efforts to the contrary.

4. Remember the importance of the universal laws that “you must ask to receive” and that “you must answer the door when opportunity knocks – opportunity doesn’t kick it down for you and drag you out kicking and screaming”.

5. It is critical to follow your bliss and not bend to someone else’s, personally or professionally.

6. Miracles come from unexpected sources when least expected and often at the last minute.  Even to atheists and agnostics. :-)

7. Perseverance sometimes requires you to do nothing.  Doing nothing is sometimes equally as important as doing something.  Silence matters.

8. My corollary to the previous point.  We should take action when we can, even if all we can muster is not as much as we would like.  Action matters – perfection is not always required.

9. There is always a lot of love around us but we need to be open to receiving it and the help that often accompanies it.

10. The world doesn’t owe you a damn thing but it sure has a lot to offer if you want to step up, assert your value / worthiness and take it.  If you don’t, someone else will.

11. Lessons, no matter how painful, repeat at difficult or inconvenient times until we “get it”, often with an ever-increasing frequency and sense of urgency (or sense of “pain”).

I wish I could identify the easiest or most difficult one to learn or which one was most important but I cannot since different combinations were woven together at different times.  However, if I were to pick the one that seemed most common in my own Life, it is #11. :-)

Ah yes, I promised twelve reasons.

Here is the twelfth.

12. In your uniqueness, there will be lessons learned that are unique to you.  Treasure them and share them with others when you can.  In our difficult times comes our greatest learning opportunities – about Life, about others and about ourselves. You will look back on the difficult times with a sense of gratitude at some point.

I wrote this blog with one person in mind – that person knows who they are.

To others, I would like to offer this long distance dedication.

I dedicate this musing to the people who helped me to learn these lessons (way too many to name here), to the people who are learning their lessons now and to those who have not yet been “blessed” with the opportunity to do so but who will probably be forced to at some point in their Life.

Take care and create a great day for yourself and others, because merely having one is too passive an experience.

In service and servanthood,

“Reverend” Harry :-)

Addendum – August 16, 2013

For those who are exploring where they are on their journey, the book “Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom” by John O’Donohue is a HIGHLY recommended read.  Please have a highlighter handy – you will need it.

Addendum – August 18, 2013

After a heavy response to this blog, I felt compelled to muse about The 13th Principle of Overcoming Adversity.

Poetry in Chaos

Some time ago, while walking home after a very complex, challenge-filled day, I happened to reach for my mp3 player to shut out the noise of the world and I happened to choose Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata.

As the soothing music relaxed me, I noticed something intriguing – the chaotic traffic around me seemed to be flowing in time with the music.

The seemingly random, stressful chaos that is the typical commute in most cities had transformed itself into fluid poetry right before my eyes.

I was reminded once again as I sat and watched this poetry in motion that the difference between chaos and poetry is often merely perspective.

That’s not to suggest that everything bad or evil in the world can be transformed into something good or enjoyable merely by playing a nice piece of music.  I’m not that naive.

However, much of what we in the western world stress over doesn’t really warrant the amount of bad energy that we tend to assign to things.

Much of it depends on our perspective.

Meanwhile in the world ….

In a similar way, much of the news we see these days tends to suggest that the world has become very chaotic in its day-to-day existence and news of war, evil and greed tends to shout over news of peace, love and sharing.

Sadly (and disturbingly), in meetings I have had in recent months with various Wall St., government and military officials, it appears that they are preparing for something even worse than that which is being reported in the news. It seems that many public officials are now more in the game of public relations, keeping people positive in a world filled with challenge as what they believe to be unstoppable moves closer to reality.

Playing relaxing or positive music won’t change this, of course.  I am not one of those Pollyanna types who believes that evil vanishes just because we pretend it’s not there or because we sit in meditation thinking good thoughts.

In fact, when we pretend that evil is not there, we give it a license to grow and spread.

However, when we change our perspective about the world and focus on the beauty that exists in nature and in the human spirit, we have a greater sense of how much beauty, peace, love and sharing is around us and within our reach to amplify instead of being beaten down by the negativity that seems common around us.

It reminds us that instead of lying down and assuming that the difficulties of today or the challenges on our horizon have doomed us, we instead have many wonderful causes that are worth fighting for.

After all, the human spirit is known for overcoming adversity no matter how dark the moment may be.

It seems that oftentimes, it’s when everything is on the line is when we REALLY shine.

In a world caught in the balance between chaos and poetry, we need people to shine more than ever.

Everything that is wonderful about the human spirit and the future that we create for our children depends on it.

Are you shining today?

How do you know?

The world is waiting for your gifts.

The question is …. what are you waiting for?

In service and servanthood,

Harry