This is my monthly article where I talk with someone who has gone through a bad time, a significant change, or a difficult decision. I wanted a space so that people can share their experience and hopefully pass on some of the learning from this, in order to help others.
What I know from the work I do with people is that finding meaning from the chaos and feeling like what you do matters or makes a difference can alter what initially feels like total devastation into something transformational
This month I’m sharing the experiences of someone who has had to deal with a close friend dying suddenly in a horrific accident. This experience has been very traumatic and involved a number of different services. The result has led to some surprising self-revelations and a need to make changes in their own life.
The message is one of courage and being brave to step out of your comfort zone. Take up chances and opportunities when you can.
Identifying first, something that you’ve gone through that you recognise, has been really trying really testing, but has taught you something, given you a lesson in life.
The death of one of my friends who was killed suddenly in a dog attack. It was the shock of the way she died; it came out of the blue. It was incomprehensible. And so, to this day, I don’t really believe she’s gone. I think that because she was so young, I cannot get my head around she’s gone. And also because she went in such a hard way, a terrible accident.
What has been the impact on you? What was it that changed for you, or you were struggling with?
I struggle with a lot of the whole aftermath because of the way she died. Also how life can turn like that, and you can lose everything, with no warning. But the thing that changed in me was it made me reevaluate how precious life is and how it turns. And so it’s made me think about the way I live my own life, and how you can waste time putting things off, always thinking you’ve got time. But actually, you never know if you really have time. So you should act when you can.
So the lesson is that we can go along in life putting off decisions that require more effort, Or that you think, Oh, I’ll do that sometime. But what it made me realize was that there might not be some time, so you should do it now. While you’re fit and able.
What would you share with other people that may help other people to stop procrastinating how have you then taken action? What is it that’s changed?
What has changed is whenever a thought has popped into my head like ‘Oh, I must do this’ or ‘ I must see this person’ , or ‘wouldn’t it be nice to go and visit this person’, instead of thinking about it, and thinking I’ll do it in the future, I go ahead and make it happen when the thought occurs, because I don’t know when my life is gonna finish. And I might not get the chance to do it again, whether it’s a question of dying, or whether it’s a question of becoming frail or incapacitated or whatever. If you put things off, the chances are, you’re not going to get the chance to do those things that you’re putting off. So why not just do them now? Find a way it’s kind of finding a way that’s what I’ve learned.
Don’t just think you might do something, do it. But a lot of us put things off. We’d like to do this. But for the example, I’ve taken up horse riding again, I’ve been meaning to do it for years. I’ve just never got around to it because of the effort of having to find the riding stables and then put myself out there, do something that, I’m a little bit worried about, because I don’t know if I’m going to be any good. There’s all those mental things that hold you back from doing the thing that you thought about. I’ve just told myself, what’s the worst that can happen? And just gone ahead and done it right So
How have you changed from the experience of dealing with your friend’s death. how do you consider life in a different way.
It’s, made me realise that I can’t let things hold me back from making decisions about things. So one of the things that was holding me back massively before she died, was travelling, and going to visit people who I haven’t seen for a long time. this was because of the anxiety that the whole business of arranging the travel and then having to do on my own created. The anxiety held me back. So I was putting off things that were making me feel uncomfortable.
So after she died, I realised that I was missing opportunities because of what was going on inside my head that was holding me back. And so I just faced them and my anxiety, I realised I had to make myself face the things that I wouldn’t face.
So by just trying something, just seeing what happens, seeing if doing it is as bad as you think it’s going to be- you find out you can do more than you thought! The message I suppose for people who might be in the same sort of predicament where they struggle with that worry or anxiety of not knowing, not knowing how it will work out or how they might be able to do something because the anxiety feels so uncomfortable…..Is take a leap of faith.
Have some faith in yourself that you can do it. Just trying something, just seeing what happens seeing if doing it is as bad as you think it’s gonna be. You will always learn something this way and be living life not waiting for things to happen in your life. And in my experience, everything I’ve done since then, has been positive. Yeah. Yeah. Which makes you then want to do more. Yes. So it’s self-fulfilling
