The upside of everything

I am beginning to see that everything, especially the events that seem painful at the time have an upside to them.

Last nights Amtrak ride was certainly not a positive event at the time, but after surviving it I a struck with the following new perspectives:

  1. It did force me to watch the 13x4 Udemy course which was extremely valuable.
  2. I now have the perspective that the trip from Ft. Collins to DIA is no longer such an inconvenience.
  3. I see why a midweek train ride beats a Friday train ride.
  4. I am wiser in the ways of traveling by train (by having little guidance at all) - reinforces that the work teaches you how.

And the power of gratitude to flip the experience from bad to good: I am grateful for the opportunity to grow, to practice compassion, and was reminded how our wealth affords us to travel in far better conditions than most have to endure.

The Upside of Adversity

So adversity is a good thing! The upside is that it makes you stronger, and we have to be strong to face the upcoming adversity in our life.

The perspective of seeing the upside of adversity requires the passage of time. Here’s a great example on the passage of time.

From Tony Robbins:

...you have to understand that, we’re all going to have extreme stress in our lives. I don’t care who you are. I don’t care how rich you are, how many people love you, how many wonderful children you have, extreme stress is part of life. It’s only a matter of WHEN it’s going to happen. The difference is how we deal with it. And so, we all have a choice. We can have post-traumatic stress, when I say it’s a “choice” it sounds avant-garde. If you’ve been in Iraq and seen things none of us have seen, you’re going to have PTS. But post-traumatic growth is what CAN happen. Research shows that if you do certain things, you can take the most painful things in your life, and you can turn them into muscle. It’s like if you can get through hell on earth, on the other side of it, a couple things happen. Number one: you know who your real friends are, cause they’re the ones that are really there. Number Two: you know what you’re really made of.

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