My experience on how I started coping with my biggest failure & anxiety that comes with it. In this article I will tell you how I dealt with my biggest failure and anxiety.
Coping with failures is difficult. Failure hits hard need to cop with through inspiration. Here's my experience on how I started coping with my failures.
I was always fascinated towards the army. I always wished to be an army officer and also get married to an army officer and have children who would be army officers one day. This was the dream I cherished from my teenage. This was all I wanted in my life.
Faliure is not just about not getting what we want in life or being unsuccessful, it can be what we had but we lost it like a good healthy body but lost a leg, a hand, or had severe rheumatoid arthritis which turned into deformities, destroying a healthy body making you almost disabled. You can conquer some of the failures quickly but some failures take time to come to terms with them.
I believe failure is not just a failure in a competitive exam or not achieving or reaching the heights where you wanted to see yourself. I consider not having a life partner or not having children just because you have a diseased body which does not let you to walk properly, destroys your joints makes your day to day activities difficult, makes your life painful is also a failure. It happened to me.
I was a business management student and after passing I got a job as management teacher in a business management college. I was teaching industrial relations and computer basics to the students above my age. I was 23 and students 25. So, was everything going the way I wanted? No. My first preference was to join the army but I could not. I wanted an army life that did not happen. Though I was 1cm above the minimum height required in army for girls but I just missed the opportunity as I started doing business management & certainly management was not my cup of tea. It was my father's wish.
A year after doing management, I started getting pain in my ankles which was so severe that I could not stand for a few minutes, shoulders & thumb started to pain severly such that I could not even move them. I could not stand for long periods, enable to lift arms. Could not go to the toilet on my own. Could not brush teeth, my palms were swelled, became tilted to one side that water used to flow down from my palm while trying to hold water for brushing teeth. The pain and swelling was so severe that I could not even open wash basin tap and further more I could not even open a tooth paste tube such was my condition. My hip joints were severely affected & used to pain severly restricting my movement. It was difficult to walk even an inch. My mom-dad used to take me to the toilet. I use to control going to the wash room for hours, the pain was so severe, I found it difficult to stand. I could not comb hair so cut them short, although I was fond of shoulder length long hair. You'll be surprised that it all happened while I was on rheumatoid arthritis treatment. I use to yell with pain all night, could not change sides while sleeping, use to eat only one biscuit throught the day because disease would not let me eat. I could not change clothes, could not bathe, was in pain all the time. My dreamful life was shattering. Blood test revealed I was RA positive which means I had rheumatoid arthritis. That was the beginning of the end of a life which I wanted for myself from my childhood. I could not get married due to this disease.
I had a severe rheumotoid arthritis attack which made me almost disabled. People think it's just a normal disease but only severely RA positive person can tell you how does a severe rheumatoid arthritis feels like. It eats up your joints and it makes you bedridden. Rheumatoid arthritis affects all the joints and in severe cases like mine it makes you almost disabled.
How I cop up with all this is a story. I'll continue in second part. It will help you how to overcome failures when you desire for something and you don't get it! How to find happiness in what you don't have?
From where I got the strength to accept my failures & fight them out...
Continued from part 2....
From being an army aspirant to being a Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patient with deformities was difficult and Coping with failures of this kind was all the more difficult but I needed to fight it off. At the beginning I was furious, almost used to break down on everything, unable to cop up with the fact that my world came crashing down with my dreams shattered. My frustration of being a failed person which I never was from my childhood, became my life. I always loved cracking jokes, I had good sense of humor, I was always enthusiastic and loved talking and convincing people when they felt low, but anxiety took over me. I was unable to accept the reality of being a crippled person with deformities. I was fond of makeup, long hair, loved styling myself, now I was bedridden.
You need to have a strong mind to deal with a situation like mine
but I being an emotional person it was difficult but I new,
I had to fight it. I needed
inspiration to boost up my spirit.
My family supported me in every way but the inner self battle was mine.
I started reading Gita, I found some solace.
But I needed inspiring stories of men and women which can transform me and change the way I looked at my failures and my struggle with RA, deformities, an unfulfilled army dream while my friends were enjoying and progressing in life.
My life came to a standstill.
How did I start coping with it?
The first step was to start accepting the harsh reality- I am a rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patient, I cannot get married, I cannot join army, I have deformities, my life will not be normal, I cannot go for trekking, climbing mountains and all these unfulfilled wishes of mine will live with me life long, none of them will ever come true.
Accepting the life as it is and believing life is not finished, was the first step towards finding happiness in small little things. I decided, I have to make my mind strong enough to realise it but it was a hard task. Accepting a failed reality is the hardest thing to believe at a young age.
There are people who don't have a leg, arm, sometimes both arms amputated, people who can't hear, see, talk, soldiers who lost arms, legs in Kargil war or in operations all of them give strength and motivation to look at your failure with positivity. When you feel God has given you nothing, always look at those people who are in worst condition than you. It invokes your dying spirits with a realization that someone is having a much more harder life than you have.
How I calmed my mind?
Relaxed mind is a necessity to fight any failure or struggle and accepting the fact- you can't fulfill your dream what you wanted to be. A calm mind accumulates your energy and divert it towards the positivity which is much required
to cop up with the faliures.
Pranayam
Pranayam is the best way to start a journey towards a calm and peaceful relaxed mind. I started practicing three pranayam:
• bhastrika
• kapalbhati
• anulom - vilom
Pranayam relaxes your mind. It gives you positive energy. I started feeling calm and relaxed.
When you close your eyes and concentrate on your breathing, you feel relaxed and rejuvenated. I got this feeling of relaxation and rejuvenation after months of practicing pranayam properly. Pranayam gives results only when you perform it with proper breathing technique. You need to learn from a yoga practitioner.
But I needed more inspiration, real stories which would raise
my spirits and since I always wanted to join army but could not. So, what better than a soldier's story for inspiration.
I read books:
• Kargil from surprise to victory- by Gen. V.P. Malik.
It has many inspirational stories of Kargil war heroes like Yogendra yadav, a 19 year old soldier at Tiger hill, hit by many bullets but still his fighting spirit did not die, he survived to be honored with Param Vir Chakra at such a young age. Soldiers in their early twenties at thousands feet of hieght under extreme cold won one of the toughest battle ever.
It inspired me to realise- a strong will power combined with a never give up attitude along with strong determination is the key to fight back all odds. If we have it in us- nothing can deter us.
At present I'm reading the book 'India's most fearless'.
• One more story of a Kargil hero that I recently saw on a youtube channel which inspired me was that of Capt. Naveen nagappa who was at .4875 during Kargil war. He narrated how his leg almost tore apart & he underwent multiple leg surgeries but today he walks without the crutches. His story was extremely inspirational one, It changed my perception that I am the only one who is battling a disease which almost crippled me. There are people who were in worst state than mine but came out of it.
Stories of soldiers are always filled with courage and valour, hope and determination. These stories once again aquainted me with my lost courage, apprised me of 'never give up attitude' and generated a self-realization of being happy with whatever I have because some people don't even have that much.
They motivated me to gather all my strength to fight out every failure & negativity like a soldier.
Reading a real story of a real soldier is far more better than reading a fictitious fake story with no reality and substance. You don't get energize after reading such books atleast I found out real stories inspire me to move ahead in life.
A soldier's story will inspire you like no one else
their never say die attitude will teach you..
Nothing can deter you, keep the spirits high,
fight against all odds.
There's a soildier in each one of us,
you just need to look your inner self you'll find one,
you'll get courage to fight it out
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