When Encountering Turbulence, Just Bounce Along

Here's a bit of Zen wisdom I encountered years ago - it's saved my sanity on a number of occasions: if you expect some chaos during turbulent times, you're less likely to be thrown off-base when it arrives. To me this sounded refreshingly sensible after years of trying really hard to believe that positive thinking always produces positive results.

Great expectations have almost become a requirement in our culture. There's a real push to believe that it's possible to solve all problems quickly & painlessly, find a dream job or build a dream life, and have whatever our hearts desire. Acknowledging limitations is "negative." These beliefs have been around as long as I can remember but they've intensified during the last decade. Best-selling books like The Secret create entire programs to help readers manifest their wishes.

The positive-thinking push has given many of us the idea that it's wrong to feel discouraged, that if we don't get what we wish for, we've failed somehow, and that we have to press on no matter what we might be dealing with at the time. I call it fighting the turbulence.

I believe that expectations are important but sometimes keeping up a relentlessly forward-looking outlook is just too much work. During transitions, steep learning curves or rocky times, just staying afloat is a reasonable goal. It's okay to let big goals and projects lie fallow during these times.

I used to try to keep ahead of everything all the time, even when the house was burning down, figuratively speaking. These days I cut myself more slack. And I've found that bouncing with the turbulence is less strenuous than fighting it.