Have you ever watched those nature shows where you see a predator animal like a cheetah or hyena hunting for its food? You’re glued to the TV.
It’s mesmerizing watching how adaptable and agile the predator is. It’s equally captivating to see what’s being hunted adapt in the moment, like a life-and-death dance happening before your eyes.
We sit all stagnant on the couch with our Cheetos (see what I did there?) binge-watching speedy cats and thinking, “wow, they are incredible. I could never do that!” But the truth is you are more adaptable than you think.
In fact, I’d say agility is one of our most underutilized superpowers!
The main difference between us and wild animals is we have these huge brains that we use to overthink, make plans and get super attached to them. We talk ourselves out of our own innate instincts. We decide we don’t see the metaphorical predator coming because it’s inconvenient to deal with or we’re avoiding our feelings.
When we’re hoping our negative thoughts, experiences, and emotions will just go away, ultimately, we’re lying to ourselves. No matter how little the lie seems or how much we try to push it away, we’re lying to ourselves about WHAT IS and that’s why we keep falling down the same holes in our lives. Life is always going to throw complications and loss and struggle at us.
The key to being emotionally agile enough to deal with it begins with learning to SIT WITH WHAT IS.
Whether that’s the sadness of bad news, the anger of betrayal, the disappointment of something that didn’t work out, we become more emotionally agile and adaptive when we stay in the feeling, ride the relatively short wave of intensity, and let it move through us.
So HOW do we do that, Rachel?!
(I know that sentence just escaped from your mouth!)
I share more in this video about shifting your mindset to being adaptive. Click to listen for more about your superpower capabilities:
I want radical self-honesty for you!
PS. Need help being more emotionally agile so you can stop falling down the same holes? Let’s talk about it.