How To Be Positive
Despite the Challenges of Change

Who hasn’t experienced a life transition? It is something that happens to all people. Apart from developmental changes, there will also be changes in your life that will be unexpected, random, planned, positive, and negative. Any of these can bring challenges that can overwhelm you, even the ones that you prayed or worked hard for. For things to work out, it is important to stay positive.

The challenges you experience during a major life transition can make you feel lost and unsure of how to move forward. They can weaken your confidence and ability to make decisions. They can also make you feel afraid of all the uncertainties that lie ahead. How can you develop a mindset that can help you face the challenges with a positive outlook?

There are a number of ways for people to develop their resilience and learn to sail through transitions. One way is to seek help from an expert counselor. Seeking professional help is proactive and practical, as it allows you to journey through life transitions with someone proficient who can offer you insights and tools to better adjust.

The Challenges of Life Transitions and Letting Go

Moving from milestone to milestone while growing older is what life is all about. Each step and stage offers challenges as well as life lessons, making you more competent and wiser. Despite this, saying goodbye to your comfort zone and facing the unknown can be frightening, and letting go can give you a sense of loss. Even when life isn’t that perfect, most people prefer the comfort of familiar circumstances that offer stability, predictability, and routine.

Moving forward offers a different kind of challenge. There is no guarantee what the future may hold. It can be a green pasture or a path riddled with potholes. Whatever it is like, it can be fear-provoking. Even a positive change can make you feel anxious, wondering if you have what it takes to meet the expectations and successfully achieve your goals. A negative change—loss of a loved one, a job, or a marriage—can be worse, for it means going on without the support of people who used to “have your back.”

Fear is powerful and overwhelming. It can ruin your outlook and destroy your confidence and self-worth. It can stop you from advancing in life. It can make you vulnerable to anxiety and/or depression. With professional help, however, you can “reframe” fear and see it in a new light, with a cautious but still positive attitude.

Adjustment Disorder: Complicating the Challenges

Though transitions are scary, your natural ability to adjust will help you get through them successfully. Nobody says it will be easy, but it is doable—unless you have adjustment disorder, which the Mayo Clinic calls a type of stress-related emotional condition. This disorder can overwhelm you, making normal daily tasks too difficult. It can also be risky, pushing you to make reckless, life-altering decisions. “In essence, you have a hard time adjusting to change in your life, and it has serious consequences.”

Adjustment disorder or stress response syndrome can be triggered by a major life-changing event that disrupts your natural ability to adjust. Its symptoms have similarities to those of clinical depression—sadness, hopelessness, loss of interest in work or activities, social withdrawal, etc.—but they can be more transient and less severe. To be certain that it isn’t depression and find help to better adapt to your life transition, seeing a professional therapist is recommended.

Seeing the Challenges with New Eyes: Reframing Them

A life transition or change is like a gift wrapped in layers of paper. You’ll never find the gift unless you take the time to peel away all the wrapping, layer by layer. If fear is overwhelming you or interfering with your ability to adjust, it can stop you from discovering the potential opportunities inside.

This is why staying positive, despite the lurking fear, is important to better navigate your sea of challenges. This is what a therapist independently contracted with Carolina Counseling Services — Pinehurst, NC, can capably do for and with you, as you travel together. The right-fit CCS-contracted therapist can help you see the difficulty from a new, encouraging perspective.

Positivity can help you cross the bridge of transition to the other side. It can allow you to reframe the challenge, so that it looks reassuring and even inspiring. Challenges can make you backtrack. With the right perspective, however, you will be encouraged to move forward, knowing it is just a delay that allows you to further fortify your skills and strengths. If you wish to better appreciate a “detour” in your life, call Carolina Counseling Services — Pinehurst, NC. Start viewing things from another angle – one that works for you.

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