When Life Gives Me Lemons, I Choose To Inspire.
How often have you come across this phrase…When life gives you lemons?
And the very interesting versions of what you can do with those lemons are all up on social media, sharing a few with you:
When life gives you lemons, make lemonade; sell it, wear your entrepreneurial cap and start a business.
When life gives you lemons, use them to make achar (pickles).
Plant the seeds and use the rinds to bake a lemon cake.
Make orange juice, get people thinking how did she do that?
You don’t have to make lemonade!
However this quote can be taken to another level; a deeper, intense one. With my experience as a woman and mother, Id like to share how I’ve handled life when it gives me lemons, I’m quite sure this sharing will encourage you.
When life gives me lemons these are some of the things I do…
Acceptance
I take a deep breath and begin the process of accepting them. I call it a process because if I just accept them without dealing with them, very likely they will turn sour. Accepting the situation, to me, is half the battle won, It takes the load off your back, allows you to understand the situation better and see what lies ahead of you, clearer.
Acceptance doesn't mean resignation; it means understanding that something is what it is and that there's got to be a way through it. Michael J. Fox
Processing
Moving on to processing your feelings; allowing yourself to feel what you are feeling. Often writing it down has been an effective way of letting things out of your system. This has proved to be a powerful tool for me. The very act of your thoughts moving from your mind, through your hand and onto a book is therapeutic. I recommend this to improve emotional health. It is known to be an effective tool to keep fit mentally.
Reflecting
Reflecting on the situation without judging yourself, this may not be easy but over time it will come to you. In doing this you will eliminate negative thoughts and feelings, getting yourself ready to step onto a positive plain.
Now the above 3 suggestions are extremely important, if you skip any one of them, those lemons are likely to get sour, in worse cases even rotten. Then, you can forget about making lemonade or pickles or baking a lemon cake with them.
Gratitude
Having stepped onto a positivity plain, you can choose to heal with gratitude. Bring to mind similar situations in the past. You will be able to identify a trend, that good will eventually come out of what has happened. Patience pays at this point in time.
"Gratitude turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion into clarity...it makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow." —Melody Beattie.
Staying mindful.
Keep flipping those negative thoughts that may come up again and again, and flip them to positive ones. You can safely do that now since you’ve accepted, processed as well as reflected upon the lemons that life has given you. Staying mindful, will not only make you feel lighter but help you to clearly see the path that lies ahead of you.
Acceptance Again
You can close this journey beautifully by accepting the path that lies ahead of you, knowing and believing that it will be one that brings out the best in you. Makes you stronger, helps you to be resilient and to love and accept the beautiful person that God created you to be,
By now, you would have probably figured out that I’ve made lemonade, pickles, baked a lemon cake, made orange juice and more with all the lemons that life has given me. The one thing that I should consider doing is putting on my entrepreneurial cap and starting a lemonade business.
