How to cope with couple’s “broken plans”: from canceled weddings to projects on hiatus

How to cope with couple’s “broken plans”: from canceled weddings to projects on hiatus

Couple

The expert couple in personal development Arnau Vendrell and Ana Moreno tell us about their experience with the intention of providing keys to acceptance and improvement for those people who have had to postpone their plans due to the threat of the coronavirus

May 16, 2020, an ordinary day for some, for us, the day we had chosen to say “Yes I want”, without fear or condition. One day for us, one day for us. But that day he had to wait.

Plans that don’t happen sometimes are the ones we remember the most and often, they are the ones that hurt us the most.

When we put so much focus on the result and life catches you on a changed foot, that’s when expectations become visible: “Why us?”, “Should we have done it before?”, “Will it be the same?”, “Do we really deserve this?” … It is very common at that time to feel emotions like sadness, disappointment o rage, all of them the result of those expectations

 which, unconsciously, we had built.

But we are not the only ones who generate expectations, others, unwittingly, also pressure us with theirs: “What about the money I have already spent?”, “And my vacations?”, “Are you sure you is it worth it? »… In the same way that we can generate our expectations, our environment it is not free from them either.

This is how expectations are built

The expectation is made up of two parts: the mental (doubts, questions, etc.) and the emotional. It does not hurt the mental, but the emotional charge that has been adhering to that expectation. A doubt does not have to imply suffering, nor the hours invested in reaching a result or the uncertainty of whether you can achieve it.

If instead of focusing on the result we would commit ourselves to the «fireplaceHow can we be unhappy? We simply could not, because the result would be an added gift to the one we have already had, that of enjoying the process.

La reality it is uncertain no matter how much we believe or want to be in control of it. Planning does not have to link us to the result. The uncertainty it does not have to be associated fear.

Embrace the dudaUnderstanding that our plans may or may not be fulfilled is the beginning of a process of change. Let’s replace the “Why me?” for the “What can I do now with the present I have?” or by “What doors open to me in this situation that I did not contemplate before?”

Through the process of acceptance, adaptation y re-enthusiasm we are capable of turning any problem into an opportunity.

What is to accept?

Accepting is the ability to welcome what happens, without pretending that reality is different. Adapting is being able to change course in the face of the new reality. In the words of Stephen Hawking: “Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change.”

To re-enthuse is to enjoy that new path traced. And it is that it is not easier to be motivated before than now. The etymology of the word enthusiasm It is already self-explanatory: “having the gods inside.” And how could the gods be happy only when things are as they expected?

Sometimes we need to be reminded of what we all know … “The road is the goal”.

Article written by Ana Moreno and Arnau Vendrell.