No one is safe guarded from devastating events that make our lives explode in a million pieces. But some can re-frame their tragedy and turn it into personal growth.
A major crisis can take us down for good. But it also can release some unknown opportunities. Here is how people have managed to rewrite their own history and came out of disasters better persons.
1. You make something happen for somebody else
Creating a NGO, a support group or initiate any other kind of social change to protect those who went through the same thing as you did can help you overcome your own trauma.
2. You develop better relationships with other people
Because of the suffering, you begin to understand human frailty and therefore you become more empathic. This can help you become more compassionate and generous with those in need of emotional support.
3. You develop a more accurate image of yourself
Because you’ve been through hell and back, you know now that you can endure anything life can throw at you. A new confidence in your resilience and a new respect for your own person can flourish if you admit to yourself that it was incredible difficult, but you’ve made it.
4. You’ve become more grateful for what you have
Being alive is its own reward. What you might have taken for granted in the past is now a source of joy and appreciation.
5. You might take a more spiritual path
There’s nothing like the finitude of life to make us want to connect to a greater power. Whatever that is in your case, your turmoil can be reshaped into something that will impregnate your future life with meaning.
Post-traumatic growth is a new concept in the field of psychology and shouldn’t replace proper therapy. Grieving takes time and is an absolutely necessary step towards healing. It only suggests that there’s a new understanding of ourselves and of our world at the end of the suffering. It’s that extra something that we need in order to make it out of bed. It’s the hope that a crisis, no matter how traumatic, will not define us. Please, share this!
