Disappointment – 5 Steps to Help Refocus

Summary

How many times have you been disappointed this week? Literally stop reading, be honest, and count within the last 7-days, how many times have you experienced feelings of disappointment? Despite your best intentions, efforts, hard work, endeavours, diligence, collaborative communications, plans formed, and agreements made, sometimes things simply don’t work out the way that we expected. Sometimes things could work out better than we expected, and that would be a very nice and pleasant surprise. Other times they will work out worse than we expected, and that can be an emotional situation and one that, if not prepared for, can lead to disappointment for you and those around you.

In this blog, we’re going to dig into this topic and explore ways of allowing us to be better prepared for both the potential outcomes and our reactions to whatever circumstances come our way. For clarity and frame of reference, we’ll work mostly on the proviso that outcomes have worked out worse than we were anticipating, as that can be where some of our stronger emotions will be attached to the experience.

Disappointment

If you have committed a lot of time and effort into something, and expectations have been set and communicated – not implied or existing only in your thoughts – and the outcome fell short of your expectations, disappointment will likely be one of the emotions that will be present for you. Not only disappointment, of course, as you could also be dealing with emotions such as resentment, frustration, and anger. For this blog, I’ll focus on disappointment.

What Is Disappointment

Firstly, let’s dig in a bit on the nature of disappointment as this can help us navigate through challenging times with greater clarity and resilience. Disappointment is:

• Natural: A common emotional response to unmet expectations, setbacks, or perceived failures and is a natural part of the human experience
• Temporary: It can feel intense initially, but employing processing strategies (listed below), its useful shelf life will gradually subside, thus reducing the impact on you
• An opportunity to reflect: Prompting us to re-evaluate the circumstances present that led us to this point, hopefully leading to insights that can benefit us in the future

You are not wired ‘wrong’ if you experience disappointment and, while it can be a burdensome emotion to navigate, it will naturally move from the immediately present bucket to the experience bucket over time. Ignoring or discounting your feelings (not just disappointment) will limit your opportunity to navigate through them and extract the good from them that will be present.

What Disappointment Is Not

For the purposes of this section, I will not compare disappointment with other emotions that are associated with hurt or conflict. Instead, we will contrast the information shared in the section above to gain more clarity on what disappointment is not:

• Failure: Experiencing disappointment is an emotional response to unmet expectations or unforeseen outcomes. It should not be viewed or construed as a failure by you or anyone else involved
• Permanent: While it can feel overwhelming in the moment and immediate aftermath, it is essential to remember that emotions are temporary and will evolve over time
• A barrier to success: Embracing disappointment as a stepping stone towards growth can help reduce early perceptions that success cannot be achieved as a result of what occurred

Primarily, I’m talking about perspective in this section. Not to suggest that we should be thrilled, delighted, or detached from reality when something doesn’t go as we anticipated, but providing yourself perspective about what your approach to both the situation and the future will be and working to create new expectations based on the learnings presented, can help with your ongoing navigation.

How to Process Disappointment

As discussed, emotions are temporary and will eventually be acknowledged, validated, addressed, and stored to allow you to function and move forward with purpose. That said, for me, disappointment can be one of the emotions that lingers and seems to have a heavier impact than other emotions. Everyone is different, and you will have your own emotional traits that will dictate impact for you. Some ways to process disappointment are:

• Self-care: Engaging in activities that support and nurture you physically, mentally, and spiritually will help you be better prepared, build resilience, and copies strategies for your more challenging circumstances. The following topics can also be classified as self-care, but will be described as stand-alone items for this blog
• Mindfulness: Practicing mindfulness techniques that work for you to stay present and acknowledge what you are feeling
• Manage self-talk: Negative internal dialogue gets you nowhere. Challenge destructive self-talk by getting curious and questioning its validity. After validation you can work towards replacing it with more positive and progressive affirmations that will serve you
• Journal: Capturing your thoughts, emotions, and experiences regularly (some people journal every day, some in response to an event – whatever works best for you) will help you gain clarity and perspective on your situation
• Support network: Seeking support from whomever you have in your support, trust, or accountability network will provide you with a safe space to talk through your disappointment

The key is to be able to understand what you are feeling, and what your typical reaction pattern is for that feeling. Using the descriptors above will provide you with a solid start.

Resilience and Perseverance

Building on your work to reduce the negative implications of disappointment, part of your growth journey will be to build up resilience to help tackle the known and unknown challenges you will face in the future.

Resilience is our ability to adjust and recover from setbacks. Perseverance is our ability to persist and face challenges, adversities, obstacles, and setbacks with determination despite whatever difficulties that are present. Having requisite resiliency will afford us the clarity, energy, and knowledge to persevere when challenges are presented to us. This can be achieved by practicing the following:

• Embrace resilience: Acknowledge the importance of being resilient and how that will help you bounce back from challenges and face future challenges with courage and determination. You need this
• Cultivate perseverance: Consider your existing propensity to persevere. Is it situation-dependent or is it part of your core being? You have enough history of times when you did or did not persevere to be able to determine how that serves you (or not). You can work from this baseline towards where you want to be
• Celebrate any wins: Celebrate your progress, no matter how small. Include acknowledgement of your efforts through the process to help you stay motivated
• Commit to growth: Lack of success or being presented setbacks should not be considered as failures. Instead, they should be embraced as opportunities for growth and learning. Every single day. Adopt this mindset and you will grow a capacity for ongoing learning and growth

Resiliency and perseverance should be a mainstay in all our lives. First, acknowledge their importance, then consider the impact each has on you. This will create clarity on how you show up, behave, and work through challenges that will inevitably come your way.

5 Steps to Refocusing After a Disappointment

In this final section I’ll walk through 5 key areas that, if performed well and with intention, will help you refocus your efforts after experiencing a disappointing situation:

1. Acknowledge your emotions: Easier said than done sometimes, but take time to recognize and process your feelings. Allow yourself to experience these emotions without judgment or any form of negative self-talk
2. Reassess your goals: You will be in receipt of information that you did not have previously. Use this time as an opportunity to review your initial goals and objectives to determine if they are still relevant and achievable. Consider this exercise as just that: an opportunity to adjust your course to suit the new information you have
3. Identify lessons learned: This is absolutely key. Lessons are everywhere around us, always. Embracing a curious mindset to uncover the lessons will allow you to reflect and identify value-add lessons or insights from your experience. Constantly asking “What is the lesson here?” will serve you well. Then use your learnings to influence your future actions
4. Revise your action plan: Plans are not built to be static, despite our best efforts to get it right the first time. Considering your plan as an intention of what you think will happen using the best information you have at the time will allow you to ease into modifying the plan when more information becomes available
5. Seek support and accountability: You’ll recognize this as a common theme through many of my blogs. The importance of having and reaching out to your support network cannot be understated. None of us must navigate this complex life alone. Seek out mentors, peers, or some other form of support network that is meaningful for you. Use them for guidance, support, encouragement, and accountability

Following these steps can serve as a roadmap for you to navigate through setbacks, refocus your efforts, and move forward with renewed clarity. By incorporating strategies such as what I have described, you will be more prepared and empowered to overcome obstacles and continue growing towards success.

Coach Gaz Challenge: Consider a time when you were disappointed in a goal, outcome, or person. How did you deal with it? Is your process consistent or inconsistent? Walk through the 5-step process listed above to guide you through the refocus efforts and determine if there is more intention you can add in your future to handle things more pragmatically and progressively. I’d be delighted to hear what changes, if any, you would make based on this read.

I’m always open to a conversation on your thoughts, opinions, and experiences on this or any topic in the library. Get in touch by subscribing below, or by using the form on the Book Gary of the site.