The Pioneers Club
The community podcast for driven entrepreneurs and leaders.
Here you can connect with like-minded people, create a sense of belonging, and gain practical insights you need to gain more mental & emotional agency and resilience for your daily life.
We, your host Monika (certified mental & systemic coach) and co-host Patrick (entrepreneur & broadcast production manager), will answer your most burning questions, talk with exclusive guests, and share their own stories & experiences on how to deal with & thrive through the trials & tribulations of entrepreneurship.
The Pioneers Club
Bounce Back Stronger: How to Handle Major Setbacks Without Giving Up
We’ve all faced moments where disappointment or backlash feels like it’s pulling us under.
But how do you deal with these setbacks in a healthy, productive way? How do you move on and not give up?
In this episode, we’re breaking down how to deal with major disappointment & backlash and avoid falling into the trap of two common toxic responses - fleeing into toxic positivity or letting one failure determine your entire journey.
We’re going to show you a better path and break down the step-by-step playbook for you to not only overcome disappointment, but turn it into fuel for growth.
You'll learn:
5:11 - Why it's important to talk about backlashes & disappointment - and what does this even mean?
9:35 - Example: When a deal falls through unexpectedly
15:35 - Toxic reaction #1: The toxic positivity trap
23:02 - Toxic reaction #2: Falling into a problem trance & giving up
27:55 - Bouncing back stronger: 3 practical steps to dealing with disappointment & backlash - in a mindful, productive way
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Your Host:
Monika Lerch
https://www.monikalerch.com/
Linkedin: /in/monikalerch/
Instagram: @themonikalerch
Your Co-Host:
Patrick Öffl
https://www.amikifilms.com/
Linkedin: /in/patrickoeffl/
Instagram: @patrickoeffl
Monika This is the Pioneers Club podcast.
Patrick The community podcast for driven Entrepreneurs and leaders.
Monika Here you can connect with like minded people, create a sense of belonging and gain more agency in your daily life. Hi, my name is Monika and I'm your host. I help impact driven freelancers, entrepreneurs and leaders live their full potential and go from feeling overwhelmed, stuck and confused to being confident, clear headed and focussed as they go after their goals as a mindset and systemic coach. I focus primarily on topics such as confidence, high performance, self coaching and self leadership and use my mindfulness based and systemic approach to help my clients thrive with more ease.
Patrick And I'm your co-host, Patrick, an entrepreneur just like you. I'm an international media producer working on live sports, premium documentaries and digital content. I help people bring their stories to life and work with a global network of partners to create engaging content. I live through the topics of our podcast, just like you and I will try to ask the questions you might have.
Patrick So welcome back to another episode. And this time, we're going to be talking about something that's quite relevant to probably all of us in business. And that's major backlash and disappointment. And I don't know how you feel about it, but it's something that we're confronted with basically every day, right?
Monika I was chuckling when you just said quite relevant, because in my opinion, at least what I see also with my clients and what I know from talking with a lot of people in my own experience as well, we are all going to come up against several points of backlash, disappointments, setbacks, just like these moments, you know, where reality clashes with our intentions and plans. And this is why I always think of this one saying, which I really like. And this is the saying, if you want to make God laugh, then plan. And sometimes it really can feel like this, right? You have these great intentions, these great plans, and then reality hits and everything goes in a completely different direction.
Patrick And I feel like that we're trapped in this make a plan and it's not really working out for quite some time now. And I want to talk a little bit about especially my industry, because that's where I've been experiencing it a lot lately, especially when talking to other people. And that's you go out there and you present your business and yourself and you want to sell yourself, get new projects, get new deals. And then sometimes you don't hear back at all. Sometimes you hear back great feedback and it's like, yes, definitely, we want to work with you. And then you hear nothing or you hear back that they're going with someone else. And that may have very different reasons, especially now. The economy is very different than it used to be before Covid. The media industry is changing drastically. Streaming. Advertisement. All of this thing might be relevant in some way or another. But for us as business owners, it doesn't change where it's coming from. It's still a disappointment because we're trying to get us out there, we're trying to get these projects and in the end, most of the time now it doesn't work out.
Monika That's really difficult to deal with. And I can imagine this being this point where you're constantly trying to hype yourself up and get excited about something. And I know you. I know how you prepare for these kinds of things and how you prepare for a pitch and meeting people. And you do… like, you do the work, really. So I can imagine how frustrating it must be to always go into every new project with this “Yes, let's do this” energy and having these great ideas and also activating your network and having all these people who are then hyped up to go into this and then - nothing. Crickets. But I can tell you as well, this is not something that is kind of specific to your industry. I know it from my own experience and as a coach, of course, I talk with very different people from all kinds of industries and we all experience this. We all have this moment where sometimes it really can feel as if you are fighting to even get the chance to do what you're good at. You're fighting to even be offered the opportunity to show how much value you can provide. And all the time you have to also motivate yourself and get up in the morning. And then these disappointments and setbacks come again and again and again. And you need to find… and this is why I say it's funny that you said quite relevant because we all go through this and this is why finding your way of approaching these kinds of situations and finding a way to productively and healthily deal with these situations, it's not an option. It's a requirement for you to be successful in the long term.
Patrick But before we talk about how we can deal with these disappointments and these backlashes, because there are very different ways of how to handle these situations, I think we have to talk about what it actually means to be disappointed. Because especially in a business context, there's so much going on out there and you might feel disappointed at certain situations and you might not even know it, that you have been hurt in some kind of way. So what is it when we're talking about disappointment or backlash?
Monika Well, you know, this moment where we have an expectation of what reality should be like, we have this way of talking also, sometimes you are not aware of having an expectation, but you can hear yourself or other people talking and they say this should be the way or this is only fair if this and that happens or things like this where we have an idea of what is the norm or what should be the norm, and then you come up against a different situation and there is a gap between the two.
Patrick Is it only what we're thinking is the norm or is it also that we sort of build like castles in our head and we feel like, okay, that is what I want to do and this is where I want to go. And then this status is not reached. Or is it just this norm factor that you've been talking about?
Monika No, it's definitely, it's definitely whatever you call it. I mean, it's the same thing. You have this picture in your mind of how things could look like and should look like in your eye and your head, and you build this emotional connection to it as well. Oftentimes it's like not something that you are neutral toward, but you aspire to it, you desire it. And the problem comes in when you are not really aware anymore of that this is not quite the norm really. Just like you said, like it's the castle that you build in your head. And this is not something bad to begin with, but this is something that we all as entrepreneurs need because this is what makes up a visionary mind. You see something that is not yet real and you have the commitment and the dedication to make it real. But of course, if you have this should idea, you have this norm idea of what things should be like and anything else is negative in your mind, of course, then it becomes a conflict where you're constantly struggling with reality instead of trying to adapt to reality and make your vision happen. This is also something why I was always skeptical. Coming from an entrepreneurial family, I knew exactly what the entrepreneurial journey looked like and I was not naive in how I entered this. I knew that from idea creation and having an insight into what could be done or what could be, you know, better… going to the realization of that, especially if it's something where there are a lot of people involved, takes so much time and so many in-between steps where you constantly have to adapt this vision where you constantly have to reiterate and reassess reality and adapt yourself, your expectations and your approach in order to then see the final picture come through. Which is why I never understood why people were glorifying the entrepreneurial journey as something like, just follow your passion thing, because it really is not. If you're just like you have this passionate idea and then you are stubbornly just thinking that this is something where you are going into this feeling all good and it will just materialize itself. That's not the reality in most cases.
Patrick And it's also so much more strength that you need because especially what you've been talking about, that we're not living up to what we thought the norm would be, especially when you were already in a situation that is not great right now. I mean, think about every entrepreneur has this situation where you don't have that many projects or you'd want to do more. You need to earn more, whatever that is for you, that situation. And then you go out there, you get yourself out there and you want to do more. You want to have more projects and you talk to a lot of people and constantly you have this rejection. It's sort of a spiral. It's also something that requires so much strength of you to go on to deal with those disappointments on, you know, almost like daily, weekly basis, how much ever you're out there. And I can remember that from my personal experience when I had that moment, I wasn't doing that well. You know, there was weeks and months where nothing was coming in. You could see that the economy was not great. And there was this one really cool project and they were basically teasing me a little bit, saying, you know, could you come in? We really want to work with you. You're so great. We've we've gone through your CV and your portfolio looks amazing.
Monika I can remember that situation.
Patrick Yeah. And then they were basically saying, we would like you to start next week and that the businessman in me would basically say, okay, where's the contract? Let's just finalize everything and then we can make it work. And then just two days later, you just call them up. You know, you wanted me to start next week. How do we go about this? And the answer is, we're so sorry, but that project doesn't exist anymore. That position doesn't exist anymore. We're going about this a whole different way. You feel a bit… Well, something that I can't say here, but you feel a bit fooled. Let's just call it like that. And that's just something. If that happens over and over, it really takes a lot of strength to not take it personally. Even though we were already talking about the different roles in business. But it's very hard.
Monika It's very hard. I mean, I saw you during this period. I know how you handled it and you handled it very well. But there is no denying that this is extremely frustrating. And that's, of course, just like we talked back then, it's okay to be angry as well at that point and to say like, this is really shitty. Like, I don't want to be treated this way. And now because you said it's like important… it's difficult to not to take it personally all the time. Yes. And sometimes you will have to take it personally. If something like this, for example, had repeated itself, you know, in 4 or 5 instances and you had noticed that they treat other people differently, then of course you should have been a little bit more attentive towards maybe it is personal. Not so much in that they treat me because I'm not worthy or whatever, but because you just simply approach these kinds of situations with a little bit of a different approach then the other person, the other party, that you are dealing with apparently. And in this situation, it was apparent because you were already making it happen. You were very realistic and committed and practical, going into it, like there is nothing in your way anymore. And they were still somehow considering it like an option. But what we finally then found out how they treated it… It was actually it was never it never got to the realization that implementation stage with them. And this is a good realization to have if this repeats itself, to recognize wait a minute, maybe I am too quickly committed, maybe I need to check a few things before and gets the approval from the other party before I put in so much effort and energy and so on. But thank God it didn't happen with you anymore. But just saying it's like these kinds of situations are not only frustrating and difficult to deal with and they require a lot of resilience and strength, but they also challenge us to sometimes question what is really happening here and to wake up to a reality that might be different from what we expected. We are talking now about rejection, but there are so many examples of where this can happen. You know, it's sometimes it's not even voluntary. Sometimes things just fall through. I can remember also when I was in a certain stage of my business and I was only working with entrepreneurs and suddenly the economic situation got more difficult for entrepreneurs, of course, and several of my clients lost nearly 75% of their business to no fault of their own. But it was just something that happened because their clients, their customers again, were in economical difficulties and they had some fall through on the side of their debtors and people who owed them money. So there is a row of things where you can say like, really, am I at fault here? Is this something where I can find even that I need to change something? Sometimes not that easy to see through, but what all of these situations have in common is of course, this first moment of realization that what you thought was going to happen and what were you already hoping for and dreaming of, maybe even and working towards, putting in so much effort is not going to come through. And this is a painful realization at times. And it's okay to say that it is.
Patrick Exactly. That's the point. It's okay to recognize that you feel down, that you feel, I don't know, hurt, betrayed, offended, whatever that may be in that current situation. I just feel that it's important to acknowledge that feeling, to actually go through that. I mean, it's a little bit like… I would compare it to the mourning process of maybe a relationship or whatever, and then you actually just acknowledge those feelings within yourself, but at the same time not falling too deep into it and then say, well, it it is what it is. It is also just… I know how that sounds, but just a business situation. What can I learn from that situation and how can I move on from that?
Monika Yes, having this distance also at some point to be able to say, of course it's painful, this is not what I wanted. But also to say this one situation doesn't define me, doesn't define my journey, and also make this differentiation between: I feel betrayed doesn't mean that I am betrayed. There is a lot of mixing up between the two where we instantly, just because we feel a certain way, we instantly mistake this for the truth or for the reality. This is also sometimes then mixed up in the two, what I see, most common reactions to backlashes and disappointments which are not healthy now. Now we're talking about the two most common reactions, which I see that are very unproductive, but are also throughout media and throughout a lot of this hyped up motivational talks, etc…. They are promoted in some way. And the first one is being exactly not doing what you just said and falling into this toxic positivity trap where people explain their feelings away, where they too quickly rationalize things in a way where they are trying to actually convince themselves that they have already understood the situation before they have even looked at it.
Patrick And this is this is what I really hate about this. It's everywhere. Like. I love this topic.
Monika I know this is your topic. Toxic positivity.
Patrick It is the problem in media. You have this really toxic positivity everywhere. I'm sure people out there know this. There's this iceberg that you see and it's a lot of in business where you say, okay, there's below the surface, everything that you have to go through to accomplish what is above the surface. And when I see those people in social media, media everywhere, basically talking about their business and they're talking about how hard it was, some people will try to put that iceberg on its head, basically talking about that negativity, that disappointment, that backlash that we all have to go through as business owners. And then just “but”… and then talking about everything that's positive and then blowing that positivity up. That everything worked out so well. And look at me where I'm now. Honestly, it's really great if you turn things around and I'm really happy for everyone who've made a lot of money, who's successful. Really, everyone go for it. But the thing is, I think we have to talk about the negativity, the backlash, the disappointment, the hardship that we have to go through more openly and more authentically.
Monika There are these fuck up nights, which I actually really like, where you talk just about things that you failed at or things that didn't work out, and therefore giving people permission to acknowledge that the path towards success is not this linear journey of success, success, success. It's actually a really challenging journey of ups and downs and you have to know how to handle both. You have to know how to handle the ups because also, if you are not prepared to handle the ups, you will quickly turn it into a down-spiraling curve. But you also need to know how to prepare for and expect the things don't work out. And just like you said, the media is promoting this fake image of things always being positive, always being good, and especially in my industry with the mindset work, etc. I can see a lot of people promoting also this taboo of not allowing people to call things by their name, you know, and say that things are painful or say that things are shitty at some point, whatever it is. But they say like, you can't be negative. No, you have to stay positive. You have to think positive. And therefore not allowing people to even acknowledge what they are going through in this moment, which is crazy for me.
Patrick There was just this really interesting show that I was watching and it's about the rise and fall of We work, it's on Apple TV and there's this character and she's always saying, You let in negative thoughts and it's distracting you from your work, from getting better or bigger. And I always found that hearing that even I found it very disturbing because it's like, what is this negative thought that you let in? I mean, you're in business. You're always confronted with so many different things. Not everything can be great all the time.
Monika There is one thing also that I don't understand when people say I don't want to be negative. I hear this a lot from my clients, which, bless their soul, they're really sweet. But in some situations I really have to remind them, Wait a second, you're not at all negative here in this moment. Just acknowledging and saying that something was painful or frustrating doesn't mean that you're a negative. It just means that you are describing what you are going through and then being… this is my idea of positivity and optimism and what I call real optimism, because apparently we have to now differentiate between what optimism is as they preach it on social media. My idea is that you can look at this situation, that you can see that this is not what you want, that this is painful, negative, whatever, and then have the inner optimism and the solution focus and the resilience within yourself to be able to say, okay, how are we going to turn this around? And this is real optimism and real positivity for me. I don't think that someone who just tries to deny that there is something happening and just tries to look the other way, that this person is positive at all.
Patrick My problem with this positivity and this constant toxic positivity is that, as you said before, we're basically ignoring whatever is going on within ourselves and then we're not really dealing with that situation. And now think about we're in this situation, we have a major disappointment and then we're just staying positive all the time. And that's one block basically that is being put on top of my strength, of my resilience, of how to deal with that.
Monika Superficially positive, we should say superficially positive.
Patrick Exactly. Exactly, superficial. But when. I go on and then I think, okay, that's all handled because I've ignored it. And then something else comes up and it could be the same issue or related issue or something completely different. I always feel like if I don't deal with it, it's just one brick on top of the other. And that's why it's getting harder and harder to get out of these situations because I haven't dealt with the first one and I'm a number 8 or 9 now, and it's like, how do I deal with that if I don't even know what caused the first one? And so I need even more strength to get out of it, weirdly enough. And then you're in this downward spiral that's just even harder and harder to get out of.
Monika Yeah, because we have this idea that as long as we don't look at something, as long as we deny it, it's not there, which is not true. And the same happens with our feelings and with our perceptions or fears or whatever this one experience triggers. If there is something that comes up with it and you feel that it might have an impact on you, you feel that there is a strong pull, but because you call it negative or because you don't know how to deal with it, which is oftentimes the case that people are just overwhelmed with it, they suppress it, they push it away, and then it still costs you energy and mental resources. But it's just like on standby mode as it's happening below the surface. And then you wonder at some point why you are constantly tired, why you don't feel motivated anymore, why you have no creativity anymore when you get up in the morning, why you don't get excited about the next project. Well, there's a lot of things that you are carrying. It's like adding consistent buckets onto your your shoulders and carrying them with you wherever you go, but acting as if you're standing there with nothing troubling you, right? This is also sometimes where then a lot of people come to me the point where they realize either they are not aware of this and they just feel “I don't know why, but I'm constantly tired, I'm constantly demotivated and I really can't come up with any creative ideas anymore, what’s happening?” But also because then there is this turning point at some point and you have this one example or this one situation that comes up and maybe it's not even that bad. You know, it may be something relatively small, but because you have been carrying so many things with you, this is the turning point. And at this point, suddenly they are ready to give up on everything. They are ready to go into this nihilistic view where sometimes they can't even explain anymore why. But everything feels meaningless. Nothing works out. You know, these generalizations come in then. “Whenever I wish for something, it doesn't happen. Everyone is against me. All these kinds of sentences and feelings - sometimes you can't even verbalize it - but all these feelings come in where you just feel as if you are doomed and you can't change anything anymore. And this is now the second reaction that people have where they overdramatize this one situation and go into a, what we would call in psychology also a problem trance, where they don't even see that, that there could be a solution to this problem where they don't even see that things are different in certain other situations. They don't even acknowledge anymore the good stuff.
Patrick Basically you have this feeling. It's like a dark cloud that's hanging over yourself and that's clouding your judgement and then that is basically determining where you move on to. While in fact, it’s not even that dark. I mean, when you look at the at your projects maybe and what's going on in your work, it might not be that dark, but that feeling is just making everything look much more desperate than it actually is.
Monika I can remember when I had this conversation with a client recently and she was doing really well for herself. Like she was really achieving milestones that she had set for herself and she was very ambitious and whatever good came her way, whatever happened, like, you know, where we had… where I had to stop her in her flow of like her monologue, I had to stop her and point out whether she's aware that this is actually an achievement, whether she's aware that this is a good thing. And she just, you know, brushed these things off because there was this one situation and there was this one disappointment, which she felt then is determining everything and is kind of finalizing her story. She was ready to let go of everything, stop her business even, look for a new job or something, which she didn't want. And it was not like she was between two options, which were both desirable. She went into a nihilistic state just because this one experience. And then we unfolded, unpacked it and then of course it came out that there was not this one situation, but there was a lot of things that led to it. Plus, again, the social media thing. She was surrounded by people who were engaging in toxic positivity, only talking about how everything was working great, how everything went well, how nothing was difficult, and even challenges for them. No, they were not difficult to deal with. So of course, she felt like the absolute fool to stand up and feel devastated in the morning because for her this one disappointment had happened. So she determined that she was not good enough to deal with this situation, which is complete craziness.
Patrick I mean, honestly, that's the worst thing about social media. And we can talk about it for hours. I mean, you know, this is my topic that I always want to talk about because I feel like it's so, so, so unhealthy that you have these people there talking about how great everything is. And in fact, they're not dealing with anything. It's just blocking it out. But that's also why I think it's even more important to talk about how can we approach dealing with these disappointments and this backlash in a healthy way.
Monika Yes. That's why I applaud people who are very honest and vulnerable in their social media. And wherever they speak to people, they show up with all of the colors and they are very honest with what it took and their challenges also, and why they were really not equipped at some points to deal with them and how they then dealt with them. Like an honest story really. I applaud people who are brave enough to do that because in this field, as you said, where we were used to having all these just success stories on superficial levels, it is a sign of rebellion, an act of rebellion, actually, and a sign of bravery to stand up and be like, No, I'm going to show up and show what is actually happening behind the scenes. And I know from looking at them and looking at their clients and their customers and their audience, I know how relieved people are when they see that and when they are like, finally, it's not just me. It's not just me who is struggling with things and who can instantly turn every negative situation around into a success story. You know, sometimes it takes time. You have to know how to deal with this. This is the important thing that you need to learn: instead of just suppressing it or giving into it and surrendering to it. You have to find the rules of the game, and there are certain rules and there are certain steps to it. This is not just like I usually say, this is not magic that we are doing here in a coaching session as well. There are structures to how you process things and how you move through them. And I specifically like to think of it as three steps that you have to go through. And sometimes they overlap, of course, but three steps that every one of us has to go through when dealing with disappointment, backlash, setbacks, whatever it is. The first one is, as we have already discussed in several other episodes, also, is to get curious about the situation, to stop judging yourself, to stop judging the situation as well, and just take a step back and try to notice what is actually happening. Try to ask yourself, wait a second, what am I feeling? What is happening? When did all of this start? Which is also sometimes a radical question. When you think back, like when did I notice to start feeling this way? Suddenly you notice, oh no, it didn't happen yesterday or the day before yesterday when the event happened. But actually this was a lingering feeling that came up already two weeks ago. You can instantly notice this is a little bit of a different story than you thought it was. And then when you start getting curious about the situation, also it gets a little bit easier to acknowledge what is happening and to acknowledge your feelings. This is step two then already. You have to acknowledge both what is happening and acknowledge your feelings. And instead of judging them, instead of trying to change them instantly and suppressing them, practice what one of the people that I really like to listen to and that I like to refer to it - Tara Brock, clinical psychologist, Buddhist lay priest, and also a teacher of mindfulness meditation - she calls this radical acceptance and she wrote a book on it. And you can Google her and look her up on YouTube, she has amazing videos and seminars, actually, where she is talking about how to choose a softer approach in accepting what you are facing right now and what you are feeling in the present moment, and how to go through this with a four step method that she has also. In the end, it's all about simply acknowledging and appreciating what is happening right now without the need to judge it and change. And this is also then what in coaching sessions happens at the first step, you know, when I get to meet people, of course, you have these conversations. So if you don't know how to do it, just imagine that you are going to a coach or someone and that you would now start explaining to them and that they would ask you, okay, what happened then? And who is involved and what are you feeling? Just as if you are explaining to someone else the situation, go through it and then acknowledge that this is the reality.
Patrick There's something that I find very helpful in this situation. Journaling.
Monika Yes.
Patrick It's something where you don't really know yet. Okay, what are I feelings and where are these feelings coming from? Even sometimes what are they doing with me? I'm not doing it all the time, but especially in some hard situations, I'm just sitting down and trying to put it on a piece of paper where you just have to focus on, okay, what does this mean? And it's it's a weird process, I acknowledge, because whenever I sit down, there's some things coming out that I haven't thought before, and you just put it on this paper and then you read it and it's like, I haven't thought about it like this before. And it's just something. That I would say, okay, you don't have to do it every day for every problem and you get into it. Also, when you learn how to maybe do this without even piece and paper. But it's very helpful to have something where you just have to focus on what are these feelings doing with me?
Monika Journaling is so powerful and thank you for saying this because it actually forces you, just as if you were speaking with someone, it forces you to verbalize things and it forces you to question them naturally because you're looking for the right word. So am I angry or am I furious or am I frustrated? What is it? And then by trying to find the right words and by journaling on them… and there are different ways of journaling, of course, just like you said, you found your way and you were not even you didn't even expect the way that you were journaling it to turn out. But there is value in it and you come up with new things. This is such a powerful tool for exactly that. It's not as if there are new things that come up. You just get more aware of what you are actually feeling and what you are experiencing. So journaling forces you to become aware.
Patrick I'm always a bit careful because you just said it's like talking to someone. I'm a bit careful with that because I know that for specific things you have to talk to people who can deal with those situations and who can connect with you on that level. So you can talk to everyone about every problem. And I totally get what you mean by that because I love talking to you about situations, because I know that we can talk about different levels of the problems. But you cannot do that with everyone. And that's why I'm always a bit careful. And that's why for me, in some situations, in the past at least, I'm still trying to wrap my head around when to use it for what situations. But journaling is very different because it is just you and you have to work with yourself on this.
Monika That's very true. And there… I was, more focusing on the act of talking where you have to choose the words that you are choosing, but what you just said is very important and so important to be aware of. First, who are you talking to? Because their response is also going to determine how you are going to think further about this problem and about the situation. If you are talking to someone who is very judgmental, good luck trying to be open and vulnerable and compassionate with yourself because if they are already judging you, that's going to be even more of a challenge. But the second thing is also, there is a certain way of talking - and now I was automatically thinking about this, of course - but there is a certain way of talking which is productive and helpful in these situations, which is different to what people often think about. It's not venting, you know, but when people go into this stage of reiterating the same story and telling five different people about how disappointed they are and how this could happen to them again and how they knew that this would happen or whatever it is… whatever the storyline, just like we talked about in the last episode is. But if you are reiterating it, if you are actually strengthening this kind of mindset and this kind of awareness within yourself instead of turning into a more productive and processing things. It's not about venting, it's about talking in a productive way. But you're absolutely right. Then it's sometimes… it's better to stay with pen and paper and really journal for yourself instead of just talking to anyone, if you are not sure that they can handle this in a good way. Because the important thing about this is also to be aware of this. It's not about accepting this, the situation and then surrendering to it. This is just step two where you are acknowledging and appreciating and accepting this situation before you then go into solution mode. Because then you have processed the feelings, then you have worked through this situational experience that you have, and then you are ready to go into a more broader view again and actually look for solutions. And this is a very different way of addressing the situation and looking at a problem compared to a problem oriented approach. I always give my clients this metaphor of looking at a locked door and you want to go through the door, so you need to open it. The problem oriented state would be the state where you continue to look at the door and you continue to assess which kind of locked door this is. You would analyze the lock and then try to decide when it was built and by whom it was built and why it was built this way or whatever. In reality, in order to open the door, if this is your goal, you need the key. And in many situations you need to turn away from the problem. But not denying it. But you need to turn away from the problem in order to look at the solution and look for the key, which meant which might have been lost somewhere completely else. And this is the shift that you then make once once you have accepted and acknowledge the situation and your feelings and everything that came up with this, then you turn into this solution oriented mode. Then you start to look for either ways of dealing with this. What can I actually do about the situation? Where have I dealt with something similar before? What was helpful then? What did I do then? Which resources do I have? You have to get resourceful there. But this is the moment where you then go into what superficially we would call also positive then also. Where you try to come up with practical, strategic ways. You try to come up with motivation and inspiration again, because you are looking for creative ways of approaching the situation and turning it around.
Patrick But what if this whole process I mean, you've described now a lot of things that I have to do in the solution mode, basically. But what if this whole thing feels a little bit too big for me?
Monika It will. It will, definitely. Because this is the nature of disappointments and major backlashes that it can even feel overwhelming at a point. I would say from experience, I see that people have this expectation that this whole process takes way longer than it usually does. I can work through this process with my clients within half an hour. You know, it doesn't take weeks, but this is something the idea that we have that if the moment, the moment that we open up to dealing with the situation in this way, that we then will then be surrendering to the situation and maybe come out the other side after five weeks or whatever. But it's not the reality. Of course, if you have already dealt with so many situations in an unproductive way that you are carrying a lot of baggage with you, then sure, it will take a little bit of time to work through this. But there also then you have a little bit of a different approach where you work with patterns. You look for common patterns that you have engaged in, situations, whatever it is, and then you work through that and then you go even deeper by looking at the most important singular situations. Overall, you can relax though, and you can accept that you don't have to solve everything right now. The most important step is taking ownership and becoming aware of how you want to deal with this situation and how you want to approach it, because this will determine whether you turn it around in the long term as well, or whether you make it just a short term fix, which you then might stumble again and again and again upon.
Patrick This is also one of my key takeaways from this whole conversation that we had. Having an honest way of dealing and processing with what you're feeling in those situations is your long term solution, because we've talked about it before. It's basically that brick above brick, above brick. And you're getting out of those situations harder and harder every time. I feel like we have to really be honest to ourselves and let ourselves feel bad. Maybe in that one situation, we have to accept that we are hurt, feel betrayed, whatever it is. We've talked about it just now. But the thing is, when we accept it, we can process it and then we can get out of it. And yes, it might not be one day for some, it might not be two days, two weeks, whatever. Some of those things take longer, but take your time. Get out of it. Because once you're out of it, you probably won't fall back into this the same way. You get out of it and you feel better the next time. You're a bit stronger at least, that's the one thing. And the other takeaway for me at least, is that having honest conversations about all of this - and I'm not talking about this talking to other people about your struggle in these things - it’s even when you go up to prospective other businesses that you want to work with, partners, whatever. From my experience, opening up a little bit and showing your true colors and saying it's not always easy, then as a response, what you might get and what I always get lately is, I thought it was just me. No, it's not just you. And in that moment, you build a different kind of rapport with that person, and you have a very different way of talking to each other.
Monika Well, because you can relax around each other, you don't have to keep up this fake image. And the amount of times that I have heard the sentence, Oh, I thought it was just me. Of course, I as a coach, have a very unique perspective into people's experiences and they share their whole journeys with me. We celebrate their successes, but we also openly talk about their problems and challenges, of course. I just wish that we would have more of these honest conversations and then I would have less clients, but I would happily give them away because this would mean that we would have a healthier platform and a healthier culture of dealing with these kinds of journeys and challenging experiences. But of course, it would also be important that people would be aware of and know how to deal with these situations in a way that is productive and healthy and meaningful. And this means that they would have to acknowledge on the one hand what's going wrong and be open to share with it and be vulnerable with it, but also then know how to process it and know how to deal with what is happening and then know how to quickly come back from this. We want to encourage ourselves to be like, Yes, you can deal with this. We can deal with a whole spectrum of emotions that comes up with this, and we know that we can turn this around and we will do something positive and create something beautiful out of this.
Patrick If you enjoyed this episode, share it with your fellow entrepreneurs so they can listen too. Grab the link in our show notes and send it to them.
Monika] If you're looking to join our tribe of movers and shakers to get a sense of belonging and fresh insights, join our Pioneers Club community. The link to our community is waiting for you in our show notes as well.
Patrick And don't forget to connect with us on LinkedIn or Instagram and let us know, what was a helpful thought or insight that you gained from this episode.
Monika Have any questions or ideas for us? Head over to our LinkedIn or Instagram pages and tell us. We read every submission and would love to answer your question in a later episode too. So thanks for joining us.
Patrick See you in the next one.