At 25, will I ever fix my despair over the plight of our planet?
DEAR BEL,
PLEASE could you tell me how one might become more resilient in the face of constant disappointment in life? I don’t believe I set the bar high, yet so often I feel unhappy with the way things turn out to be.
For example, I invested thousands of pounds of savings (in addition to a large loan) to pay for a degree that led to no graduate job or studentship for a PhD. I worked in a hotel for two years to save for a masters degree, which I’m now undertaking.
The quality of this course is also extremely disappointing and I really regret starting it. The rejections have begun again due to the competitive nature of securing a funded PhD (I’ve had my CVs and applications checked and they are fine). I fear the same will happen again once I finish this course.
There are also disappointments on a broader scale, for instance, the catastrophe that is Brexit and the fact people still continue to live a life convenient for them at the expense of damaging our planet. All this has started to chip away at me and at the age of 25 I feel bitter.
I know life is anything but fair, but I am struggling to change my mindset. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. HANNA
That some people are ‘ copers’, while others collapse in a heap at the slightest setback, has always interested me.
a marvellous book called the School Of Life — an Emotional Education (edited by alain de Botton) suggests resilience has much to do with upbringing: ‘One kind of person, the bearer of a solid emotional inheritance, will tend to be resilient . . .’ whereas another person’s ‘backdrop of shame and self- contempt’ will always reconfirm itself. I wonder if that resonates with you.
Perhaps you were brought up to expect too much of yourself and the world and learned a habit of criticism. If that’s the case, disappointment is inevitable. Instead of the lessons in happiness people chunter on about, we all need to understand that nothing will ever be as we want it to be.
Growth happens when we start to come to terms with that fact, when we decide we can take control of our own lives by resolutely putting one foot in front of the other.
You segue rapidly from personal frustration and disappointment to angry, sweeping statements about the world — the sort of catastrophising which is hardly good for mental health, common though it seems.
the ‘ change in your mindset’ needed here is not about the fairness or otherwise of your life. It is about how you deal with setbacks — and how to re- configure the face you present to others.
Please read your letter again and try to see it through my eyes.
here we have a young woman, with her whole life before her, angry that her investment in a degree brought none of the benefits she expected, disappointed with her present course of study, already expecting rejection, furious we have left the EU and contemptuous that so many people are indifferent to the environment. all adding up to an intense feeling of bitterness, which must surely tinge everything you do. all so sad.
Suppose we try to change the tune of this litany of woe? Like many graduates, you didn’t find paid work or a PhD, but showed admirable initiative in working in a hotel to save for your master’s degree. that’s the best thing in your letter. Now you criticise your Ma, but who likes every aspect of a course or job?
Learning to compromise is a key part of education. Finding something good within every single day is the only way to survive in life. Who knows, when you have finished you may walk into a job? But such good fortune depends on you embracing hope, not negativity.
Sorry, but nobody wants to give a job to — or work and socialise with — a moaner. tell yourself the sky isn’t grey, it’s pearly.
Jumping out into the wider world, to call Brexit (which in practical terms hasn’t happened yet) a ‘catastrophe’ is harmful to you. a
catastrophe is a tsunami, an earthquake, the Australian bushfires. Making an intelligent decision to shift your mindset and realise that politics is a slow, changeable process will relax you, opening your eyes to infinite possibility, at home and abroad.
I am so tired of wilfully sad people predicting disaster, when the only honest response in the present is to say: ‘I haven’t a clue what will happen next year.’ Lastly, each day the people you think don’t care about the planet are recycling, picking up litter, buying less meat, telling their supermarkets not to use plastic, and so on.
Of course, others are chucking rubbish, scoffing burgers and not giving a damn — and there are
always going to be those polarities. But the trajectory of humankind is towards slow- but- sure betterment. It really, really is.
Yes, we have many problems — and governments are waking up to the need to take environmental issues seriously. But I’m afraid that won’t stop people chucking rubbish in rivers, here or in India.
If you despair about everything, you throw away the gift of life.
You’ll help yourself if you quit bitter sorrowing and clench your fists, ready to take life on.
Embrace the powerful message that the sisters can indeed do it for themselves and the brothers can take up arms against a sea of troubles and, in so doing, we will survive. Join Extinction Rebellion! Volunteer! Allow a fearsome wonder woman to whirl into your psyche and give you a good shaking and dusting down, followed by a pat on the back so hard it takes your breath away.
Stare into your mirror and tell yourself you can make your own life good. Who else is in charge of it?