Embrace The Suck.

Life being hard isn’t a philosophical breakthrough of an idea. Anyone in adulthood knows life is hard. I’m willing to bet once you’ve made it past the age of 10 you’ve figured out life isn’t a cup of chocolate milk. Thinking about this over the last few days has peaked my interest. If you’re anything like me, you’ve moaned and wailed throwing the question, why life has to be so hard into the cosmos or at God. Why can’t it be easy? Why suffering? Etc. Questions we’ve all asked at one time or another. And while there are so many good answers, which ones are true? What’s the foundational purpose of why life has to be difficult, hard, etc?

The problem isn’t that life is challenging. I don’t think it’s inherently “fair or unfair”… I think it’s what WE make it to be. We are who we make ourselves to be. A problem is that we expect life to be easy. Struggles aren’t obstacles; they’re opportunities to grow. By embracing challenges, you stop fighting reality and find meaning in hardship. This perspective shifts how you approach problems. Instead of being overwhelmed, you adapt and learn. Struggles lose their power to break you because you see them as a natural part of life. Accepting life’s difficulties doesn’t make them disappear but helps you face them with resilience and purpose. When we expect life to be easy or fair, we add unnecessary pain. By facing struggles as a normal part of life, we can grow stronger, reduce fear, and find peace.

So life is hard. Okay, so… now what are you going to do about it?

No matter what the reasoning behind the difficulty, I think what matters more is how we respond to it. I believe there in lies the power that we have towards accomplishment and perseverance and growing into whom we want to be. We can play the victim mentality game and just stay upset while moaning, complaining, etc… and never really doing anything about our situation. Or we can detach from the issue, the change that’s taken place, or the scenario and take small steps forward.

"You cannot control the wind, but you can adjust your sails." – Unknown

Through detaching from the moment we are able to take a step back and identify the truth that life is hard. Once this truth is identified, we can accept it and once it’s accepted then the difficulty itself no longer matters but then how to move forward. It doesn’t do any good to moan or fixate on the enormity of your burden. Psychiatrist and author M. Scott Peck, in his book The Road Less Traveled said, “Life is a series of problems. Do we want to moan about them or solve them? Do we want to teach our children to solve them?”

One way that we can rewire our brain to help step back, take a breath, and find the solution to the problem before us is to detach. Detachment is a way of reframing the negative into a more positive light and allows you to be resilient when life’s challenges face us—not as emotional numbness, but as a way to create space between yourself and your emotions. This space allows you to respond thoughtfully rather than react impulsively. Detachment fosters inner peace and helps you navigate life's challenges with clarity and strength.

"The primary cause of unhappiness is never the situation but your thoughts about it."

Eckhart Tolle

Practicing detachment and reframing thoughts daily requires mindfulness, intentional actions, and consistency.

Reframe Negative Thoughts

• Practice gratitude: When faced with negativity, focus on what you are thankful for. For example, instead of thinking, "I failed," replace that with, "I learned something valuable from this experience."

• Challenge limiting beliefs: Ask yourself, "Is this thought absolutely true?" Replace unhelpful narratives with empowering ones. Take each thought captive and compare it to the reality of truth.

• Use affirmations: Create positive statements to counter negative self-talk (e.g., "I am capable and resilient”, “Everything will be fine, I just need a plan”. “You’re okay, you’ve got this.”).

Create Emotional Space

• Pause before reacting: When emotions run high, take a few deep breaths to create space before responding. Try to temporarily take yourself out of the moment and look at it in third person mode.

• Label emotions: Instead of saying, "I am angry," say, "I am experiencing anger." This detachment helps you see emotions as temporary states. We can’t help feel our feelings sometimes and that’s okay. Feel them and validate them, but we don’t have to act on them.

These are just two examples I’ve started to incorporate into my life to help detach myself from the moment, my feelings, etc and to be able to see what feelings are true and which ones are lies. Which situations are a real dumpster fire and which ones aren’t that big of a problem at all. Accepting difficulty in life, as it becomes more normal, makes it more manageable and doesn’t feel impossible to navigate anymore. It gives you freedom from false expectations and enables you to grow through the struggle. Sometimes you just have to EMBRACE THE SUCK! Difficulty is the way forward.

“The best way out is always through.”

Robert Frost