Opportunity and Regret

When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us. – Helen Keller

Take time to mourn the things that leave your life, the changes that happen both with and without your permission. And then stop. Don’t let the past become your obsession. Your present will fly by and your Future will unfold without you if you continue to see only the past.

Denial is one of the five stages of grief, and grief is not just for death of a loved one. It’s for all kinds of losses. Denial isn’t just a “I can’t believe he’s dead” type of thing. It’s also denying your own reactions, your own feelings, and the changes that are happening in your life. It’s also about denying what this loss means to you.

Some people will lose their high paying jobs and deny that they won’t find something as high paying again. They’ll cling to the illusion that they can find a job that pays just as well, despite the fact that they don’t have as much seniority in a new company. In some cases, they’re in even worse shape because their type of job no longer exists. Middle managers are a good example of a high paying job that suddenly didn’t exist any longer, or at least not in the numbers that had been before. But some people refused to believe that they would have to take a pay cut.

What did that do to them? Well, if you think you’re going to be paid just as much and in a short while, why change any of your spending habits? You can still afford two houses and a boat. And if it takes a little longer, take out a loan. You’ll be able to pay it back no problem. But they can’t. But they’re so busy looking at the “closed door” that they don’t even see other opportunities. The opportunities are not exactly what they want, exactly what they used to have, so they just don’t exist for these people.

Denying that you hate your ex does not mean you don’t hate your ex. You still hate. You just don’t get past it, and the hate solidifies and rolls up into a ball that sits in between your chest and your stomach. Denying you’re upset about a death means you won’t notice that you’re easy to set off, irritable beyond what a situation calls for, or being rather rude and mean to other people. You refuse to accept that you’re upset, so you refuse to see that you are, and you refuse to see the effects you have.

Grieve. Get past the denial as quickly as possible, though be careful you aren’t denying that you’re still in denial. And then look for the other open doors, the other opportunities that surround you. The Future can be bright and brilliant, if you dare to take a look.