One of life’s most challenging and inevitable realities is that we will either face an unexpected death at a young age or experience a loss of capacity in something that once was central to our identity. This could be our ability to remember, walk, talk, hear, see, or even feel youthful or sexually vital. There are countless areas where we might experience a decline—too many to cover in a single article.
We’re often taught and believe ourselves that these capacities are essential to our sense of self-worth and life’s fulfillment.
Naturally, our instinct in these situations is to repeatedly wish, “I want to get this back.” Whether it’s the ability to play tennis, drive a car, or feel as we once did, we long for the return of what we’ve lost. But when these losses inevitably happen, we rarely receive guidance on how to best navigate them. That’s the purpose of this article: to explore how we can care for ourselves through these difficult times. In all of these situations we need to look at what is possible and redefine our focus and priorities to be well within our present capacities.
There exists a guiding principle or pathway that cannot give us everything we desire, but it does offer what is possible we truly need: acceptance, dignity, intelligence, and self-trust.
We have the potential to become the true guides of our own minds. Instead of fixating on what we can no longer do and being dominated by past experience, we can focus on what is still possible. This may seem like an obvious solution, but it’s important to recognize our automatic tendency to cling to what we cannot regain, and what we have been able to do or how we could be in our prior life. What if, as you read this, you consider that accepting what is lost and focusing on what is possible now might be the greatest act of mastery and self-empowerment in your life?
Many wise individuals throughout history have focused on this practical enlightening focus that it is during times of hardship that we can discover our true strength and courage.
It’s easy to be confident and self-assured when everything is going well, but what if we stopped viewing our dependence on external conditions as the true measure of our character? One of the major causes that we will focus on in another article is the effects of our society being rooted in a denial of death, which leads us to believe that we can avoid major vulnerability and loss indefinitely. But the real test of our character comes when we lose something important, when we have no control, and the only thing left to manage is our response.
If this idea initially feels discouraging—or like a consolation prize for losing something meaningful—I invite you to look at it through a different lens.
By eliminating the priority of facing emotional loss when we are young and growing up, learning that we are also going to lose capacity and ultimately face the loss through death of our animals, friends and ultimately ourselves we create an imbalanced society. This leads to two of the natural ways to foster balance. One is the teaching of children to keep asking real questions that have to do with character, life and death and poverty and wealth. This will lead them to naturally be more open to their parents in a different way than normal and also to teachers and grandparents. It’s why elderly people in Western cultures often always lack the respect they once held in indigenous societies and elders. We shelter our children from the reality of mortality and teach them to focus on achievement and success. For example, when a child asks, “Do I have to worry about death? Are you and Mommy going to die soon? What happens when our dog dies? “We often provide one-dimensional answers, offering false reassurance to avoid their discomfort. This cuts off curiosity, courage to face reality, being grounded in the broader world.
But is it helpful to tell children, “You don’t have to worry about death”?
Not if that is the full answer. The real challenge lies in how we answer. We rob ourselves and our children of the opportunity to develop true courage, faith, and a grounded understanding of life as it is. Here’s an example of an approach that inspires curiosity to such a question, depending on the child’s age: “I understand why you’re afraid. We’ll talk about death more as you get older. There are many different beliefs about what happens when pets die, and it’s a great question. I think that wherever they go, it’s probably somewhere peaceful, but many people have different views. I love that you’re asking. You could ask Grandma (or whoever is the wisest elder about it); she has thought about this more than I have.” This response opens the door for both reassurance and curiosity. It allows children to embrace life’s difficult questions without a fear that will exponentially grow when it is avoided throughout life .
Teaching children about the real-world challenges and the subtle impermanence of life is essential—not just to help them cope with death, but to prepare them for life’s inevitable disappointments, like losing a game, facing rejection, or failing a test
These moments—what could be termed “ego deaths”—teach valuable lessons about resilience, humility, and self-reliance. Do you see the correlation between growing in our capacity to face our own deaths and being more able to be resilient and creative when life provides us mini-deaths. By facing these ongoing losses in a way that has expanding depth acceptance we are guided to focus on how we respond to loss, rather than on controlling the uncontrollable. It also nurtures the creativity and emotional intelligence needed to value and honoring our best efforts—even in defeat. The more we learn to accept loss with grace, the more courage we develop. Instead of falling into self-rejection when things don’t go our way, we can begin to respond with something like: ‘I gave it my all with a hard earned acceptance, and that defines who I am more and more.
I distinctly remember asking myself as a child, “Why does my mom praise me when I do well in golf, but criticize me when I cry after being cut from a team?”
I thought, “I don’t need praise when I succeed. I need support when I fail.” This is a microcosm of what almost all of us have faced. We place such a high value on success that we often overlook the quiet damage caused by self-rejection, relentless competition, and the burnout that can follow. The urge to constantly outdo even our best needs to be recognized for what it is—a dangerous illusion. And if that truth hits close to home, maybe it’s worth meeting it with a knowing smile with peace and strength in your heart..
Can you see the paradox here?
Our best opportunities to develop confidence, character, and humility arise when we lose. If we can embrace this truth early in life, it will help us also face our mortality with greater strength.No matter what stage of life we realize this the sooner we embrace the reality that life is a setup for both victory and loss the more balanced, creative and resilient we will become. The ultimate start would be if we teach our children to keep an open mind about death, we also teach them to approach life’s losses with dignity and curiosity. This is part of the natural role for grandparents to help their kids pass on this lesson. All of us have a role to play in this embracing life in a more wholesome way.
This development of deepening our capacity for acceptance and resiliency is a practice as it is all too rare in our society. This needs to be much more than an intellectual insight and is so helpful if we can learn this earlier in life and guide others that are in their earlier years especially in our families. This evolution is one that really requires noticing even the smallest losses and deepening our capacity to find a depth of acceptance. It is a quality of life changer, and anyone that wants support with this can reach out further to me at Awarenessthatheals.org.
Society’s obsession with winning, succeeding, and being “right” creates a distorted view of success.
It leaves us unprepared to handle the deeper lessons of life—those found in both victory and defeat. It’s not the outcome that matters dominantly, but how we respond. Our reactions to success and failure offer a far more accurate measure of our character than the actual events themselves. Does this not only make sense to you, but also create a place inside that realizes you want to contemplate this for the rest of your life.
It’s easy to ignore this truth when we’ve been conditioned to prioritize achievement and self-image.
But whether you’re a parent or a child, it’s never too late to reconsider the relative importance of winning and losing, wealth and poverty, or life and death. Society’s focus on positivity, success, and the pursuit of an ideal image often undermines our ability to respond with grace to life’s inevitable challenges, especially those that are deep. The real challenge lies in learning to face these challenges with acceptance, see their naturalness as a part of life and it results in courage and humility. These are the “baby” steps that ultimately cumulatively accept the reality of our own mortality.
In conversations with close friends, I’ve often heard comments like, “That makes sense,” or “I wish I had been raised that way,” or “I think I’ve done a good job raising my kids.”
But when the conversation goes more deeply, they usually recognize that these responses only tell part of the story. A more aware response might be, “I see the value in this approach, and I want to pay attention to the places where I haven’t quite embraced it yet,” or “I see how my upbringing shaped me, and I’m committed to growing through it.” I want to look at my losses along the way and spend time reimagining how I would have liked to think about them to help prepare me for my future. I also want to either teach my kids this more consistently or open myself up to my grandparents to let them play more of this role.
This is not about inducing guilt.
As we have stated, most of us were raised in a culture that prioritized achievement and success over resilience and humility. It’s understandable why we suppress thoughts of our mini deaths throughout our life, as doing so helps us feel in control of our lives and consciously makes us feel better. But by honestly examining our conditioning to lose the golden greater capacity to respond with the dignity, creativity, redefining of achievement and resiliency, we can see how we can respond well when we lose something vital. This will set us up for developing character and be invaluable as we face issues of aging.