Feeling defeated is pretty common. However, when you haven’t felt defeated in a very long time, and then a situation occurs when you want to just scream, it kind of sucks (for lack of a better word).
A while back I did some work for someone, and it was totally and completely the opposite of what this person had wanted. Whether it was a miscommunication or something else, I’m not sure, but in that moment, when they expressed how they felt about my work, I truly felt like I wanted to crawl in a hole and not come out for hours. It’s a shitty feeling when you do what you think is quality work and it’s not perceived that way by someone else. So, at that moment, I shut my computer, went upstairs, took a shower, got in bed, and watched YouTube videos in bed (I LOVE YouTube videos) and decided to be done with that day. While I didn’t wake up feeling perfect and like all was great in the world, I felt much better. Rather than dealing with the situation in that moment when I was ‘heated’ I took a breather and decided to handle it in the morning. I still felt defeated, but I dug myself out of that hole and put a positive spin on the situation.
For one thing, in a situation like this, you can turn it around to your benefit and have it push you in a better direction. Have it challenge you, and going forward, strive for even better. Also realizing this is business and not personal is something to think about. It’s very easy to want to just give up and quit when you start to feel defeated. DON’T. Take advantage of the situation and have it make you a better person.
In life, you will feel defeated, whether personally or professionally. It happens. It’s totally normal. The thing to remember is to NOT let that moment of feeling defeated define you.
Do your best to bounce back from defeat. You might just realize how positively transformative the situation truly was.
Image via Stephanie Sunderland Photography