Setbacks Are A Part Of Life; It's Your Reaction To Them That Matters Most.

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There are many things in this life that are just impossible to avoid experiencing. I believe that one of those things is something that that we've both heard and experienced time and time again. What am I talking about you may wonder? I'm referring to setbacks, which is something that many of us experience more often than we'd probably like. Now what exactly is a setback? We all have our own interpretation of what a personal setback may be, but my personal definition of a setback is when something that may be important to us doesn't go as planned. A setback can come in all shapes and forms, and as I alluded to previously, no one is immune to them taking place. While the occurrence of setbacks may be a constant aspect of life, the various ways in which we choose to react to them is always up in the air. Because we are all different individuals with different ways of processing things, we all have different ways of reacting to setbacks. Just like anything else in life, there can be both positive and negatives that can be taken away from having setbacks. However, I believe it is safe to say that most people focus primarily on the negative aspect of setbacks. Regardless of what the setback may be, we find ourselves questioning ourselves and wondering; why is this happening to me? It's perfect normal to question why something may have happened to cause a setback, however, getting too caught up in the setback itself is counterproductive. We have to learn and understand that no matter who you are or what you've done, setbacks are just a part of life. What matters most is how we choose to react to them.

Hello once again ladies and gentlemen. It is I Brad H. back at it once again to present the end of 2016 edition of 'Brad H.'s Perspective'. The blog itself isn't coming to an end, however, this will likely be the last entry of 2016. As always, I hope all has been good and well with everyone. For anyone that may be first time visitors and not familiar with how things go here, I normally come on here every other week to give my personal perspective on various thoughts and ideas that play a part in my life on a regular basis. I try to take those ideas and put them into words that can hopefully serve as an inspiration to others, as well as motivation for myself. Since we're near the end of the year, I wanna take a few moments and reflect. For me personally, it has been quite a journey with handling this blog series this year. In fact, I believe this is the first year that I've actually stayed consistent with updating regularly throughout an entire calendar year. That was one of the goals that I set headed into 2016, and I'm very glad to have accomplished it. I can only hope that through the process of staying consistent that I was able to reach and hopefully inspire others while being on this quest. Since 2016 isn't officially over yet, I don't want to get too far ahead of myself and say how good or bad this year has been to me. I'll just say that just like everyone else, I've experienced my share of highs and lows, but I'm also aware that anything whether for good or bad can still happen before the year ends. Since Christmas day is only a couple of days away, lets try to focus on enjoying that day itself, as well as the rest of 2016. Again, I thank everyone that has taken out the time to read any of these posts. Now that I've had the chance share a couple of reflections, lets go ahead and talk about this week's topic of setbacks and the importance of our reactions to them.

Before talking more about this week's topic, I always let others know that a person's individual viewpoints will always vary from person to person. The goal with this isn't to focus too much on what is considered right or wrong, but rather to encourage more in depth thinking on various subject matters. If anyone disagrees with or has a perspective different from myself on this or any other topics, that is all fine and well. I welcome all thoughts, and the promotion of learning from one another is something that I'm a firm believer in. Now, for a little insight on how I arrived at ending this year's blog series on this topic. I personally thought it would be both beneficial and therapeutic to write on this topic due to a recent setback that I've had personally. Not going too much into details, but I recently had a setback that has kinda thrown me for a loop a bit. Something that I was really hoping to work out recently just happened not to. Of course I'm disappointed about it, and I'm not going to front as if I'm above reacting negatively to setbacks. My hope this week is that I can show others that while setbacks aren't always an ideal part of our lives, we always have a choice on how we react to them. More importantly, I'm hoping that me writing this will serve as a form of inspiration to myself. Maybe it can help be the extra jolt that inspires to me pick myself back up from this setback that has knocked me down a bit. I'm trying to keep in mind that famous quote that goes; "If you fall down, you can look up, and if you can look up you can get up."

Now as I stated previously, the majority of people view setbacks happening in a negative way. Having negative thoughts towards a setback is totally understandable, and I would even say that depending on how severe of a setback that has occurred in your life may be, a negative outlook is sometimes warranted. I'm in no way saying that everyone handles a setback in this way. As I've stated in previous posts, we all handle and process things differently. Now while it may be both normal and natural to feel down or depressed following a setback happening, many of us allow those negative feelings to marinate within our minds. We often don't move forward fast enough from the setback, and that's when the negative state of mind can creep in and take over full force. Once that happens, it becomes even more difficult to get our lives back on course, and it becomes a vicious cycle of daily bouts of self-pity and doubt. Like I mentioned, we all handle and process things differently, which also means that the time frame of rebounding from a setback varies within us individually. However, the healing process takes a lot longer if we constantly allow a negative mindset to fester within following a setback. The biggest trait of a setback is that we often cannot control them, nor can we stop them from happening. They are guaranteed to happen in life, and they often hurt us deeply whenever they occur. While we often can't change nor stop them, we do have control of how we react to them.

People that are frequent visitors here are likely aware of that fact that I often talk about the power of the mind, as well as the importance of working towards strengthening our minds. In regards to getting through a topic such as this one, as well as many others, the mind is a key factor in determining if and when we bounce back from setbacks. It is easy to sit around and wallow in self-pity whenever a setback occurs. We are aware that participating in those self-defeating habits is equivalent to taking the easy way out. The hard part for us is developing the ability to be able to take positives from a setback, and then being able to learn and grow from them. Although this is can be a hard task to take, it's the one option out of the two that gives us the opportunity to grow as individuals. Embracing the agony and disappointment that comes with having setbacks isn't something that is easy to do, and I feel that it takes a certain amount of fortitude to do this. I know that I myself am working on trying to implement this tactic in my life. Again, much of this hinges on how big of a setback that a person is experiencing. I want to be sure and stress that the degree of impact that a setback can have varies, and if we're being honest with ourselves, there are some setbacks that may not be recoverable. Even if that is the case, we still have control over how we react.

Well I'm going to go ahead and bring this entry to a close. I guess I'll end by saying that we shouldn't focus too much on setbacks happening. Why? Because they are inevitable, as well as a part of life. We may have control in certain circumstances, but we can never control unexpected events happening. Instead of worrying so much about the setbacks, lets try focusing on how we react to them. Getting caught up in the self-pity and wallowing in our issues doesn't help the situation, nor does it add to our ability to fix whatever the situation may be. I want to state again that I definitely don't have it all together when it comes to this topic, and I'm still dealing with some backlash from the recent setback that I referenced to previously in this post. But like I said, this blog is all about me trying to inspire myself along with others. That said, me getting these thoughts out there helps me to learn myself. I can't speak for anyone else, but I will say that for me personally, you'll be surprised at how much you learn about yourself when you put effort into something you're passionate about. Well we're at the end now, so I'll leave you all with a quote that coincides with this week's topic. This one comes courtesy of Dau Voire: "A minor setback is an exquisite setup for a major comeback, remember that."

Well that's all for this edition of 'Brad H.'s Perspective' for 2016 folks! We made it guys! I hope you all enjoyed this blog entry, and I hope that some meaning and understanding was able to be gained from it. Before ending this, I want to say congratulations again to my younger sister for receiving her bachelor's degree last week. I mentioned her then upcoming graduation ceremony in the previous post, so I wanted to bring it to light once again. The commencement ceremony was truly great, and I'm so proud of you sis. Keep up the great work! Christmas is right around the corner, so Merry Christmas to everyone out there. Enjoy the day with your family, and take some time to reflect on and remember those that are no longer with us this holiday season. Alright, I'll see you all in a couple of weeks in the year 2017. Until then, I wish you all a happy holidays, and I'm sending light, love, peace and positive thoughts to all.

©2016 Bradrick H. All Rights Reserved.

Don't Be Afraid To Let People That Don't Respect You Go. (Having Respect For Yourself).

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Anyone that knows me fairly well are probably aware that just like many others out there, I love listening to motivational videos. One of my favorite motivational speakers that I've referenced to on this blog in the past is the great Les Brown. I was listening to one of his powerful speechless last night, and he mentioned how it's the people that we're the closet to are the ones that we're the most vulnerable to. This is something that many of us are already aware of, and it is something that I've frequently brought up in previous posts. Whether it may be family, friends, a spouse or associates, every single one of us have people in our lives that we have interactions with. Now I don't want to come across as if EVERYONE deals with disrespectful people. However, I think many of you can agree with me when I say that we all generally having dealings with a least one person in our lives that can be disrespectful towards us and others at times. One of the characteristics about disrespect is it isn't limited to just one type of person It could be family member, a girlfriend/boyfriend, a friend, etc that displays a lack of respect towards us. We all are going to experience disrespectful people from time to time, but when it becomes something that is rampantly happening towards us, it's probably time to take a step back and evaluate our relationships with these people. I believe that the biggest form of respect that can be displayed is self respect, and allowing others to constantly disrespect you without any repercussions can be damaging from a mental standpoint. It's okay to let go sometimes, and it's okay to not be afraid to let go of the people that do not respect you.

Hey, how's it going everyone? It is your man Brad H. once again on the mic about to spit a few bars. Nah, I'm just messing around with you all. I'm definitely not an emcee or a rapper, but I'd classify myself as somewhat of a wordsmith when it comes to another edition of 'Brad H.'s Perspective'! Hope everyone has been doing well out there wherever you are in this world. For those of you that may be first time visitors and not know how things go on here, I come on every other week to give my personal perspective on various thoughts and ideas that I think about on a regular basis. I try to take those ideas and put them into words that can hopefully serve as an inspiration to others, as well as motivation for myself. So Thanksgiving has come and gone, and we're now in the very last month of 2016. Wow, it's amazing how fast this year has flown by. It seems just like last month when I was writing the first blog post of the year for 2016, and now we're less than a month away from a brand new year. This December is going to be a pretty exciting month for my family. In exactly a week from today, my younger sister will be graduating from college. This is a huge accomplishment for our family, because she is the first to actually attend a university and finish. I received an associates degree back in 2007, but she will be receiving her bachelors. I, along with the rest of the family is extremely proud of her and this achievement. Way to go sis! Beyond that, I'm just excited for the rest of the football season, as well as the upcoming Christmas holidays. I've been hearing people complain about hearing so much Christmas music already, but I'm personally loving it just like I do every year. Well now that I've gotten on my soapbox for a minute, lets go ahead and talk a little about not being afraid to let go of people that consistently display disrespectful actions towards you.

Before going more into this week's topic, I always let it be known on here that a person's individual viewpoints will always vary from others. The objective I have here isn't to focus too much on what is considered to be right or wrong, but rather to encourage we as people to think about topics more in depth. If anyone disagree with me on this or any other topics that I've covered, that is totally fine. All thoughts are welcomed here, and the promotion of learning from one another is something that I think should be promoted more. As for how I came to discuss this topic for this week, the only thing I can point to is hearing others mention things about disrespect as of late. I actually wrote a post a little over 3 years ago titled 'Never Tolerate Disrespect From Others(Cutting People Off)'. You can check that out here if you'd like. I believe out of all the topics that I've written about, that one received the most comments from others. That particular post was probably more straightforward in terms of cutting me off. However, I want to piggyback off of that topic with a more less straightforward approach, and instead implement a more cerebral approach that hopefully inspires us to feel more empowered. Any one of us can cut a person out of our lives because of emotions like anger or fear, but letting go off others because we recognize that self love and respect are more important than our relationships with others is something that can leave us feeling more confident and empowered.

So as I stated earlier, we all generally have interactions with people that are disrespectful occasionally. Now in a scenario where we're dealing with someone that may be disrespectful, but it's a scenario that is only temporary or for a moment, it's a little more easy to not be phased by those kind of people. You know the kind of people that you may encounter out in public, but you don't have any previous interactions with them. We typically have no kind of feelings or attachments to those kind of people, so it's much easier to speak your mind and forget about them. The dynamics change completely when it comes to feeling disrespected by someone that is a big part of your life. These are the kind of situations that are often harder to not be phased by, and they can be even harder to just walk away from. Why is this so? Well, most of us have close bonds and attachments to these people, therefore, walking away is often not an option. Think about it for a second. Imagine that you have a spouse that is being disrespectful towards you, but they weren't that way towards you when you met them. Do you really think it would be easy to just let them go if you had years of time invested into them? More than likely, it would not be easy to just walk away from them, in comparison to someone that you don't know. Now I used a spouse as an example, but it can be any kind of relationship with someone that is a big part of your life. The bottom line is that it isn't always easy to let go of someone close to you that is being disrespectful, but here is why you have to at the very least not be afraid to let these people go. You are disrespect yourself.

So how are we being disrespectful to ourselves if we are allowing people to treat us any kind of way? Well from my perspective, when we allow people (regardless of who they may be) to be disrespectful towards or treat us any kind of way, we are basically not viewing ourselves as an individual of value and importance. Allowing this kind of behavior from others is basically a form of devaluing yourself, which can affect your level of confidence and self worth. One thing that I've learned as I've gotten older is that when a person is afraid of potentially losing you, their real feelings and emotions begin to show. In other words, when people see you as someone that is of importance and value to their life, they will often treat you accordingly. This means that they will consistently treat you well, and they likely won't ever disrespect or devalue you because having you in their life gives them fulfillment. Do you really believe that someone that really cares about you would constantly disrespect you if they knew that you would walk away if they never stopped doing it? I highly doubt they would, and if they did, then that's probably a person that doesn't truly care about you. No matter who you are, you are valuable to someone in this world, and the people that see you as being valuable are the ones that will consistently treat you with respect. As I stated earlier, self respect is the most important kind of respect that we can have, and when you respect yourself unconditionally, you won't allow others to constantly disrespect you.

Now with all of that being said, I want to say that I'm not saying that we should just completely cut off people that we're close to. What I'm saying is that if someone doesn't show you the respect that you feel you deserve, then it's okay to reevaluate your relationship with them. From my perspective, there is a bit of difference between letting someone go, and cutting them off completely. I see cutting someone off as an act of retaliation against someone that you feel have wronged you. In other words, it is more than likely done out of spite in order to hopefully hurt that person. In my opinion, letting go means that you're open to trying to work out whatever the problem may be, and then if there isn't a solution to your liking, then you basically remove yourself from the situation. I view letting go as a way of putting yourself before others, which is something we should always do when it comes to having self esteem. So don't ever be afraid to let go of people that don't respect you. Again, there are all kinds of respect, but self respect is one of the most important things we can do for ourselves. I'm going to leave you with a quote that I came across that I feel gives some credence to this particular topic. "No relationship is ever worth sacrificing your dignity or self respect for."

Alright ladies and gentlemen, we have come to the end of another topic. As always, I'd like to thank everyone that came through for another installment of 'Brad H.'s Perspective'. My hope is that there was some meaning and understanding that could be taken away from this topic, and hopefully it served a source of inspiration for someone out there. If you feel the need to add or contribute anything else in regards to this topic, feel free to drop it below in the comment box. Well I'm about to go ahead and sign off for now folks. The Christmas holiday will be right upon us by the next time I update, so continue to stay positive and in the holiday spirit. I know this can be difficult to do sometimes, especially around this time of the year. Many people grieve even more during the holidays, and we also lose a lot of people during the holidays. It can be rough, but try to be thankful for everything you have whether big or small. Alright, I'll see you all in a couple of weeks. Until then, I wish you all peace and positive thoughts.

©2016 Bradrick H. All Rights Reserved.