“While you can't control your experiences, you can control your explanations.”
― Martin E.P. Seligman
We all experience pain and challenge at some point in our lives. That part is inevitable. But why do some people recover from setbacks more quickly than others?
In this video, I share why the answer may have less to do with what happened and more to do with the story we tell ourselves about it.
Psychologist Martin Seligman spent decades studying what is known as explanatory style: the way we explain difficult events to ourselves. His research suggests that people who view a setback as temporary, specific to one part of their lives, and influenced by external circumstances tend to respond with more resilience than those who interpret it as permanent, pervasive, and entirely personal.
Some may even emerge from the experience stronger, carrying greater confidence in their ability to face whatever comes next.
That is pretty incredible when you think about it. The event itself matters, of course, but so does the meaning we assign to it. How we explain an experience can shape how we move through it.
Watch the whole video to learn 7 mindset shifts that actually work and read to the end of today’s email to learn about the ancient Sanskit concept that maps to this modern psychology.
Love,
Jay ♥️
Have you ever realized your first interpretation was wrong?
Today’s Takeaway
What I love about the “explanation” research is how closely it echoes the ancient Sanskrit concept of anitya, or impermanence: the understanding that everything changes and everything passes.
We may not always be able to control what happens to us, but we can learn to question the explanations we attach to it.
If you think about the last time you were faced with a challenge, how did you explain it to yourself? How might have you have explained it differently?
