EMPOWERING STUDENT WELLNESS
LIFE IS DIFFICULT
BY MATT EDWARDS (SECONDARY CHAPLAIN)
Life is difficult.
I was surprised that this is the first sentence in M. Scott Peck’s book, ‘The Road Less Travelled’. He doubles down pretty quickly too. A refusal to acknowledge and believe that life is difficult, is the cause of many mental health challenges.
What a premise! If I tried to write a bestseller, I probably would not have started there.
Peck writes that we cannot avoid the things that we find challenging in life if we want our wounds healed and our lives to flourish. Like an expert who has mastered their craft after years of practice, we too can train ourselves to face and work through challenges, rather than avoid them. Yet, the reason why we find this so hard, is that problems produce pain.
That’s why we call them problems! We have to be willing to suffer the pain, to solve these problems.
Facing life’s difficulties are necessary for life. The idealistic ‘easy life’ is a pipe dream.
Sitting down on the couch, getting my phone out and thinking, ‘Now my life is good’, is a lie (unless turning into a slug is the good life.) Rather, what we need to face these problems, is self-discipline. To learn the skills to front up to the challenges of life, feel the pain, and to work through it. Like a muscle that is exercised, though there is pain, it also produces growth, strength and endurance.
Our kids need to have a realistic vision of life, where problems, challenges, even heartaches, are not items to redact from life’s memories. But to acknowledge and accept that they are present and can have value in developing good mental health and an increased resiliency.
Over the coming weeks, I will look at 4 tools of self-discipline that can help our kids to face challenges, and to be shaped positively by them.
For further information and for more articles of interest, please see the below
https://bhcs.vic.schooltv.me/newsletter-external-resource/how-build-resilience-your-child
https://bhcs.vic.schooltv.me/node/7365
