When Life Gives You Lemons

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. This metaphorical phrase means to make the best out of a bad situation, a challenge or when a calamity befalls upon you. It's a great metaphor to keep in mind because when bad things happen or when you find yourself facing a hard time, it's difficult to see how to change the situation around.

The lemons can come in any form. Losing your job when you are the breadwinner, going through a difficult divorce or a chronic illness can make you lose your sense of self. If you aren't in the right mindset, you will feel devastated and see only gloom right in front of you.

So what can you do when life gives you lemons? What can you do when you are sick and broke? What can you do when someone you love deserted you and you ended up lonely and depressed? What is left to be done when you've lost everything? How do you face your fears and go about trying to remain calm when you can't see a way out? What can you do when you don't know what to do?

Being in a state of fear paralyzes you. So keep your body and mind relaxed as much and as often as you can. Breathing deeply is the easiest thing to do to keep you calm and focused. In a relaxed state of mind, you can think better and find answers and solutions.

When life gives you lemons and that's all that you have but you don't know how to make lemonade, get a piece of paper. Write down all the ways you can make use of those lemons. "If you write "I can do this but...," remove the "but." If you add it, you are already admitting defeat. It doesn't matter even if you don't have the tools or resources. For now just state your intention and write down what you can do with those lemons.

Pick one item from your list and do that one thing immediately. If it doesn't turn out right, look at what you can do to improve it. There is always more than one way to do things. You may have to try a hundred or more times or go further to change your situation around.

You must continue to take action consistently. When life gives you lemons and notices that you are not only making lemonade everyday but also finding other ways to use the lemons, it knows that you are serious and may stop sending you more. But if you are just fretting about it and not taking any action, life will continue to give you lemons until you "awaken."

There are people out there who know what you don't and have been through what you are facing right now. If you observe and learn how they did it and follow their footsteps, you too will achieve what they did. If you are willing to ask for help, they would give you what you ask for and even something better.

Another thing that would help change and turn things around for you when life gives you lemons is to develop the right mental attitude. Instead of saying what good is a lemon other than making lemonade, ask things like what else can I do with it? What if I do this, then what happens? Your brain is uncanny. It can come up with answers that you've never thought of. Give it the right question and it will provide you with the solutions.

You have stated your intention but what about your expectation? You get in life what you expect to have. You might wonder why life gave you lemons in the first place. Here are four probable reasons.

1. What you expected and believed would happen, will show up. If the voices in your head have been telling you that your spouse didn't love you and you had images of him cheating on you until it made you felt jealous and unreasonable, who did you blame when the worst thing happened?
   
   
   
2. Neglecting to do the things that you should or past errors and carelessness are some of the probable causes. If you have been smoking 3 packs of cigarettes per day and never exercised, didn't it ever, at least once, make you feel that it will be disastrous to your health?
   
   
   
3. Why do bad things happen to good people? There is energy moving within and around each one of us. Most of the time, we aren't aware what kind of messages we are sending. But somehow, that vibration brings back what it sends out. So probably when life sends you lemons, you might have been asking for it.
   
   
   
4. Life is mysterious. It could be a test to challenge your faith. You may have taken life for granted. So life is giving you something to stir you and test your mettle.

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