When consequential, momentous, stomach-turning, heart-racing events happen – whether they are good or bad – it affects you deeply. It doesn’t make a difference if it was a thing you’d dreaded or dreamed of. The effects disturb your mind and disrupt your physical body, like an alien spirit or a belt of whiskey.
These events can be as traumatic as a death, and those who experience the tumult are likely to go through many of the same Kubler-Ross stages of grief – denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. When you are working your way through these emotions, it’s best to make as few permanent decisions as you can, deferring them to when you feel more stable.
“Good” Surprises
Winning the lottery. A landfill inheritance. Acceptance into an elite college or other program. A baby on the way. Even wonderful events bring with them the need to make important and sometimes life-altering decisions that can throw you into a tailspin.
Losing a Job
Many of us connect our very identities at least in part with our jobs, and when a layoff or firing occurs, it can be devastating. It’s common to react with an anger so hot you want to burn bridges, laying waste to your work relationships and all that was good but is now vanished. Stepping back, cooling off, and waiting to act can make the transition safer and more lucrative.
Health-Related Problems
Health is wealth as they say, and losing the equivalent of even a penny of your health net worth causes alarm. Unexpected major health issues throw a wrench into the most well-planned lives. When a severe accident, injury, or illness strikes, address the issues that are immediate and insistent and take your time on all the rest.
Divorce
Ending a marriage – like ending any contract – brings with it a level of financial upheaval that disrupts lives. After all, there is one finite pot of money between the two of you and after you pay the lawyers, that’s all you have to divide. And it’s rarely enough.
Death
Losing loved ones, especially family members brings a host of responsibilities and sorrows to your clan. The loss of a child sends you reeling in ways no parent was meant to feel. The death of a spouse is an event that shakes you to your core and usually requires a considerable level of decisions and actions. If you can try to take care of the most pressing issues first, avoiding decisions that are irreparable – like selling your house or cashing out your IRA – you can better preserve your emotional and financial wealth.
Big Dealings Don’t Demand Immediate Solutions
When something big happens, we often feel as if we need to do something big in return – and right away. That inclination works in our thinking on Christmas present equivalency, amount of chocolate consumed in response to a bad day, and family back-biting arguments. Tit for tat. When a mind-shattering event suddenly affects you, it’s hard not to react in an equally big and sudden way.
Taking time to heal mentally and to consider the long-term effects of a decision will help you make the right choices more often. It may well be that you end up quitting your job, selling your house, and moving across the country to live with your son and his wife and kids. Or unload all your investments to open the tea shop you dreamed of owning. Or attend a ayahuasca retreat in Costa Rica. Or eventually, make any other drastic change, . any of which may prove to be just right. But waiting is smart.
Take Your Time With Big Decisions When Life Is in Turmoil – Avoid Rushing
When a big event smacks us in the head, we tend to feel as if it requires a swift response. And part of it may. But few major life changes need to be made right away. They can wait until your thinking is clearer and the initial gush of emotions has dwindled to a more manageable leak. But just weeks after the life-changing event is probably too soon to know. Wait some amount of time – and there is no right amount! But it’s not within days or a few weeks – and then make the decisions that help you steady yourself.
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