We are all familiar with disappointments. Things that were supposed to be an expected "appointment" ended up not being so, and thus it became a disappointment. Disappointments will easily drown you in a well of negative emotions which will result in giving up and failure. The natural responses to disappointments include, complaining, self-pity, self-doubt, fear and unhappiness. None of these are helpful to growth.

Disappointments comes in all kinds of ways. Perhaps you were expecting a certain sales figure or a certain target for organizational growth. Perhaps it was a promotion or a certain job. Disappointment may even come after attaining an objective, like landing a job or starting a business, only to find out that it was not what you thought it would be. Any setbacks that life throws at you is a disappointment.

To move forward, you must rise above your disappointments. Remember, once the disappointment happens, it is in the past. To continue to focus on the disappointment as your gauge for your future is to focus on the past. You do not drive your car forward by keeping your eyes on the rear-view mirror. So you must be able to look past or rise above your disappointments.

So the question is, how do you rise above disappointments? Well, disappointments are as powerful as you are willing to make them. The fact that something did not happen the way you expected it to in itself is not damaging. What is damaging is the weight you ascribe to the event. Imagine a disappointment scale from 1 to 10, with 1 being the lowest weight. Now, take two scenarios of disappointments for an example. The first scenario is of you missing a birthday party that you were looking forward to, because a last minute issue arose at your job. How much weight do you ascribe to that disappointment? Would it be a 1, 2 or 10? Is it enough to alter your outlook on life?

Now, consider a second scenario. You work hard in your organization to get things done, you understand the ins and outs of your department, you are the perfect candidate to run the place, but you are "ignored". One of my teachers said, "burn-outs do not happen because you are busy, they happen because someone else got your promotion." How much weight to you ascribe to that disappointment? Would you ascribe a 1, 2 or 7? Most likely, you will ascribe more weight to the second scenario than the first.

The purpose for the comparison is to illustrate how the magnitude of the disappointment plays a role in the weight you ascribe to it. Now, after ascribing the weight to the disappointment, you must counter that weight. Again, the disappointment is in your past and so its impact is dependant on your focus on it. So you must counter by focussing on something else. You must redirect your focus towards your vision, your dreams, your aspirations. Temporary setbacks and disappointments are not indicators of failure. In fact, they are the components of your journey that will serve to strengthen you. If you give into them, you lose. But if you rise above disappointments by focusing on your lifes' target, you will find yourself tacking into the wind so to speak, which will propel you ahead.