What Lobsters Can Teach Us About Coping With Adversity

On inevitable growth during challenging times.

I have been thinking a lot about lobsters recently. Especially lobsters in stress.

The lobster grows inside its rigid shell until it becomes confining and uncomfortable. When that becomes too painful to tolerate, the lobster hides under rocks, casts the shell away and grows itself another one. This bigger one will eventually get too narrow again, the pain of the lobster becomes unbearable, so it repeats the process.

The stimulus for the lobster to grow is the unbearable discomfort of its current situation. It goes through pain and it becomes vulnerable so that later on it could grow.

The Rabbi adds that if lobsters had doctors, they would get a prescription and never grow into a bigger, better version of themselves — they would simply suppress the pain and live with it.

We are currently going through a growth process, whether we see it as one or not. Adversity is typically a new process that we aren’t familiar with. There are no best practices, rulebooks or knowledge base to tap into. We didn’t ask for it. We weren’t prepared for it.

We are collectively thrown into life, where we are required to grow. It is painful. It is vulnerable. It is new. It is a challenge.

Each of us has our own ways of dealing with it. Some become more productive in the face of adversity, realising their life-long dreams of starting a business or writing a book. Some lay back and revel in the fact that they don’t have to be productive.

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